Decompile

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To translate machine code or executable files back into a higher-level programming language form; to reverse-engineer a compiled program to recover its source-like structure; to process a binary file to obtain readable source code representations
2. To convert compiled binaries into human-readable code; to reconstruct original or approximate source code from executable files; to analyze software binaries by reversing compilation processes
3. The act of transforming compiled object code into source code formats; recovering programming instructions from executable files; extracting human-readable code through reverse compilation techniques

Etymology: "Decompile" is a plain formation: the prefix "de-" added to "compile." The prefix comes from Latin "dē," meaning "down," "off," or "away," which gives English words like "descend" and "deduce" their sense of reversal or removal. "Compile" itself traces back to Latin "compilare," to plunder or pile together, a sense that survives in the idea of gathering material into one collection. Put together, "decompile" means to undo that compiling: to take the machine-readable output of a compiler and work back toward something resembling the original source code. The result is rarely identical to what a programmer first wrote, since compilation discards names, comments, and much of the structure, so the reconstruction is an approximation.

Synonyms: disassemble, reverse-engineer, decode, translate, deconstruct

Antonyms: compile, assemble, build, construct, encrypt