icoextract

icoextract is an icon extractor library for Windows executables (.exe/.dll/.mun). It also includes a thumbnailer script (exe-thumbnailer) for Linux desktops.

This project is inspired by extract-icon-py, icoutils, and others.

icoextract aims to be:

• Lightweight
• Portable (cross-platform)
• Fast on large files

Installation

Dependencies

• Python 3.10+
• pefile
• Pillow - optional, for exe-thumbnailer
• nefile - optional, for Win16 / NE EXE support

Installing from source

You can install the project via pip: pip3 install icoextract[thumbnailer]

On Linux, you can activate the thumbnailer by copying exe-thumbnailer.thumbnailer into the thumbnailers directory:

• /usr/local/share/thumbnailers/ if you installed icoextract globally
• ~/.local/share/thumbnailers if you installed icoextract for your user only

The thumbnailer should work with any file manager that implements the Freedesktop Thumbnails Standard: this includes Nautilus, Caja, Nemo, Thunar (when Tumbler is installed), and PCManFM. KDE / Dolphin uses a different architecture and is not supported here.

Distribution packages

You can install icoextract from any of these distribution repositories:

Usage

icoextract ships icoextract and icolist scripts to extract and list icon resources inside a file.

Note: recent versions of Windows (Windows 10 1903+) have moved icons from system libraries (shell32.dll, etc.) into a new C:\Windows\SystemResources folder. icoextract can extract these .mun files natively, but the .dlls themselves no longer contain icons.

For API docs, see https://projects.jlu5.com/icoextract.html

usage: icoextract [-h] [-V] [-n NUM] [-i ID] [-v] input output

Windows executable icon extractor.

positional arguments:
  input          input filename (.exe/.dll/.mun)
  output         output filename (.ico)

options:
  -h, --help     show this help message and exit
  -V, --version  show program's version number and exit
  -n, --num NUM  index of icon to extract
  -i, --id ID    resource ID of icon to extract
  -v, --verbose  enables debug logging

usage: icolist [-h] [-V] [-v] input

Lists group icons present in a program.

positional arguments:
  input          input filename

options:
  -h, --help     show this help message and exit
  -V, --version  show program's version number and exit
  -v, --verbose  enables debug logging