[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Bjoern Schliessmann wrote: >> [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>>> That's not the point, however. I'm trying to say that a >>> processor cannot read a Python script, and since the Python >>> interpreter as stored on disk is essentially an assembler file, >> >> It isn't; it's an executable. > > I appreciated the intelligent response I received from you > earlier, now we're splitting hairs. :-) Not at all. Assembly source is ASCII text. An executable commonly consists of a binary header (which contains various information => man elf) as well as code and data segments. Normally, you're only guaranteed to find machine language inside the code segments. > Assembler, like any other higher level language Assembler is _no_ high level language, though there are some assembly languages striving for resembling HLLs. http://webster.cs.ucr.edu/AsmTools/HLA/index.html > is written as a source file and is compiled to a binary. BMPs are binaries, too. Assembly code is compiled to object code files. > An executable is one form of a binary, as is a dll. When you view > the disassembly of a binary, there is a distinct difference > between C, C++, Delphi, Visual Basic, DOS, I don't think so. How a HLL source is translated to machine code depends on the compiler, and there are cross compilers. > or even between the different file types like PE, NE, MZ, etc. Yes. > But they all decompile to assembler. No. They all _contain_ code segments (which contain machine code), but also different data. > While they are in the binary format, they are exactly > that...binary. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_data > Who would want to interpret a long string of 1's and 0's. Binaries > are not stored in hexadecimal on disk nor are they in hexadecimal > in memory. But, all the 1's and 0's are in codes when they are > instructions or ASCII strings. No -- they're voltages or magnetic fields. (I never saw "0"s or "1"s in a memory chip or on a hard disk.) The representation of this data is up to the viewing human being to choose. > No other high level language has the one to one relationship that > assembler has to machine code, the actual language of the > computer. Yes. That's why Assembly language is not "high level", but "low level". > All the ASCIi strings end with 0x74 in the disassembly. *sigh* > I have noted that Python uses a newline as a line feed/carriage > return. (The means of line separation is not chosen just like this by Python users. It's convention depending on the OS and the application.) > Now I'm getting it. It could all be disassembled with a hex > editor, but a disassembler is better for getting things in order. Argl. A hex editor just displays a binary file as hexadecimal numbers, it does _not_ disassemble. "Disassembly" refers to _interpreting_ a file as machine instructions of one particular architecture. This, of course, only makes sense if this binary file actually contains machine instructions that make sense, not if it's really a picture or a sound file. Regards, Björn -- BOFH excuse #130: new management -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
