Covert Java - Techniques for Decompiling, Patching, and Reverse Engineering

Have you ever been in a crunch where all conventional approaches have failed? Do you know of a product that solves exactly the same problem you are facing but there is no documentation on how to implement it? Are you using a third-party library for which you need to change some of the logic but you don't have the source code?

This book shows how to overcome unsurpassable problems with practical methods such as:

• Decompiling and obfuscating classes
• Hacking non-public variables and methods
• Replacing and patching application classes
• Using Profilers for application runtime analysis
• Eavesdropping to facilitate troubleshooting and performance tuning
• Intercepting control flow and controlling class loading
• Understanding and tweaking bytecode
• Altering third party application logic
• Hacking JVM behavior
• Protecting commercial applications from hackers

Author Alex Kalinovsky acknowledges that the techniques in Covert Java are controversial, but as he says in the Introduction "...Any information or discovery can be used for good or ill. This book is for the good guys, and if you are a bad guy please stop reading right now and get a new job with the testing team."

Tricks and in-depth information presented in 'Covert Java can save you hours of effort. Each chapter focuses on a technique that solves a specific problem -- outlining the problem, demonstrating the solution, and then suggesting additional ideas for testing the approach.