Mocha

The Java Decompiler

Recently Hanpeter van Vliet released a beta version of a Java decompiler named Mocha. A controversy erupted and he has caved in to the pressure and withdrawn it from public distribution. He has a page allowing people to vote on whether it should be made available.

I would encourage everyone to vote yes. Mocha is just a tool and is not inherently "bad" or "wrong". Attempting to ban tools like Mocha to prevent reverse engineering of software is like trying to ban microscopes to prevent reverse engineering of integrated circuits. Disassemblers and decompilers for other languages have been available for years, and have many legitimate uses.

The readme.txt file in the Mocha distribution states:

The distribution archive (file "mocha-b1.zip") may be distributed freely, provided its contents ("mocha.zip" and this file, "readme.txt") are not tampered with in any way.

I am pleased to be able to make the Mocha distribution available under those terms:

mocha-b1.zip ( 121k, Tuesday, 27-Aug-96 11:55:14 PDT)

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Last updated August 29, 1996

eric@brouhaha.com