Re: Disassembler



"Peter Lacey" <lacey@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:4401D1AE.578753D3@xxxxxxxxxx
Pete Dashwood wrote:

This is not your typical disassembler. ["DisASSEMBLER" is probably a
misleading term.] If you look carefully, you will see that the patent
owner is Source Recovery Company. They turn executable code into
_COBOL_source_. That's a simplified description. They also will use
your
variable names in the generated source if you provide record
definitions.

Why would you need to disassemble something you have the source to? If
you
have the source fo the record definitions it is reasonable to suppose you
have the source of the programs...? Am I missing something here?

Pete.


I find it very easy to imagine that the source for a program is lost
whereas the copy books for the files still exist, either in the copy
libs or as listings. As copy books usually apply to more than one
program it's more likely that they'll be looked after more carefully. I
haven't done it myself but I have had dealings with several sites who
were running productions programs for which they'd lost the source.
Heads rolled, naturally, and there was frantic reverse-engineering. One
place I know of had it happen more than once!

Usually, as I recall, it had happened because someone left a backup or a
save or some scheduled task until tomorrow but then had forgotten about
it by tomorrow. And in one case backups hade been scrupulously done but
the JCL stream was in error and the tapes didn't actually get written
on!

Ah, the joys of maintaining source... :-)

There's more to disassembly than simply losing source. If you have no source
and you disassemble what you have, you will still have major problems
amending and mantaining it, especially on an ongoing basis. Disassembly is
not a silver bullet (as anyone who's ever had to do it, knows). In fact,
other than extreme and isolated circumstances, disassembly is not a solution
at all. Programmers who have worked in high level languages all their
careers and may have "some Assembler knowledge" are NOT Assembler
programmers. Even people who ARE Assembler programmers would not embrace
maintaining undocumented compiler output. (I know, because I was one...:-))

Please see response to Alastair above.

Pete.



.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Disassembler
    ... If you have no source and you disassemble what you have, you will still have major problems amending and mantaining it, especially on an ongoing basis. ... Programmers who have worked in high level languages all their careers and may have "some Assembler knowledge" are NOT Assembler programmers. ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)
  • Re: Disassembler
    ... and you disassemble what you have, you will still have major problems ... Programmers who have worked in high level languages all their ... careers and may have "some Assembler knowledge" are NOT Assembler ... maintaining undocumented compiler output. ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)
  • Re: Disassembler
    ... and you disassemble what you have, you will still have major problems ... Programmers who have worked in high level languages all their ... careers and may have "some Assembler knowledge" are NOT Assembler ... maintaining undocumented compiler output. ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)
  • Re: Your opinion on the Agner fog manuals.
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