While you are correct, I would note that OP didn’t ask “What is reverse engineering?”, they asked “How do you reverse engineer software?”. That typically always starts with decompiling in some form. You’re right that it’s not the whole picture, but I would say “Decompiling and studying binaries” would be a satisfactory ELI5 answer to OPs question.
While you are correct, I would note that OP didn’t ask “What is reverse engineering?”, they asked “How do you reverse engineer software?”. That typically always starts with decompiling in some form. You’re right that it’s not the whole picture, but I would say “Decompiling and studying binaries” would be a satisfactory ELI5 answer to OPs question.