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Text File | 1991-09-30 | 10.7 KB | 230 lines

              RX - a reverse Windows(tm)3.0 resource-compiler
                          (resource extractor)
                   (c) Copyright Andreas Gruen 1991

                                                       September 30, 1991
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE:
This is a completly experimental program in it's pre-beta version.
It is not guaranteed to work properly under all circumstances, although
it has been tested for a couple of weeks. Everyone who uses this program
does this on his own risk, so if your machine explodes, don't tell me
you didn't know.

Andreas Gruen releases this software "as is", with no express or
implied warranty, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties
of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose.

This program is completly free for everyone.
You can do with it and its sources whatever you want, but it would
be fine to leave my name somewhere in the program or startup-banner.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's assumed that the reader is somewhat familiar with Windows(tm)-
Resources, i.e. Icons, Bitmaps, Dialogboxes, Menus etc.

What's RX
=========

RX is the complement to the Rescource-complier RC shipped with
the SDK. It extracts resources from an compiled files into a
form that is readable and re-processable by RC. This means
that you may easily change menus, dialog-boxes or the icon(s) of
a progam and recompile it, without having the source-code, although
this is not the intended purpose. If you do it, please note the
copyright terms of the program you process.

You may better use RX to extract for example icons from an
icon-library to have them in a form you can import into other
programs or work on them with an icon-editor.
Or you want to create fonts, but not from the scratch.
Or you want to see the authors of a programm (often included in
STRINGTABLEs)  or,or,or.

Please note: RX is like RC not a Windows(tm)-Program but runs under
             DOS (or in the DOS-Box). If enough people find RX useful,
             I may think about a Win-Version.
             For recompiling you will need a resource-compiler
             compatible with Microsoft(R)'s RC.

For insiders: RX supports all resources, except User-Defined resources,
              with all possible extentions (mem-options,load-options...).
              There are restrictions for STRINGTABLEs (see below)
              and icons and cursors that contain multiple images
              (see below).
              Because of this a recompiled file may differ from the
              original file although no changes were made. This may
              probably lead to difficulties in running the new program.
              (I haven't seen any).


How to use RX
=============

Run RX with the following command-line:

  RX -options inputfile [outputname]

options   : are the view/extract options listed below.

inputfile : contains the name of the file to be processed.
            You may specify an extension like .EXE,.DLL,.DRV,.FON,
            the default extension is .EXE
            It may contain a full pathname.
            The file must be a valid Windows(tm)3.0 file (Library or
            executable) otherwise RX will fail.
outputname: (optional)
            secifies the (base-)name of the files that will be extracted.
            It should not contain an extension or a full path, although
            it will work (extensions are stripped, the path will only
            work for the .RC file).
            If an extract option is specified, RX will at least create
            a file 'outputname.RC', otherwise (only view option)
            the name is ignored.

options:    valid opitons are: i b c m d s f a r n x v
            (*nix-geetings) and may be combined (i.e. -i -v and -iv are
            equivalent).

-i        : extract all ICONs contained in the inputfile
            a 'name ICON ICONxxx.ICO' or 'number ICON ICONxxx.ICO'
            is appended to the RC-file, where xxx is a decimal integer.
            The name-statement will be used in the case the ICON has
            an assigned name stored in the inputfile. Otherwise the
            ordinal number will be used.
            The extracted icons are stored in separate files named
            ICONxxx.ICO.
            xxx is a decimal number that counts the extracted icons.
            NOTE: Icons that contain multiple (n) images are extracted
            to n .ICO-files. This usually leads to a larger recompiled
            executable and may lead to difficulties in running the new
            program.
            The format of the ICON-Files is the standard-icon format
            to use with any icon-editor.

-b        : extract all BITMAPs contained in the inputfile
            a 'name BITMAP BITMxxx.BMP' or 'number BITMAP BITMxxx.BMP'
            is appended to the RC-file, where xxx is a decimal integer.
            The name-statement will be used in the case the BITMAP has
            an assigned name stored in the inputfile. Otherwise the
            ordinal number will be used.
            The extracted BITMAPs are stored in separate files named
            BITMxxx.BMP.
            xxx is a decimal number that counts the extracted BITMAPs.
            The format of the BITMAP-Files is the standard-BITMAP
            (BMP) format.

