How do I turn off the --verbose flag?

[PacoH]

I tried using the --verbose flag once, just to see what it does, and now it is forever enabled even after several OS X reboots. How can I turn it off? I really don't need all that verbiage, which gets in the way of testing different command options and scripts. There is no --quiet flag.

[mgmacias95]

Hello @PacoH,

I tried using it and then remove it and it worked correctly:

$ vt domain google.com -i popularity_ranks --verbose
* Config file: /Users/mgmacias/.vt.toml
* API key: xxxxxxxx
* API host: www.virustotal.com
- popularity_ranks: 
    Alexa: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1678381080
    Cisco Umbrella: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1678381081
    Majestic: 
      rank: 2
      timestamp: 1678381081
    Quantcast: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1585755370
    Statvoo: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1678381081
$ vt domain google.com -i popularity_ranks          
- popularity_ranks: 
    Alexa: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1678381080
    Cisco Umbrella: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1678381081
    Majestic: 
      rank: 2
      timestamp: 1678381081
    Quantcast: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1585755370
    Statvoo: 
      rank: 1
      timestamp: 1678381081

Can you provide more details to help us reproduce the issue? Thanks!

Regards,
Marta

[PacoH]

Oh, I see. Without --verbose you don't get the header at the top but you still get all the scan results. I thought it suppressed the sans. I wanted to eliminate the individual scan results. I only want the positives/total result.

Anyway, I started using the VirusTotal API using simple REST API commands with curl. I can get exactly what I want from its JSON output. I wrote a simple bash script to scan and analyse a file whose path is in the clipboard. It loops until the analysis is done and outputs the final result, similar to the website interface. It then appends the result to the filename for future reference:

/Users/user/Downloads/3.2MiB.bin
Last scanned: 2023-03-10 14:39:22
Results: 0of59
/Users/user/Downloads/3.2MiB.bin ==> /Users/user/Downloads/3.2MiB_VT0of59.bin

BTW, I found a great site that creates custom size test files to test this out:

Download & Generate Test Files

[mgmacias95]

Hello @PacoH,

If you want to supress specific elements from the output you can use the -x option. Copied from the cli's help:

  -x, --exclude strings    exclude fields matching the provided pattern
  -i, --include strings    include fields matching the provided pattern (default [**])

So you could do:

$ vt domain google.com -i last_analysis_stats
- last_analysis_stats: 
    harmless: 78
    malicious: 0
    suspicious: 0
    timeout: 0
    undetected: 11       

and it would return exactly what you need.

You can also use --format option to get JSON results:

$ vt domain google.com -i last_analysis_stats --format json
[
  {
    "last_analysis_stats": {
      "harmless": 78,
      "malicious": 0,
      "suspicious": 0,
      "timeout": 0,
      "undetected": 11
    }
  }
]

feel free to close this issue if this answers your question.

Regards,
Marta

[PacoH]

From vt -h I get:

Flags:
  -k, --apikey string   API key
	  --format string   Output format (yaml/json/csv) (default "yaml")
  -h, --help            help for vt
	  --proxy string    HTTP proxy
  -v, --verbose         verbose output

I don't see -x or -i. And how would you know what strings to use? I don't see any documentation for those. Probably the extensive API documentation.

The --format json option is useful. I hadn't noticed that.

The output from the API just gives me positives and total which is all I need.

[mgmacias95]

Hello @PacoH,

try doing vt file --help and you should see the -x and -i options there.

I hope this helps.

Regards,
Marta

[PacoH]

vt scan file --help shows more, including the new -w, --wait flag––Wait until the analysis is completed and show the analysis results.

[mgmacias95]

awesome! I'm closing the issue now since I feel your question is resolved. Feel free to reopen if not.