Does Re-Fox (FoxPro decompiler) produce useable code?

Question

I was planning on trying out Re-Fox: http://www.refox.net/

They have a demo version - however when testing it it said the recompiler is unsupported in trial mode (which seems strange considering that mainly what the tool is for).

It's a $500 product, and I spent quite a bit of time trying to find a legitimate review of Re-Fox but could only find sites trying to generate revenue from Google ad-words.

So the question is - does Re-Fox work in the context of: - Does it generate code that can be used to maintain going forward?

Decompilers I've seen in the past generate such cryptic looking code that it's not really feasible.

Thanks!

Answer 1

It is my opinion that Refox should only be used to recover code you cannot find any place else. Backups, and even older versions might be better from a usability point of view because of the loss of #DEFINES, comments, etc. Refox also cannot recover files excluded from the project and not built into the EXE.

It also will not decompile code that is protected by the original developer using ReFox branding to protect the code.

Rick

Answer 2

According to this: http://fox.wikis.com/wc.dll?Wiki~ReFox~VFP

Refox won't recover anything that was #INCLUDEd -- those bits in .H files, and the references to the included values in code, are lost forever. You'll get what the preprocessor produced after the #INCLUDE processing.

Google Image Search for "ReFox output". It looks pretty readable to me.

Answer 3

I HAVE ReFox, and it DOES decompile well. As Lod3n mentioned, it doesn't recover any #DEFINEs, but does do a good job even exporting to proper prg, VCX/VCT and SCX/SCT file formats.

If you would like to see a sample of such output, and would like to send me a copy of an EXE, I can decompile it and send you a sample back for you to make your own decision.

Answer 4

The project I have sitting on my screen at the moment was recovered through Refox - it works fairly well, bar the occasional weirdness in string formats (I've got odd bits where it's recovered as a seemingly random mixed case, but VFP isn't case sensitive about these things so it's not a big deal).