Xref: utzoo comp.arch:6788 comp.lang.c:13493 comp.lang.misc:2030 Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!cbmvax!snark!eric From: eric@snark.UUCP (Eric S. Raymond) Newsgroups: comp.arch,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.misc Subject: Re: Universal Disassemblers vs. Universal MIILs Message-ID: Date: 21 Oct 88 15:16:15 GMT References: <358@istop.ist.co.uk> Organization: Eric Conspiracy Secret Laboratories Lines: 36 In <10191@cup.portal.com>, bcase@cup.portal.com (Brian bcase Case) writes: > In article <7226@ihlpl.att.com>, knudsen@ihlpl.ATT.COM (Knudsen) writes: ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > >And distributing a uMIIL isn't going to make automatic disassembly *easier*? Eh? I wrote what he's quoting, and I am *not* "knudsen@ihlpl.ATT.COM". > You have described "MacNosey" for the Mac by Jasik Designs! Check it out. Interesting...does anybody know of a similar product for Intel-family machines? > Yes, this is the problem. But the point of a MIIL is to prevent obsolete > software, not prevent reverse engineering. My article was in reply to a claim that a uMIIL would somehow offer better security against what we politely call "reverse engineering" than current machine code. > However, the prevention of > reverse engineering will probably be required to gain the kind of acceptance > it needs to make an appreciable impact. True. And this raises an insuperable problem for uMIIL proponents, because "preventing reverse engineering" and "easy portability" are diametrically opposing goals. The uMIIL concept seems to me to be a particularly ill-thought-ought stab at serving both masters -- but machine-coded proprietary software already well meets the requirements of the former and HLL source is pretty good for the latter (modulo OS-standardization problems that any uMIIL will *also* have). In case it isn't obvious, I think this is yet another reason to class the whole notion of uMIIL as a distracting red herring and forget it. -- Eric S. Raymond (the mad mastermind of TMN-Netnews) UUCP: ...!{uunet,att,rutgers}!snark!eric = eric@snark.UUCP Post: 22 S. Warren Avenue, Malvern, PA 19355 Phone: (215)-296-5718