Question

Extract .swf file from the projector .exe

Asked by: mac_rowe

Hi all

I'm a computer programmer (Delphi etc) rather than a flash developer but have been given a flash animation by a company to be included in the software package I'm writing for them.

Unfortunately the 'flash animation' they've provided is a project .exe rather than an .swf file, and I need it as a .swf file to make it part of the software package.

How can I extract the .swf file from the .exe ?

Thanks in advance,

Mac

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Asked On
2002-01-24 at 20:42:13ID20259301
Tags

projector

,

from

,

swf

,

exe

Topic

Adobe Flash

Participating Experts
3
Points
0
Comments
8

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Answers

 

by: shekarkrPosted on 2002-01-24 at 20:52:02ID: 6755569

Hi,

It's not possible to reverse engineer an EXE to get the SWF. There's no way it can be done, since the projector file itself is created using the Flash Player.

So, sorry, but it can't be done, AFAIK...

Shekar.

 

by: mac_rowePosted on 2002-01-27 at 20:10:14ID: 6760229

Hmm,  

I figured that the final EXE would probably just be a standard projector EXE 'bound' with the SWF file.  In the good ol' days we used to do tricks like that by simply concatenating the two files, and having the EXE search through itself for the file to open.

I assumed that by generating a couple of EXEs from SWFs and doing a byte-by-byte comparison of them it would be pretty easy to extract the additional data.  The file format for SWF files is on www.openswf.org (I think) so it should be (theoretically) possible ...

(I don't have the software to generate flash EXEs, or I would have tried the experiment myself ...)

I'll leave the topic open a bit longer in case anyone has done it before, or wants to try my suggestion.  
 
Ah well, I'll just have to keep harrassing the client to produce the 'original' SWF file....

Mac

 

by: mac_rowePosted on 2002-01-28 at 18:41:52ID: 6762799

Hi Shekarkr,

Not only is it possible but it is very very easy.

I tried out my own suggestion and discovered that the flash EXE file can be converted to an .SWF simply by removing the first 0x5C000 bytes from the file.

I'm sure that it will be different with different projector systems, but it seems to work reliably on the EXEs that claim to be 'Flash Player 5'.

I even spent an enjoyable hour writing a quick 'n dirty program to do the hard work for me.  If only I had just tried the obvious thing first before asking for help ....

Thanks anyway ..

Mac
(PS: Can I award the points to myself !?)

 

by: shekarkrPosted on 2002-01-28 at 19:58:26ID: 6762895

Hi mac,

Thanks for the tip. I'm not a hard core programmer, so i wouldn't know ;)!!

BTW, you can delete the question. Get in touch with Admin...

Shekar.

 

by: JaymolPosted on 2002-02-05 at 03:59:06ID: 6779095

Nice.  I am a programmer (Delphi too), and will certainly be playing with that.  Think I'll write a Projector-SWF application.

Ta,

John.

 

by: JaymolPosted on 2002-02-05 at 04:07:50ID: 6779114

You could probably do a search for a bunch of 00's followed by FWS for any of the other players.  Did you try removing the SWF part (truncate at 5C000)?  You're left with the Flash player, and it runs!

Nice tip mac.

Thanks,

John.

 

by: elhyPosted on 2003-09-18 at 01:23:10ID: 9384633

No comment has been added lately, so it's time to clean up this TA.
I will leave a recommendation in the Cleanup topic area that this question is:

-PAQ/Refund



Please leave any comments here within the next seven days.
 
PLEASE DO NOT ACCEPT THIS COMMENT AS AN ANSWER!
 
elhy
EE Cleanup Volunteer

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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