Not to be confused with Portable application or Windows Preinstallation Environment.
This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Portable Executable" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR(December 2010) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
The Portable Executable (PE) format is a file format for executables, object code, DLLs and others used in 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows operating systems, and in UEFI environments.[2] The PE format is a data structure that encapsulates the information necessary for the Windows OS loader to manage the wrapped executable code. This includes dynamic library references for linking, API export and import tables, resource management data and thread-local storage (TLS) data. On NT operating systems, the PE format is used for EXE, DLL, SYS (device driver), MUI and other file types. The Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) specification states that PE is the standard executable format in EFI environments.[3]
On Windows NT operating systems, PE currently supports the IA-32, x86-64 (AMD64/Intel 64), IA-64, ARM and ARM64 instruction set architectures (ISAs). Prior to Windows 2000, Windows NT (and thus PE) supported the MIPS, Alpha, and PowerPC ISAs. Because PE is used on Windows CE, it continues to support several variants of the MIPS, ARM (including Thumb), and SuperH ISAs.[4]
Analogous formats to PE are ELF (used in Linux and most other versions of Unix) and Mach-O (used in macOS and iOS).
^Andersson, Henrik (2015-04-23). "application/vnd.microsoft.portable-executable". IANA. Retrieved 2017-03-26.
^"UEFI Specification, version 2.8B" (PDF)., a note on p.15, states that "this image type is chosen to enable UEFI images to contain Thumb and Thumb2 instructions while defining the EFI interfaces themselves to be in ARM mode."
^"PE Format (Windows)". Retrieved 2017-10-21.
and 25 Related for: Portable Executable information
The PortableExecutable (PE) format is a file format for executables, object code, DLLs and others used in 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows operating...
The DOS MZ executable format is the executable file format used for .EXE files in DOS. The file can be identified by the ASCII string "MZ" (hexadecimal:...
The New Executable (abbreviated NE or NewEXE) is a 16-bit executable file format, a successor to the DOS MZ executable format. It was used in Windows 1...
In computing, executable code, an executable file, or an executable program, sometimes simply referred to as an executable or binary, causes a computer...
computing, the Executable and Linkable Format (ELF, formerly named Extensible Linking Format), is a common standard file format for executable files, object...
executable. When this compressed executable is executed, the decompression code recreates the original code from the compressed code before executing...
is a comparison of binary executable file formats which, once loaded by a suitable executable loader, can be directly executed by the CPU rather than being...
continue to be used on some Unix-like systems, on Microsoft Windows (PortableExecutable), in UEFI environments and in some embedded development systems....
exported functions of a portableexecutable file. It also displays a recursive tree of all the dependencies of the executable file (all the files it requires...
Look into the Win32 PortableExecutable File Format – MSDN Magazine, February 2002. "Every PE file begins with a small MS-DOS executable. ... The first bytes...
executable or SYS driver), objects: Executable and Linkable Format (ELF) or Common Object File Format (COFF) (classic or MS-specific), or executables...
running either a subset of Intel x86, ARM, or MIPS native code, or a portableexecutable, in a sandbox. It allows safely running native code from a web browser...
disease Pulmonary embolism, a medical condition PortableExecutable, a Microsoft Windows executable file format Provider edge router, an edge network...
find code caves in PortableExecutable (PE) files. Ollydbg: a debugger for code analysis. It traces the script calls and executes, as well as displays...
A portable application (portable app), sometimes also called standalone, is a program designed to operate without changing other files or requiring other...
most prolific executable packers is UPX (the Ultimate Packer for executables). Not only does it handle dozens of different executable formats, but also...
affected by DST. Relocation (computing) Position-independent code PortableExecutable (PE) High memory area (HMA) Dynamic dead code elimination Levine...
ILAsm (IL Assembler) generates a portableexecutable (PE) file from a text representation of Common Intermediate Language (CIL) code. It is not to be...
external hard drives. To be considered for inclusion, an application must be executable on multiple computers from removable storage without installation, and...
PlayStation Portable homebrew refers to the process of using exploits and hacks to execute unsigned code on the PlayStation Portable (PSP). Additional...
also have different file formats for executable files and object files, such as PortableExecutable for executables and COFF for object files in 32-bit...
of flash memory Phase encoding, another name for Manchester code PortableExecutable, a computer file format Windows Preinstallation Environment, a lightweight...
same as for Windows EXE files – that is, PortableExecutable (PE) for 32-bit and 64-bit Windows, and New Executable (NE) for 16-bit Windows. As with EXEs...
released in March 2000. AIDA32 was distributed as freeware, and as a portableexecutable file which does not need to be installed on the host computer. Development...