Can you clarify the question? What examples of reverse engineering have you seen which would suggest a “worthless” valuation of software?
As a case in point, curl – the URL fetcher – is an indispensable utility that has been reimplemented in various software packages (eg BusyBox) and included on billions of devices, from desktops to servers to IoT devices and even spacecraft that have left this planet. As FOSS, reverse engineering curl would be rather pointless, but the utility of curl is unquestioned, even if a precise dollar figure cannot possibly be ascertained for its economic value.
I assert that curl is one of the most valuable pieces of the software that humanity has wrought, underpinning a huge part of modern computing, precisely because it is freely available.
Photoshop. I assumed the question is more about commercial software pricing.
in fairness though, photoshop is the worse example of this theoretical concept to begin with. From what I’ve seen from everyone who’s used it, vibe coded photoshop is basically buggy, unreliable. doesn’t really do a good job beyond the most basic features, mimics the interface pretty well and that’s about it.
Now there certainly is a factor to note, IE from what I’ve heard it’s ability to plagerize games is actually getting close enough that several developers are canceling previews and showings of their games, out of fear of AI clones of their game beating the real one to market. Not really sure in the examples of AI clones happening it’s that engines are easier to de-compile and actually fully rip off, or perhaps just the concept that in the game world workable ideas designed in a good way is the hard part, the code itself is often fairly simple, at least assuming they don’t have the budget to write their own engine from scratch.
I honestly can’t fathom why anyone would waste time reverse engineering Photoshop when GIMP already does more and you can change the shortcuts to match Photoshop so you don’t even have to learn anything new.
GIMP already does more and you can change the shortcuts to match Photoshop so you don’t even have to learn anything new.
I spent days trying to do that, it’s not actually possible. Don’t ask me details, I don’t remember them. There were multiple things that didn’t work the same and nothing I did would change that.
Gimp’s workflow is objectively worse, shortcuts are not the most difficult part to get over. There is a reason I personally use krita as my replacement since while it probably won’t ever have parity with Photoshop, it does do all the things I want it to without having to redo my entire workflow.
I’ve used Photoshop a moderate amount for a number of years. I’ve used GIMP on and off, coming back when I can. I have a huge amount of respect for the software, but there’s absolutely no comparison. Basic workflow things are just harder in GIMP. Here’s an example: a layer can be dragged, but it’s still beholden to the original dimensions of the layer. You need to “set canvas to image size” after every drag to make it behave like Photoshop. Even then it’s not perfect because Photoshop preserves outside of the canvas It’s a small thing that adds a ton of friction. Smart select and puppet warp practically don’t exist.
Proof of concept.
I kind of like it, since Adobe has been shitty for so long.
If it worked that would be nice, I’m not an artist for me gimp does everything I want it to, but from what I’ve heard from deep photo editors there are limitations in gimp. More than just learning the UI. Theoretically an application could surpass it… however in this case I’d say gimp (especially with like the gimpshop skins), is considerably ahead of vibe coded photoshop. Though hypothetically it could be the door to note that it’s possible it could surpass it in the future.
Probably name recognition.
Not many people are familiar with GIMP but everyone (and I do mean literally everyone) knows the name Photoshop, if nothing more than to know it has the ability to manipulate photos.
To say you reverse engineered Photoshop and have a free version gets a lot more eyes on it than something that has been around for decades and was built from the ground up and has a different UI.
People still prefer to pirate Photoshop to this day than use an actual free program like GIMP.
Analogy: do you want a cheap but still nice looking bag from an original company/person or would you prefer to get a very convincing knock-off of a brand name like Gucci if it looks exactly like the real one in every way? People like you and I would prefer to get the original bag where a lot of the average consumers would rather have a really good looking knock-off out of those two choices.
I don’t think Photoshop does anything that any of the modern FLOSS graphics apps can’t (or could) do. It’s main advantage has been market share and familiarity.
I’d far prefer adding features to existing projects over relying on a shaky reversed port of a propriety program.
Yes, sorry i meant commercial software and games.
Has someone reverse engineered Photoshop?
In any case, I’ll await OP’s clarification before spilling more ink on the topic.
Someone has vibe coded many of the Adobe creative suite to include Photoshop.
Yeah lol FOSS doesn’t even need to be reverse engineered because the code is freely available. In a utopia this would be the natural outcome anyhow, but we live in a different world :’)
They probably mean worthless in the capitalist sense. You can’t sell curl because it’s free.
don’t confuse “impossible to use for rent-seeking” with “worthless”
No, the tools might become cheaper. But if someone can put them to useful work, then the tool has worth in combination with the labour , skills and other factors of production.
Lots of things with no market price are worthy, air is a classic example.
Will anyone develop an improved tool if they can’t sell it?’ Yes, craftspeople have always butted up against limitations in tooling, and the true masters of their craft will learn, improve and develop their tools so as to improve output, quality, efficiency of their own work. That’ll still happen, though it might change in scale, scope and speed.
I think craftspeople would benefit from not outsourcing their mastery to adobe - but more generally they’d benefit from deeper ownership and understanding of their tools - and always more independence and choice on inputs.
No. Take Linux for example, it is already “reverse engineered” as it is open source. It has immense value as it powers the majority of the Internet and mobile devices.
It wouldn’t be worthless, if people only reversed engineered existing software then the quality would slowly degrade, like a JPEG that’s been shared too many times. You still need competant developers to write new software!
I’m in no way an expert on this but my understanding of ai reverse engineering is that it’s buggy and lazily made. If that holds true, then I don’t see any reason reverse engineering software would ever compare to classic piracy.
Now I am excited about it because reverse engineering software would give us far better results in breaking DRM, spoofing live services, or bypassing anticheats that lock us out of games for not using the right OS. I would love to see fallout 76 or Destiny 2 Rebuild for private servers, offline, and lan play.
I do think it poses a serious threat to the subscription model and I’m all for that. There’s a satisfaction in using the weapons of the enemy against them.
Worthless as in people that don’t know what they are doing are making software reverse engineer original software that required somebody human to create.
