how do you “reverse engineer” something?

Question

how do you “reverse engineer” something?

In: 64

Answer 1

There are direct methods: take it apart, try to understand each pieces, then how the whole things comes together

But there are also indirect methods: try it on different situations and guess how it may be designed based on it’s behavior

Usually the second method is faster when you just want to be compatible with the thing you reverse engineer by building your own product. Typically, file format are understood this way.

While the first method become relevant when you want to make the same product, reuse/understand it’s component, or hijack the original product by adding/modifying some components. Typically, game cheat/trainers are built this way.