Reverse Engineering of Windows Distribution

[Peter Hansen]

Markus Stenzel wrote:
> 
> I have a Python software for Windows, packed into a single exe file and
> accompanied with a few dll and package files.
> 
> Is there any way to reverse engineer this packet by extracting the
> source files so they can be used on Linux/Unix? I have checked the exe
> but it seems to be compressed by zlib.
> 
> Some people on the mailing lists told my friend it's possible to get the
> code once you can "unpack" the files from the exe.

It seems likely that the source to this program would be available
to you already, wouldn't it?  It *is* open source, right?

If it is, you can probably find the source on the web, or just
contact the author for it.

If it is not, you are probably violating your license agreement in
trying to do this.  Did it come with a license?

Technically it is possible, but it's not trivial, and seems like
a pretty bizarre thing to do if the author didn't intend it to
be used on Linux in the first place.  (Which we can infer from the
choice of distribution method.)

-Peter