Ask about Resource Editor......

[albertlee]

An example resource editor is: resource hacker

 

I have seen its description: It can open *.res files, and windows module files, eg, DLL, EXE, etc...

 

What are res files??

 

By the way, since EXE is "already" compiled into machine code, how come it can be edited??

 

Albert

[5614]

i do not know how this program works, i know what it does and what you can use it for though!

 

the reason i do not know how this program works is because i am not about to de-program it to find out and i do not know the guy who made it to ask him/her!

[albertlee]

so Jonathan, what does the program do? (Cant get it from description)

 

and

 

What you can use it for? except changing bootskin!

 

Albert

Edited August 25, 2009 by swansont

[Rakdos]

edit explorer.exe and change the start button text

[JohnB]

I never thought of that. Hmmm, what will I call it?

[5614]

what does the program do?

FREEWARE utility to view, modify, add, rename

and delete resources in Win32 executables and

resource files. Incorporates an internal

resource compiler and decompiler. Works on

Win9x, WinNT, Win2000 and WinXP.

 

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Summary:

----------------------------------------------

 

Resource Hacker™ has been designed to:

 

1. View resources in Win32 executable files

(*.exe, *.dll, *.cpl, *.ocx) and in Win32

resource files (*.res) in both their compiled

and decompiled formats.

 

2. Extract (save) resources to file in:

*.res format; as a binary; or as decompiled

resource scripts or images.

Icons, bitmaps, cursors, menus, dialogs,

string tables, message tables, accelerators,

Borland forms and version info resources can

be fully decompiled into their respective

formats, whether as image files or *.rc text

files.

 

3. Modify (rename or replace) resources in

executables. Image resources (icons, cursors

and bitmaps) can be replaced with an image from

a corresponding image file (*.ico, *.cur, *.bmp),

a *.res file or even another *.exe file.

Dialogs, menus, stringtables, accelerators and

messagetable resource scripts (and also Borland

forms) can be edited and recompiled using the

internal resource script editor.

Resources can also be replaced with resources

from a *.res file as long as the replacement

resource is of the same type and has the same

name.

 

4. Add new resources to executables.

Enable a program to support multiple languages,

or add a custom icon or bitmap (company logo

etc) to a program's dialog.

 

5. Delete resources.

Most compilers add resources into applications

which are never used by the application.

Removing these unused resources can reduce an

application's size.

 

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Latest changes:

----------------------------------------------

 

* 32bit Resource Files (*.res) can now also

be viewed and edited.

* Added support for the following Dialog

extended style flags: WS_EX_LAYERED,

WS_EX_NOINHERITLAYOUT, WS_EX_LAYOUTRTL and

WS_EX_NOACTIVATE.

* All resource language ids (except those for

cursors and icons) can now be easily changed.

* Bug Fix: LBS_NOINTEGRALHEIGHT and

LBS_MULTICOLUMN listbox style flags in dialogs

previously could not be combined.

 

----------------------------------------------

Note regarding WinXP and Visual Styles:

----------------------------------------------

 

* Adding a manifest resource to Resource Hacker™

will cause intermittent problems when viewing

or editing dialogs - so I don't recommend it

 

----------------------------------------------

Known limitations:

----------------------------------------------

 

1. Resource Hacker™ will not read 16bit executables.

 

2. Resource Hacker™ is currently compiled with

Delphi 3.02. When decompiling and recompiling

Borland's Delphi forms in applications compiled

with later version of Delphi, there may be errors

in the recompiled forms if frames have been used

to create the form. This error is due to the DFM

keyword 'inline' not being recognized. While

decompiling, the 'inline' keyword will be replaced

by 'object' and, if manually corrected before

recompiling, 'inline' will be rejected by the

Resource Hacker™ compiler.

 

3. To reduce the size of application files, some

applications are "packed" or "compressed" using

an EXE compressor after they have been compiled.

This has a side-effect of making it more difficult

to view and modify resources. When a "compressed"

executable is viewed with Resource Hacker™, only

resource types and names will be visible but not

the actual resources.

 

What you can use it for?

(see above!)

nah, basically you use it for editing system files... as someone's cat said () you can "change the start button text" you know when it says "welcome" on the XP screen when you log on, you can change the 'welcome' to 'we're all gonna die' or sumin!

you can effectively edit anything you want... any windows message or OS related stuff... the only problem is finding the system file where it is stored.

 

remember to back up all your system files before you do it... also you cannot replace system files due to windows protection system, you must boot into safe mode (for XP, press F8 at start-up) and then you can copy/paste in your moded system file... also some windows updates will not properly instal if you have moded sytem files, for example an update for the explorer.exe file would come along and think "hmmm, this is not the orignal explorer.exe file i am meant to replace, so i'll leave it alone!" so just keep that in mind.

[Silencer]

Sounds like you basically mean a hex editor, which allows you to edit the hex or binary code of any file. (note: I didn't read most of the above posts, so sorry if someone said that already).

[albertlee]

thx 5614!

 

By the way, what are *.cpl, *.ocx, *.res file types??

 

Albert

[mtong]

I love res-hacker....i transformed my Windows machine into a Mac-look-alike by editing explorer.exe.

[5614]

*.cpl

Compel is now bundled with other multimedia software and no longer available alone.

 

*.ocx

ActiveX. Note: This file type can become infected and should be carefully scanned if someone sends you a file with this extension.

 

*.res

 

click on the names for more details.

 

mtong, can you tell me where some of the most common changes are for explorer.exe ?

like where i can find them in resource hacker.