Chunked scans miss EXACT/NOT_EXACT matches that straddle a 256 MiB chunk boundary (overlap only applied to str)

[krishna3554]

Summary

In process/scanning.py, iter_search_results reads bufflength - 1 extra bytes past a chunk boundary only when pytype is str. But EXACT_VALUE and NOT_EXACT_VALUE scans are routed through scan_memory_for_exact_value, which locates the target bytes with bytes.find at any byte offset — not just the bufflength-aligned offsets a stepping numeric scan visits. For any region larger than DEFAULT_MAX_REGION_CHUNK (256 MiB), an exact match whose bytes cross an internal chunk boundary is found by neither chunk and is silently dropped from the results.

Location

• File: PyMemoryEditor/process/scanning.py
• Function: iter_search_results
• Relevant code:

str_overlap = bufflength - 1 if pytype is str else 0
...
is_last_chunk = chunk_offset + chunk_size >= size
read_size = chunk_size + (0 if is_last_chunk else str_overlap)

with the routing decision a few lines above:

if scan_type in (ScanTypesEnum.EXACT_VALUE, ScanTypesEnum.NOT_EXACT_VALUE):
 searching_method = scan_memory_for_exact_value

Problem

The overlap logic assumes non-string scans step in bufflength strides, so a typed numeric scan can never have a value straddle a boundary — the rationale documented on util.scan.iter_region_chunks. That holds for the comparison scans driven by scan_memory (BIGGER_THAN, VALUE_BETWEEN, ...), which iterate aligned windows inside each chunk. It does not hold for the two scan types that bypass scan_memory:

1. EXACT_VALUE — scan_memory_for_exact_value runs data.find(target) from every offset of the buffer it receives. Chunk N ends mid-value and chunk N+1 starts after the value began, so no chunk ever sees the complete byte sequence → missed result.
2. NOT_EXACT_VALUE — the candidate range per chunk is range(0, read_size - bufflength + 1, step). Windows straddling a boundary fall outside both neighboring chunks' ranges, so offsets whose value differs from the target are silently omitted there as well.

Since EXACT_VALUE is the default scan_type of search_by_value, this affects the library's primary code path whenever a single region exceeds 256 MiB — large heaps (browsers, JVMs) being exactly the case the 256 MiB cap exists for.

Trigger / Reproduction

Static-analysis finding (not executed); the trace follows the code paths above.

• A region larger than 256 MiB, split by iter_region_chunks into aligned chunks.
• An int32 (or any-width) target whose bytes sit across a chunk boundary, e.g. starting at chunk_size - 2.
• search_by_value(int, value=..., scan_type=ScanTypesEnum.EXACT_VALUE) over that region reports nothing for that address; the same scan on an unchunked region finds it.

The existing test tests/scan/test_chunking_integration.py::test_scan_memory_across_chunked_region_finds_all_matches plants targets at offsets 100 / 5000 / 60000 in each 64 KiB chunk — all safely ≥ 4 bytes from the end — so the straddling case is currently untested.

Expected Behavior

Every exact match present in the region should be reported regardless of where it falls relative to internal read chunks; NOT_EXACT should evaluate every candidate window exactly once.

Actual Behavior

Matches/windows that straddle an interior chunk boundary of a >256 MiB region are skipped without any error or warning.

Impact

Silent false negatives in memory scans — a particularly bad failure mode for a cheat-engine-style workflow, because the user concludes the value is not present rather than suspecting the tool. The larger the target process's regions, the more likely a boundary lands mid-value.

Suggested Direction

Widen the overlap condition to cover every scan mode that can match at a non-aligned offset, e.g.

needs_overlap = pytype is str or scan_type in (
 ScanTypesEnum.EXACT_VALUE,
 ScanTypesEnum.NOT_EXACT_VALUE,
)
overlap = bufflength - 1 if needs_overlap else 0

The existing clamp (if offset >= chunk_size: continue) already prevents double-emission of overlap-region matches, and the stepping comparisons driven by scan_memory keep their current no-overlap behavior unchanged. A regression test planting a target at chunk_size - bufflength // 2 would pin this.

Evidence

• process/scanning.py gates the extra read solely on pytype is str, while the routing block sends EXACT/NOT_EXACT to the offset-arbitrary scan_memory_for_exact_value.
• util/scan.py::scan_memory_for_exact_value yields every data.find hit with stride 1 — alignment is not considered.
• util/scan.py::iter_region_chunks docstring documents the aligned-stride assumption that EXACT scanning does not follow.