Help: I lost the source to my program, but I still have the EXE
Mike Wahler
news:3a245df4...@news.ctcn.net...
> Is there a program that can covert the EXE back to a c++ program?
>
> TIA
>
> -Rich J-
No. A binary executable is just machine
instructions. There's no way of even
determining *which* language the source
was written in, let alone converting it back.
The best you might do is find a 'disassembler'
some of which produce fairly decent assembly
language source code. But 'hand-translating'
that back to C++ is not a task for the faint
of heart. Probably practically impossible, once
you realize that for example, there's no reliable
way of determining if a chunk of code was the
result of a call to a standard library function,
or one you wrote yourself. Also there are an
almost limitless number of combinations of source
code constructs that would create the *exact*
same binary code.
So, did this tragedy teach you anything?
Back up, back up, back up. :-)
A client once asked me "which files
should I back up?" My answer: "Only
the ones you care about." .
As for myself, If I have any files I
*truly value*, I make *two* extra copies. :-)
-Mike
Rich Johnson
Jack Klein
wrote in alt.comp.lang.learn.c-c++:
> Is there a program that can covert the EXE back to a c++ program?
>
> TIA
>
> -Rich J-
No.
Jack Klein
--
Home: http://jackklein.home.att.net
Rich Johnson
On Tue, 28 Nov 2000 23:16:38 -0800, "Mike Wahler"
<mkwa...@mkwahler.net> wrote:
>Rich Johnson <Ri...@somewhere.com> wrote in message
>news:3a245df4...@news.ctcn.net...
>> Is there a program that can covert the EXE back to a c++ program?
>>
>> TIA
>>
>> -Rich J-
>
al
:
: TIA
:
: -Rich J-
:
:
OT for this group
for info on decompilers and peoples misconceptions
(decompilers work a hell of a lot better with java as is compiled to
bytecode)
http://www.webcrawler.com/cgi-bin/WebQuery?searchText=decompiler
http://www.it.uq.edu.au/groups/csm/decompilation/
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dome/3917/Decompilers.html
http://www.softpanorama.org/SE/reverse_engineering_links.shtml#Decompilers
http://www.it.uq.edu.au/groups/csm/dcc.html *.exe to c and thesis on
decompilation
http://archive.csee.uq.edu.au/~csmweb/decompilation/home.html
http://archive.csee.uq.edu.au/~csmweb/dcc.html
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dome/3917/Decompilers.html
unless you can read assembly it won't be much use to you.
even the ones that produce c as output the c is unreadable to me
you might also want to have a look at getting masm32
http://www.pbq.com.au/home/hutch/masm.htm
could also have a look at
http://www.litespeed.org/
Alex