How to extract data from DLLs?

[RuudBaltissen]

Hello,


Background:
In 2003 Microsoft released a game called "Freelancer", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freelancer_%28video_game%29. It could be played online as well and people started to make mods. The best one I know is "Discovery", http://discoverygc.com/wiki/.
In this game you can trade goods. A French guy, Wiz0u, made a tool, "Freelancer Companion" http://wiz0u.free.fr/prog/flc/, which is a great help. But it lacks some features so I decided to create my own version.

So far I managed to extract a lot of information from INI files. But I also found out that a lot of information has to be extracted from DLL files. I never ever worked with DLL files before so I did some research. The English Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic-link_library, gave some good information but yet it doesn't help me. The given example expects you to know that there is a function you can use. In this case I haven't any idea at all what functions or procedures to find.
I can imagine that DLLs have a certain structure. Knowing this structure means you can read and understand the contents of this DLL. It should be clear to you that I haven't any idea so far.

So my question: can anybody give me some examples, pointers to examples/URLs, or what ever to solve my quest?

Thank you very much in advance!

PS: the program will be open source.


With kind regards, Ruud Baltissen
www.Baltissen.org

[howardpc]

There are several tools you can use. For instance the one here
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/dll_export_viewer.html

[RuudBaltissen]

Unfortunately the tool didn't find anything. I had a look at the DLL with a BIN editor. As expected it is full with text, familiar text, and hardly anything that looks like executable code. But then I still haven't any idea how the program knows how to find the right text. Still a lot of research to do....

With kind regards, Ruud Baltissen

[sarason]

Use the example code you have to see how the DLL's are read, there is likely to be big similarities between the 2.
At this point you are in reverse engineering land. Which is not an easy place for beginners, or for that matter for those that are experienced in coding but not in clue detection which is where you are at. Unfortunately the suggested tool gives entry points but no interfaces. If you have the interfaces in the main body of the code use these s they will do all the work for you.

regards sarason