Newsgroups: comp.arch
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Universal Disassemblers vs. Univers
Message-ID: <1988Nov7.180356.15674@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <e8amX#27Cbjc=eric@snark.UUCP> <28200227@urbsdc>
Date: Mon, 7 Nov 88 18:03:56 GMT

In article <28200227@urbsdc> aglew@urbsdc.Urbana.Gould.COM writes:
>Do you really think that obfuscating your C will make it terribly
>hard to understand your source?  After all, people disassemble
>their competitors object code and binary every day. In assembler,
>at least, flow of control info is hidden - even in obfuscated C
>it is not, you still have labels.

Uh, assembler has labels too, and a good disassembler will insert them.
It's not that hard to sort out flow of control from a binary.  Obfuscated
C probably won't be as hard to understand as binaries resulting from a
heavily-optimizing compiler, but it could come pretty close to equalling
assembler-derived binaries, and the industry seems to accept those as an
acceptable method of software distribution.  (Comparisons should be
against realistic alternatives, not hypothetical perfection.)
-- 
The Earth is our mother.        |    Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
Our nine months are up.         |uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
