Xtract: Egosoft X4 Foundations Cat File Extractor

Xtract is a Python script for extracting files from Egosoft's X4 Foundations .cat archives. It allows you to selectively extract files by type or by specific file name, making it easier to work with modding or data analysis for X4 Foundations.

Features

• Extracts files from .cat/.dat pairs in a given directory
• Supports filtering by file extension (e.g., xml, html, js, css, lua)
• Optionally extract only specific files
• Verbose logging for debugging

Requirements

• Python 3.8+
• Rich 14.1+

Usage

python xtract.py <source_directory> <destination_directory> [options]

Arguments

• <source_directory>: Directory containing .cat files (and their corresponding .dat files)
• <destination_directory>: Directory where extracted files will be saved

Options

• -i, --include: List of specific .cat files to extract (default: all found)
• -t, --types: Comma-separated list of file extensions to extract (default: xml, xsd, html, js, css, lua)
• -e, --expansions: Auto-detect and extract official expansions
• -v, --verbose: Enable verbose logging for debugging

Examples

Extract all XML, HTML, and JS files from a Steam install:

python xtract.py /home/username/.local/share/steam/steamapps/common/X4\ Foundations /output -t xml,html,js

Extract only *.xml files from cat file 01 and 02:

python xtract.py /path/to/cats /output -i 01.cat 02.cat -t xml

Logging

By default, only warnings and errors are logged. Use -v or --verbose for detailed debug output.

Notes

• The script expects .cat and corresponding .dat files to be present in the source directory.
• Only files with the specified extensions will be extracted.
• The script creates output directories as needed.

Contributing

Pull requests and issues are welcome! Please ensure code follows PEP8/ruff formatting and is well-documented.

License

This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0. See the LICENSE file for details.