[Gambas-user] How easy is it to decompile

[Wolfgang (DL7NB)]

Thank you Adrien. So as long as there is no decompiler for gambas it may take some time to do so. But it can be done...

That just confirms my thoughts abbout it. So lets hope for fair users ;-)

Wolfgang

On 30. Juni 2015 22:35:43 MESZ, Adrien Prokopowicz <adrien.prokopowicz at ...3425...26...> wrote:
>Le Tue, 30 Jun 2015 20:50:54 +0200, Wolfgang <123 at ...3490...> a écrit:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I just wonder how easy it would be to decompile (get some source
>code)
>> from a *.deb file.
>> I programmed a software -lets call it "MyProg"- in many, many hours
>and
>> would like to install it via MyProg.deb.
>> That works easily and safe.
>>
>> But is it (easily) possible to take the "MyProg.deb" and get the
>source
>> code out of it?
>>
>> Is my work somehow "safe"?
>>
>> greetings from hot Bavaria
>>
>> Wolfgang
>>
>
>Short answer : from a security point of view, expect everything in a
>compiled program to be as readable as plain text, as nothing is
>encrypted or anything of the sort.
>
>It may take some time, depending on the size of your program and
>the tools available, but consider that anyone with enough will and
>knowledge can make it through.
>
>Long answer :
>
>First, .debs themselves (like any other package, even for
>Windows/MacOS)
>are just compressed archives. You can actually open most of them in
>your favorite archive manager.
>Needless to say, this is basically nothing to go through.
>
>The actually "hard" part is to decompile the binary files generated
>by the compiler. The "hardness" of this depends of the language used.
>I'm assuming you are talking about Gambas here, but this applies
>to any other compiled language (C/C++, Java, C# ...).
>
>When it comes to code, compiled code is actually just your source
>code "translated" into some binary form, more readable for
>the interpreter. So, as you can guess, it is pretty easy to do
>with the right tool.
>
>I have never heard of any decompiler for Gambas, but making such
>a tool is completely feasible (although a bit long).
>Unless you have Benoît sitting next to you. I'm pretty sure he's
>secretly able to decompile Gambas bytecode just by reading it. :)
>
>As for resources (like images and so), it is just plainly copied
>into the executable. Again, anyone can find and extract it.
>
>In the end, there is nothing you can do technically "protect"
>your code. There are methods out there that try to "hide" code
>(like obfuscation ...), but it is just a matter of time before
>someone can go through these.
>
>However, you can give juridic protection to your work by using
>licenses. I don't know much about proprietary licenses, but
>if you want to go open-source, there are quite a few, such as
>the GPL, MIT or Apache Licenses, or Creative Commons for anything
>that is non-code.
>This site[0] gives interesting summaries about these (and others).
>
>Hope this helps,
>
>[0] http://choosealicense.com/
>-- 
>Adrien Prokopowicz
>
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de Wolfgang, DL7NB-m