Can I retrieve code saved to an Arduino?

Development Tools IDE 2.x
1

Hi, i'm a Junior in highschool who loves programming and using Arduinos.

My school is a technical school, and the Seniors made senior capstone projects. My shop teacher had asked me to add a few features to a game that one of the Seniors made for their capstone It's like an arcade game where you pull the lever, and the light goes around the wheel in a circle and you stop it on green to win jackpot, but instead of a wheel, it's a tower.

The thing is, I don't have access to the file that the kids used to code the Arduino, and kids being kids, they didn't save the code either. They uploaded the code. The code IS saved to the Arduino, but not on any of the school laptops, or flash drives.

Is there any way to like reverse upload the code from the Arduino to where I can edit it as I don't want to mess up their entire senior project.

2

No, there is not. What is uploaded is binary. The C code it originated as stayed on their computers.

3

Alright, thank you for letting me know. I'll have to program their thing from scratch unless I can find which computer out of like the 20 we have they saved it to.

4

Look for an ino file with the approximate time and date. Depending upon preferences, the IDE may have saved a copy at compile time. No guarantee they didn't compile another version later, but would be better than a cold start.

5

If the sketch outputs any text to either a display or the serial monitor, then you can narrow down the search to the files that contain some of the more unique words in the text.

6

I try to keep in habit of including some sketch name for Serial output at the beginning of every sketch for exactly this purpose.

7

You can download the binary and then run it through a disassembler, but I have never heard of a way to get an ino file.
Strange that a school would not have a robust backup system.

8

That is easy.

9

Are you ready for fun? Here we go...

I see three ways to solve this. (1) Make an exact duplicate of the rig which you know the outcome. When the time comes that the original is finished, you need to make the logic that makes the newly desired outcome. (2) "Play" the game while another Arduino is physically attached to the outputs that create the original presentation and when Arduino #2 sees the key output(s), it shows the newly added content. (3) Contact the seniors who wrote the code to get a copy... which is probably on Wokwi.