6.1 Introduction to the Problem of Reverse Engineering …
507
The reason why so much prominence is given to reverse-engineering issues in this
section consists solely in the fact that the method today is one of the main tools to
identify such parasites in separate military, spacecraft, and commercial microcircuits.
This is why modern microcircuit developers shall study it in depth. The best
description of this method is given in the book Reverse Engineering, An Industrial
Perspective issued by Springer and written by Vinesh Raja and Kiran J. Fernandes
(eds.), which was released in 2008 (Springer-Verlag London Limited).
In fact, this was the first book dedicated solely to the problem of reverse engineering in industrial applications. As briefly stated in the introduction to this book,
reverse engineering is the creation of design of any products by means of computer
modeling of a physical object (product), which can be used as the main development
tool to create a complete copy of this object, recreate the concept of its design, or
reverse-engineer a product present in the market or its components.
As follows from this definition, the authors formulate prerequisites for the emergence and development of this direction in a fairly tactful yet essentially correct way.
Therefore, we decided to site these and other terms and definitions from this book
as close to the original text as possible (in italics).
With globalization and trade liberalization, production companies face the
increasing competition in the field of goods and services from economies with lower
wages. Countries of the West recently lost their ability to compete with low wages;
therefore, they depend on an increase in the level of implementation of innovations and best technologies to create the best product in the market. In an effort to
stay competitive in such unstable environment, the companies pay special attention
to development of their own strategies of competitiveness and profitability. On a
global scale, the production is mostly aimed at reducing production costs and implementing automation into management of production processes. On the other hand,
such flexibility provides for consideration of certain processes that are not officially
regulated.
In ensuring such flexibility and efficiency, Western companies can rely on traditional approaches that often lead to certain difficulties with official accounting,
overhead costs and production effectiveness. The companies do not always fully
understand that the environment in general has changed significantly.
For example, mass production is not applicable for the products when the
customers require small quantities of certain mostly custom devices, when the additional services and the presence of advantages affecting added value, such as: software updates and later versions, are essentially comparable to the products as such.
In these cases, approaches such as rapid prototyping and reverse engineering are
very effective and acceptable in solving some of these problems.
For example, rapid prototyping is a relatively new class of technology used to
create physical models and prototype (cloned) components through the use of 3D
computer modeling data. Unlike milling machines (which differ in terms of the operations performed), rapid prototyping systems combine the fluid, powder and special
plastic materials for formation of complex components in the prototype. Layer
by layer, special prototyping machine present in the market manufacture plastic,
507
The reason why so much prominence is given to reverse-engineering issues in this
section consists solely in the fact that the method today is one of the main tools to
identify such parasites in separate military, spacecraft, and commercial microcircuits.
This is why modern microcircuit developers shall study it in depth. The best
description of this method is given in the book Reverse Engineering, An Industrial
Perspective issued by Springer and written by Vinesh Raja and Kiran J. Fernandes
(eds.), which was released in 2008 (Springer-Verlag London Limited).
In fact, this was the first book dedicated solely to the problem of reverse engineering in industrial applications. As briefly stated in the introduction to this book,
reverse engineering is the creation of design of any products by means of computer
modeling of a physical object (product), which can be used as the main development
tool to create a complete copy of this object, recreate the concept of its design, or
reverse-engineer a product present in the market or its components.
As follows from this definition, the authors formulate prerequisites for the emergence and development of this direction in a fairly tactful yet essentially correct way.
Therefore, we decided to site these and other terms and definitions from this book
as close to the original text as possible (in italics).
With globalization and trade liberalization, production companies face the
increasing competition in the field of goods and services from economies with lower
wages. Countries of the West recently lost their ability to compete with low wages;
therefore, they depend on an increase in the level of implementation of innovations and best technologies to create the best product in the market. In an effort to
stay competitive in such unstable environment, the companies pay special attention
to development of their own strategies of competitiveness and profitability. On a
global scale, the production is mostly aimed at reducing production costs and implementing automation into management of production processes. On the other hand,
such flexibility provides for consideration of certain processes that are not officially
regulated.
In ensuring such flexibility and efficiency, Western companies can rely on traditional approaches that often lead to certain difficulties with official accounting,
overhead costs and production effectiveness. The companies do not always fully
understand that the environment in general has changed significantly.
For example, mass production is not applicable for the products when the
customers require small quantities of certain mostly custom devices, when the additional services and the presence of advantages affecting added value, such as: software updates and later versions, are essentially comparable to the products as such.
In these cases, approaches such as rapid prototyping and reverse engineering are
very effective and acceptable in solving some of these problems.
For example, rapid prototyping is a relatively new class of technology used to
create physical models and prototype (cloned) components through the use of 3D
computer modeling data. Unlike milling machines (which differ in terms of the operations performed), rapid prototyping systems combine the fluid, powder and special
plastic materials for formation of complex components in the prototype. Layer
by layer, special prototyping machine present in the market manufacture plastic,