Debug - Stepping through an exe without the source code - any help

[Chua Wen Ching]

Hi there,

I am looking forward to learn how to debug exe or dll files without the
source codes.

1. As i understand that back in native, people use softice or ollydbg as a
way to debug the native exe or dll in assembly language. But those software
can't cater managed exe or dll.

2. I am wondering do you know any tools i can use to debug those managed exe
or dll without the source files?

I know you can use vs.net to debug, but that is if you had the source code
with you.

3. I trying to find a similar managed debugger which can achieve similar to
Softice or Ollydbg.

maybe when you debug the exe or dll, you can step into the Intermediate
Language.

Any help please?

Thanks.
--
Regards,
Chua Wen Ching
Visit us at http://www.necoders.com

[Mohamoss]

Hi Chua
You can use winDBG for that ( what is known as the windows debugger ) .
here you are a tutorial on how to use it
http://www.codeproject.com/debug/windbg_part1.asp . if you want to get the
source code line however ( even if you don't have the source files ) you
need to have at least the debugging symbol file of your exe . in .net you
find that on the file with extension .pdb ( program debug database ) .
Hope that helps

Mohamed Mahfouz
MEA Developer Support Center
ITworx on behalf of Microsoft EMEA GTSC

[Chua Wen Ching]

Thanks a lot :)

But not all exe downloaded from the internet comes with a pdb files? :(

"Mohamoss" wrote:

Hi Chua
You can use winDBG for that ( what is known as the windows debugger ) .
here you are a tutorial on how to use it
http://www.codeproject.com/debug/windbg_part1.asp . if you want to get the
source code line however ( even if you don't have the source files ) you
need to have at least the debugging symbol file of your exe . in .net you
find that on the file with extension .pdb ( program debug database ) .
Hope that helps

Mohamed Mahfouz
MEA Developer Support Center
ITworx on behalf of Microsoft EMEA GTSC

[Mohamoss]

you can still use winDBG with that but sure you can never get refernce to
souce code line with out debug file
Mohamed Mahfouz
MEA Developer Support Center
ITworx on behalf of Microsoft EMEA GTSC

[Joep]

With just the binary you will need knowledge of assembly language, to create
source you will need to know how source ends up in the binary (and with all
the optimization options and the like that can be quite a tough job).

Dll's can be loaded by your own app, sometimes put an int3 in the file image
in the proper place (sometimes you can optimize some bytes away to create
the required space) to have it call your JIT debugger, intercepting lib
calls is best done with the image loaded and so on.

What's is the problem you are facing?