Understanding the executable file structure

In the context of normal files, two basic types exist—data and executable.

1. 1. Data: These files contain raw data, which can be interpreted and used by software which understands the format of the data. Although the format of such files may be platform-specific, there is a pretty good chance that it is portable and can be used under other operating systems, either directly or after some conversion. Plain Tcl scripts (that is *.tcl files) are considered to be data files, because they need to be interpreted by the actual Tcl binaries in order to be run. On Unix systems, such scripts are correctly run by specifying the binary name, but the script itself cannot be run on its own.

2. 2. Executable: An executable file contains a set of instructions that are executed by the system when you run the file. The instructions are usually formatted in machine code (assembler), which is directly related to the type of hardware platform and operating system you are...