When you buy software, the source code usually is not made public, but doesn’t your computer still have to run the code to use the software? How can it run the code without allowing the user to see the code?

Question

When you buy software, the source code usually is not made public, but doesn’t your computer still have to run the code to use the software? How can it run the code without allowing the user to see the code?

In: Technology

Answer 1

Say you have some source code… in your source code is the line “if playerhealth<0, gameover = true.” Seems pretty easy to understand.

Now the compiler will convert that into binary. It will look something like this “010111000101010010.”

You can decompile it, but the compiler through out all of the variable names and just gave them numbers, so now you’re left with
“If AE0<0, 0F1=1”

Now maybe you can play around with the game and the code, and eventually you’ll figure out that AE0 means playerhealth and 0F1 means gameover… but you’ll have to do this with hundreds or thousands of variables. It would be a daunting task for any modern software, to say the least.