-c        : extract all CURSORs contained in the inputfile
            a 'name CURSOR CURSxxx.ICO' or 'number CURSOR CURSxxx.CUR'
            is appended to the RC-file, where xxx is a decimal integer.
            The name-statement will be used in the case the CURSOR has
            an assigned name stored in the inputfile. Otherwise the
            ordinal number will be used.
            The extracted CURSORs are stored in separate files named
            CURSxxx.CUR.
            xxx is a decimal number that counts the extracted CURSORs.
            NOTE: CURSORs that contain multiple (n) images are extracted
            to n .CUR-files. This usually leads to a larger recompiled
            executable and may lead to difficulties in running the new
            program.
            The format of the CURSOR-Files is the standard-CURSOR format.

-m        : extract all MENUs contained in the inputfile.
            All MENUs are stored in a file named outputname.MEN
            and a '#include "outputname.MEN"' statement is appended
            to the RC-file.
            Within the .MEN-file a name-statement will be used in the
            case the MENU has an assigned name stored in the inputfile.
            Otherwise the ordinal number will be used.


-d        : extract all DIALOGs contained in the inputfile.
            All DIALOGs are stored in a file named outputname.DLG
            and a '#include "outputname.DLG"' statement is appended
            to the RC-file.
            Within the .DLG-file a name-statement will be used in the
            case the DIALOG has an assigned name stored in the inputfile.
            Otherwise the ordinal number will be used.


-s        : extract all STRINGTABLEs contained in the inputfile.
            All STRINGTABLEs are stored in a file named outputname.STR
            and a '#include "outputname.STR"' statement is appended
            to the RC-file.
            For insiders:
            Although it is not documented the Resorce-Compiler allows
            named and numbered STRINGTABLEs. This is currently not
            supported by RX. The string-numbers are computed using
            the method described in [2].

-f        : extract all FONTs contained in the inputfile,
            'number FONT FONTxxx.FNT' (FONTS must not have names)
            is appended to the RC-file, where xxx is a decimal integer
            and number is the ordinal number of the font.
            The extracted FONTs are stored in separate files named
            FONTxxx.FNT.
            xxx is a decimal number that counts the extracted FONTs.
            The format of the FONT-Files is the standard-FONT (FNT)
            format.

-a        : extract all ACCELERATORs contained in the inputfile.
            All ACCELERATORs are stored in a file named outputname.ACC
            and a '#include "outputname.ACC"' statement is appended
            to the RC-file.
            Within the .ACC-file a name-statement will be used in the
            case the ACCELERATOR has an assigned name stored in the inputfile.
            Otherwise the ordinal number will be used.
            ACCELERATORS are fully supported.

-r        : extract all RCDATAs contained in the inputfile.
            All RCDATAs are stored in a file named outputname.RCD
            and a '#include "outputname.RCD"' statement is appended
            to the RC-file.
            Within the .RCD-file a name-statement will be used in the
            case the RCDATA has an assigned name stored in the inputfile.
            Otherwise the ordinal number will be used.
            NOTE: Because I found no bytes that describe the real length
                  of the RCDATA I had to use the segment size.
                  This leads usually to RCDATA statement filled up
                  with trailing zeroes. It doesn't look nice, but
                  it doesn't affect the recompiled file.
                  Whenever the RCDATA is printable, strings will be
                  used to compact the RCDATA-file.

-n        : extract the nametable contained in the inputfile.
            This is not necessary to recompile, but may be
            useful. In the nametable-file every resource that
            has a name is listed with its ordinal number.
            The nametable (not the file) is internally used
            to create name-statements. The nametable is
            not documented (as far as I know).
            Nothing is appended to the .RC-file.


-x        : extract everything contained in the inputfile.
            same as -ibcmdsfarn

-v        : verbose mode: additionally informations about
            every resource are printed. Only useful for
            those who are familiar with the extended executable
            file-format.
-?, -h    : help : prints short usage-description
            also printed when RX is run without arguments.


Try it to learn more.

Thanks to Brigitte for letting me sit behind the screen instead of doing
housework for these days and for the beer and pizza.



Lit & Refs:
==========

[1]         Microsoft Windows Software Development Kit (SDK)
            Reference - Volume 1
[2]         Microsoft Windows Software Development Kit (SDK)
            Reference - Volume 2
            especially: Section: The Resource-Compiler