How can one extract resources from a New Executable?

Question

I'm trying to extract menus and other stuff from a New Executable (NE), i.e. the ones from Windows' 16-bit times. The tools I find (e. g. ResourceTuner) work for PEs only.

Any idea for tools to facilitate the resource extraction? Could be several steps too, e.g. one program extracting the raw resources, one displaying them in a proper form.

meta-question: why did it tell me my question was subjective, based just on the title? request: could someone retag "pe-resources" to "resources" or "ne-resources", because I don't have the reputation to do so (need 150, just upvote so I can do it myself ;) ) — heinrich5991, May 03 '13 at 20:50
I don't know, but their subjectivity detector definitely triggers on 'how can you' ;) — Ange, May 03 '13 at 21:26
@Ange: "how can you" and "how can one" are near synonymous. No? Fixed up the question a bit. It's great, because it touches a topic not too often found anymore these days. — 0xC0000022L, May 03 '13 at 21:35
"How can you kill puppies" could either be a subjective, emotional question, or a request for objective, instructional material. — Rolf Rolles, May 04 '13 at 01:32
@AshRj How is resources a very generic tag? I wanted it to address specifically resources from windows executables. Maybe this question should be tagged [tag:pe-resources], although it's not about PE resources. — heinrich5991, May 04 '13 at 07:29
Resources could refer to resources being used by Windows or Linux or Mac executables thus it cannot by itself used for a question. See meta tags for more. — asheeshr, May 04 '13 at 07:34

score 9 · Accepted Answer · edited May 04 '13 at 01:30

9

You should try OpenWatcom's Resource Editor, and also Hiew and HT Editor albeit these 2 won't likely display them in proper form, as they are just NE-supporting hex editors.

OpenWatcom includes a full toolchain for Win-16 and dos development.

edited May 04 '13 at 01:30

Justin Dearing

325
2
9

answered May 03 '13 at 20:59

Ange

6,694
3
28
62

I took a look at the OpenWatcom, looks very promising. Thanks – heinrich5991 May 03 '13 at 21:14
Perhaps a bit more detail would be in order? Especially since you only mention OpenWatcom, not exactly which of the tools to use. – 0xC0000022L May 03 '13 at 21:18

score 6 · Answer 2 · answered May 03 '13 at 21:50

A great resource for old tools is the SAC server. From a quick search Resource Grabber seems to support NE resources, though the UI is annoying to use.

Another options is eXeScope (shareware).

Also, long time ago I found somewhere a tool with the name dresplay.exe. I don't have it at hand right now and Google doesn't seem to know about it...

How can one extract resources from a New Executable?

2 Answers2