C++ Decompiler

[dimava]

Hey, I'm looking an EXE -> C++ decompiler, I need to decompile a 218KB dos file to view the source of it (I realize that the functions and such won't have the original names but thats ok).

I know they exist because I remember using one a while back, I just can't find any right now.

I already have this EXE file in ASM, so an ASM to C++ coverter will be just as good.

thanks

Dimava

[TheGuru]

Originally posted by dimava
Hey, I'm looking an EXE -> C++ decompiler, I need to decompile a 218KB dos file to view the source of it (I realize that the functions and such won't have the original names but thats ok).

I know they exist because I remember using one a while back, I just can't find any right now.

I already have this EXE file in ASM, so an ASM to C++ coverter will be just as good.

thanks

Dimava

I've honestly never heard of such a converter. But I imagne that if one ever created one, it would be a very complicated beast due to all the optimizations a retail exe goes through.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Never heard of one either, but I always thought it could be done. Ugly as sin, though.

[TheGuru]

Well the problem of doing it would be how the compiler optimizes code. I mean you can get different exes with the same code by just adjusting some compiler optmization options. Then when you think of all these different compilers, you see how this one problem becomes very complicated. Then you also know that optimized code is extremely criptic. Meaning even after you do get all these exe's converted back to C, it's going to be full of gotos and ****. Then your program will have to be modified every single time a compiler gets and update.

[DiGiTaIErRoR]

It would mostly depend on how the converter would create C structures. There's no way to compile something into C that has any real degree of complexity and return it to the same thing after a decompile.

It's easy to expand onto vagueness(VB/C -> ASM) it's not as easy though to do the reverse.

I've never seen a good working EXE decompiler, ever.

[dimava]

are there any programs to take ASM code and draw out a logical diagram of how it works, with the gotos and how they flow into eachother, or like show a list of places that refer to a specific address

tnx

Dimava

[Celest]

Originally posted by dimava
are there any programs to take ASM code and draw out a logical diagram of how it works, with the gotos and how they flow into eachother, or like show a list of places that refer to a specific address

tnx

Dimava

Not as far as i know. Your best bet is to just learn ASM.

[DiGiTaIErRoR]

Originally posted by dimava
are there any programs to take ASM code and draw out a logical diagram of how it works, with the gotos and how they flow into eachother, or like show a list of places that refer to a specific address

tnx

Dimava

An ASM editor would do that, you'd be able to follow jumps and such, but without knowing ASM that wouldn't really help.