File Format

[onsight]

Ok, How do I change a .gwc to a .lua so I can edit in the builder?

[a_snail]

Ok, How do I change a .gwc to a .lua so I can edit in the builder?

 

In theory you don't. The whole point of the c part of gwc is that its the compiled finished version.

 

There would be a lot of upset people if you could because they have spent ages thinking of ways to prevent people taking the .gwc file and running it in the builder or finding otherways to cheat.

 

If you wan't to edit it, you need to select "Download source" (below License in the Wherigo home page for that cartridge) and if your downloaded .gwz (z for zip) file doesn't have .zip on the end, you add one and then extract the contents like any other compressed zip file. Alternatively, if you can't download source, ask the author nicely, and they may well email you a copy, or even better, tick the box so that everyone can download it (a useful option if its your own cartridge and you have lost the code).

 

If this question is: "I want to hack into the cartridge, breaking licensing agreements and the wishes of the authors", then as a hacker, that is your puzzle/challange from the Wherigo (A task that is probably going to be more chalanging that playing the Wherigo properly).

[onsight]

Sorry, I should have been more clear.

This would be for my own cartridge. I accidentally deleted the .lua file and am left with only the .gwc file on my GPS.

[+sTeamTraen]

Building cartridges is really a form of software development. You don't necessarily need version control, documentation with flowcharts, etc, but you certainly need backups. Apart from anything else, the builder can eat your cartridge if it goes badly wrong.

 

Matejcik has some tools which claim to be able to reverse engineer a compiled cartridge, but at the risk of appearing to be cruel, which is not my intention: if your software development experience is such that you lost the only copy of the Lua file, I suspect that it will be quicker for you to rewrite it from scratch, rather than work out how to use all of his tools.

 

As a bonus, by so doing you will in fact be obeying one of the tenets of possibly the greatest book on software engineering ever written, "The Mythical Man-Month" by Frederick ¨P. Brooks, who gives this great advice: "Plan to throw one away. You will, anyway."

[a_snail]

Sorry, I should have been more clear.

This would be for my own cartridge. I accidentally deleted the .lua file and am left with only the .gwc file on my GPS.

 

Fair enough. Did you upload the Wherigo to www.Wherigo.com, because if you did, make the source public and just download it. You can remove the public status again afterwards if you want.

 

If its your only copy, I belive a few people out there do know how to convert the gwc into the original components, e.g. the people who develop wherigos and the emulator. I suspect you may need to give them the gwc file and get them to decode it for you and send you the files.

 

Failing that, you can get the pictures back by taking screen shots (either in the emulator or in the GPS (if your GPS supports screen shots, Oregons do and I suspect PPC would))

 

Good luck

[matejcik]

just to clarify: my "reverse engineering toolkit" won't give you the lua file back. it can be used to examine and understand the source in readable form, but you'd still need to recreate the cartridge in the builder or rewrite it by hand.

and since you're the author, you don't need to see what's going on inside to be able to recreate it, right?

[kvhollis]

Ok, How do I change a .gwc to a .lua so I can edit in the builder?

 

Easy solution.

 

Goto the Wherigo.com site and login. Pull up the details of your cartridge.

 

Click on "Creative Commons".

 

Under "Download Settings" put a checkbox next to "Make the GWZ file downloadable (no permission required to download)".

 

Download the file - open up the GWZ file by renaming it with a ZIP extension I believe.

 

Go back and set your cartridge where it can NOT be downloaded.

 

You have recovered your LUA source.

 

Good luck.