StegoForge is a modular .NET steganography toolkit for reliable carrier workflows.

• Core contracts in StegoForge.Core define service and payload models.
• StegoForge.Application coordinates embed, extract, capacity, and info orchestration.
• Delivery surfaces include a scriptable CLI and a WPF desktop app.

• Layered architecture

  Core contracts, application orchestration, and provider modules keep UI concerns separate from carrier logic.

• Deterministic CLI contracts

  Stable exit codes and JSON error shapes are designed for scripting and CI automation.

• Policy-aware workflows

  Embed and extract requests enforce compression/encryption policy validation before handler I/O.

• Test-first reliability

  Unit, integration, CLI, and WPF suites validate round trips and failure semantics.

• PNG: png-lsb-v1
• BMP: bmp-lsb-v1
• WAV: wav-lsb-v1

• dotnet run --project src/StegoForge.Cli -- embed --carrier samples/input.png --payload samples/message.bin --out artifacts/output.png --compress auto --encrypt aes-gcm --password-env STEGOFORGE_PASSWORD

  Embeds a payload into a PNG carrier with automatic compression and AES-GCM encryption from an environment-provided password.

• dotnet run --project src/StegoForge.Cli -- extract --carrier artifacts/output.png --out artifacts/recovered.bin --password-env STEGOFORGE_PASSWORD

  Extracts and decrypts the payload from the stego carrier back to a binary file.

• dotnet run --project src/StegoForge.Cli -- capacity --carrier samples/input.wav --payload 65536 --compress auto --json

  Checks whether a WAV carrier can hold a 64 KiB payload and emits a machine-readable capacity report.

• dotnet run --project src/StegoForge.Cli -- info --carrier artifacts/output.png --json

  Inspects carrier metadata and embedded envelope details for troubleshooting and pipeline checks.

Use the WPF app when you want a guided desktop workflow instead of CLI flags.

• Interactive validation before running long operations.
• Guided parameter entry for encryption/compression combinations.
• Operator-friendly status and diagnostics when triaging failed extracts.

Launch on Windows with:

dotnet run --project src/StegoForge.Wpf

Build on Windows with:

dotnet build src/StegoForge.Wpf/StegoForge.Wpf.csproj

Full GUI documentation: docs/gui.md

git clone https://github.com/Adilx05/StegoForge.git
cd StegoForge
dotnet restore
dotnet build
dotnet test tests/StegoForge.Tests.Unit/StegoForge.Tests.Unit.csproj
dotnet run --project src/StegoForge.Cli -- help

Full build and environment instructions: docs/building.md

• Milestones 1-2: Foundation and contracts

  Solution scaffolding and stable core abstractions for embed/extract/capacity/info contracts.

• Milestones 3-5: Payload, compression, and crypto

  Versioned payload envelope, pluggable compression, and authenticated encryption with KDF policy support.

• Milestones 6-8: Carrier format coverage

  Production PNG/BMP/WAV LSB handlers with deterministic capacity and validation behavior.

• Milestones 9-11: Delivery surfaces

  Application orchestration hardening plus stable CLI command surface and first usable WPF GUI.

• Milestones 12-14: Hardening to release

  Robustness, documentation/developer-experience completion, and v1.0 release readiness.

Detailed checklist: docs/roadmap.md

Is StegoForge production-ready?

Core CLI/application flows for PNG/BMP/WAV are implemented and covered by tests.

Can I script it?

Yes. Use CLI JSON mode and mapped exit codes for deterministic automation behavior.