Compilers for languages intended to be machine-independent, such as Java, Python, or C#, translate the source code into byte code for a virtual machine, which is then run in an interpreter for the ...

Instructions written in a programming language. Source code is the text that a programmer writes, but it is not directly executable by the computer. Source code must be converted into machine ...

The two-year effort to decompile Super Mario 64 wasn't started with a Windows executable in mind. Instead, it was motivated primarily by speedrunners who wanted "to understand the game's code ...

Instead of fixing the source code, it appears that the company's developers made a series of careful changes directly to the buggy program's executable file.