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IDA pro understanding disassembly specifics

Time:10-21

Currently trying to disassemble a string-to-mem copy function of an old game from x86 machine code to C .

From the function below I see that the code checks if the string is larger than the destination space reserved for assignment.

If it is not, it goes into the ELSE where string is directly copied.
If it is, then it cuts the string from string[*(this_dest-1) - *this_dest] location.

I do wonder what can be done to make the pseudocode look more C like? So far I cannot find solution for *(this_dest-1) - *this_dest.

I am just using this to learn how to disassemble better so any other tips are welcome!

char *__thiscall copyA2strToA1mem(char *this, const char *strStart_a2, char *strEnd_a3)
{
  void *dest_v4; // edi
  size_t strLength_v5; // eax
  size_t destLength_v6; // ecx
  const void *v7; // edi
  void *v8; // esi
  char *i; // esi

  dest_v4 = *this;
  strLength_v5 = strEnd_a3 - strStart_a2;
  destLength_v6 = *(this   1) - *this;
  if ( strEnd_a3 - strStart_a2 > destLength_v6 )// destination space > string size ?
  {
    qmemcpy(dest_v4, strStart_a2, destLength_v6);
    for ( i = &strStart_a2[*(this   1) - *this]; i != strEnd_a3;   i )
      sub_401D20(this, *i);
  }
  else
  {
    qmemcpy(dest_v4, strStart_a2, strLength_v5);
    v7 = *(this   1);
    v8 = (strLength_v5   *this);
    if ( v8 != v7 )
    {
      memmove(v8, v7, 1u);
      *(this   1)  = v8 - v7;
      return this;
    }
  }
  return this;

Here is the assembly code:

 00406660     copyA2strToA1mem proc near              ; CODE XREF: sub_406430 1AB↑p
 00406660                                             ; sub_409130 1CC↓p ...
 00406660
 00406660     strStart_a2     = dword ptr  4
 00406660     strEnd_a3       = dword ptr  8
 00406660
 00406660 000                 mov     edx, [esp strStart_a2]
 00406664 000                 push    ebx
 00406665 004                 push    ebp
 00406666 008                 mov     ebp, [esp 8 strEnd_a3]
 0040666A 008                 push    esi
 0040666B 00C                 mov     ebx, ecx
 0040666D 00C                 mov     ecx, [ebx 4]
 00406670 00C                 push    edi
 00406671 010                 mov     edi, [ebx]
 00406673 010                 mov     eax, ebp
 00406675 010                 sub     eax, edx
 00406677 010                 sub     ecx, edi
 00406679 010                 cmp     eax, ecx
 0040667B 010                 mov     esi, edx
 0040667D 010                 ja      short loc_4066BA
 0040667F 010                 mov     ecx, eax
 00406681 010                 mov     edx, ecx
 00406683 010                 shr     ecx, 2
 00406686 010                 rep movsd
 00406688 010                 mov     ecx, edx
 0040668A 010                 and     ecx, 3
 0040668D 010                 rep movsb
 0040668F 010                 mov     esi, [ebx]
 00406691 010                 mov     edi, [ebx 4]
 00406694 010                 add     esi, eax
 00406696 010                 cmp     esi, edi
 00406698 010                 jz      short loc_4066E4
 0040669A 010                 mov     eax, edi
 0040669C 010                 sub     eax, edi
 0040669E 010                 add     eax, 1
 004066A1 010                 push    eax             ; Size
 004066A2 014                 push    edi             ; Src
 004066A3 018                 push    esi             ; Dst
 004066A4 01C                 call    memmove
 004066A9 01C                 add     esp, 0Ch
 004066AC 010                 sub     esi, edi
 004066AE 010                 add     [ebx 4], esi
 004066B1 010                 pop     edi
 004066B2 00C                 pop     esi
 004066B3 008                 pop     ebp
 004066B4 004                 mov     eax, ebx
 004066B6 004                 pop     ebx
 004066B7 000                 retn    8
 004066BA     ; ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 004066BA
 004066BA     loc_4066BA:                             ; CODE XREF: copyA2strToA1mem 1D↑j
 004066BA 010                 mov     eax, ecx
 004066BC 010                 shr     ecx, 2
 004066BF 010                 rep movsd
 004066C1 010                 mov     ecx, eax
 004066C3 010                 and     ecx, 3
 004066C6 010                 rep movsb
 004066C8 010                 mov     esi, [ebx 4]
 004066CB 010                 sub     esi, [ebx]
 004066CD 010                 add     esi, edx
 004066CF 010                 cmp     esi, ebp
 004066D1 010                 jz      short loc_4066E4
 004066D3
 004066D3     loc_4066D3:                             ; CODE XREF: copyA2strToA1mem 82↓j
 004066D3 010                 mov     cl, [esi]
 004066D5 010                 push    ecx
 004066D6 014                 mov     ecx, ebx
 004066D8 014                 call    sub_401D20
 004066DD 010                 add     esi, 1
 004066E0 010                 cmp     esi, ebp
 004066E2 010                 jnz     short loc_4066D3
 004066E4
 004066E4     loc_4066E4:                             ; CODE XREF: copyA2strToA1mem 38↑j
 004066E4                                             ; copyA2strToA1mem 71↑j
 004066E4 010                 pop     edi
 004066E5 00C                 pop     esi
 004066E6 008                 pop     ebp
 004066E7 004                 mov     eax, ebx
 004066E9 004                 pop     ebx
 004066EA 000                 retn    8
 004066EA     copyA2strToA1mem endp

CodePudding user response:

ebx is being set to the initial value of ecx, which is this pointer if the calling convention truly is __thiscall.

[ebx], ie [ebx 0], refers to the data member located at byte offset 0 in this.

[ebx 4] refers to the data member located at byte offset 4 in this.

The way these two data members are being used, we can assume they are 32-bit pointers, and they are related to each other, so they are most likely the start and end pointers of a buffer.

Knowing that, if I translated the assembly correctly, the C code would look something like the following:

SomeClass* SomeClass::copyA2strToA1mem(char *strStart, char *strEnd)
{
    int strLen = strEnd - strStart;
    int bufferLen = this->bufferEnd - this->bufferStart;
    if (strLen <= bufferLen)
    {
        qmemcpy(this->bufferStart, strStart, strLen);
        char *src = this->bufferEnd;
        char *dst = this->bufferStart   strLen;
        if (dst != src)
        {
            memmove(dst, src, 1);
            this->bufferEnd  = (dst - src);
        }
    }
    else
    {
        qmemcpy(this->bufferStart, strStart, bufferLen);
        strStart  = bufferLen;
        while (strStart != strEnd)
        {
            this->sub_401D20(*strStart  );
        }
    } 
    return this;
}

The memmove() is a little tricky. I think the code is checking if there is a gap between the end of the copied string and the end of the buffer, and if so then it is effectively moving 1 byte from the end of the buffer to the end of the copied string, and then setting bufferEnd to point at that byte. Why, who knows.

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