First ever programming...an anti-virus software

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shovenose

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i want to make an anti-virus program...i can write batch files and i know html, but neither of those are very helpful.

my ideas:
-free
-good
-custom gui ( i already have somebody who would like to design a gui)...

is it illegal to inspect the code of another anti-virus solution and copy it? i dont want it to be plagarism, im against doing stuff like that...

any advice would be appreciated.

btw, if anybody wants to help with the programming let me know...
 
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THE TRUTH.
READ IT.
First you will need to become proficient in C and assembler programming. Next you will have to thoroughly understand Windows internals. Then obtain samples of all current malware and study how it works.

Do not try to reverse-engineer commercial software; whether it is legal or not you are laying yourself open to legal challenges that will cost tens of thousands to defend.
 
Batch files and html will give you nothing to help with writing an anti-virus software. Even if you look at the code of another program you will be able to do nothing with it short of renaming it. You have about 4-5 years of programming/studying to do before you can even write a small peice of a A/V software.
 


You don't use Visual Basic to write heavy duty software, maybe a database front end or some fluffy click here to make noise program. Let's put it this way, if you don't even know which language to pick to do this, how are you going to learn how every piece of the OS can be attacked, and have your software watch for it and block it?

Just out of curiousity I asked my father, who has been programming low level code for about 30 years now, how long it would take him to write an advanced program to hook into the OS without knowing the OS code beforehand. He said about 2 years for a basic start.
 
I think there's also something of a confidence issue here. Would any of you install on your PC an anti-virus solution written in Visual Basic that was the author's first attempt at programming?

Start with something a little less ambitious.
 

shovenose

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lol alright. i started with a web browser :)

it works fine, but how do i made it a self-sufficient, single-file .exe or something? because it has like 3 vb files, and it requires .net framework and all that crap :)

so can i make an exe out of it? thanks!
 
Go back to basics. Don't use the .Net framework but write it in C (or better yet in assembler) using only the Windows API calls that are available in every Windows installation. That way you won't need "all that crap".

And don't confuse putting a pre-defined IE web control on a form with programming a web browser.
 

callumparker666

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Nov 22, 2010
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THE TRUTH.
READ IT.
 
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