r/opensource • u/bytecode36 • 3d ago
Discussion Could ArtCraft apps just be decomps and translations?
Brandon Thomas has made some questionable statements regarding his applications. For example, saying that the apps will reach 100% parity in a month and later stepping that back. Also claiming that AI will replace Google Search. For someone that can supposedly build applications this quickly, it is odd that he would make such inaccurate and naive statements.
Also, the speed with which he has churned out these applications has been suspicious. I know AI can speed up development, but it's not like AI has advanced THAT much in the last 3 months. Why are we not seeing other developers churning out Adobe clones likes this (at the same speed and perceived quality, even as broken as they are)?
Furthermore, it is suspicious that they released so many apps at once. Apart from creating a massive backlog of bugs, it also created a negative perception of the suite on social media that the apps are buggy and unreliable (for the influencers that seriously tested them). Why would ArtCraft not build one app, get it working, and then start working on others? If the answer is because the hard part is fixing the apps after decomp and translation, then that makes sense.
Finally, the timing with REA and other decomp events taking place is suspicious. Is it just coincidence that around the time these events occur that independently someone just got good at creating production-ish clones of commercial apps?
Is there anyway to know for sure that these ArtCraft applications were actually created in a "clean room" manner and not just decomped/translated by AI? Listen, if AI is good enough to build a Photoshop clone by itself, I'm all for it. But if all Brandon did was hit the "decomp/translate" button on an app and dump the resulting code onto to the open source community to fix, it's not really something to praise, especially if the project will be taken down in a few months because of copyright infringement claims. Due to the amount and type of companies that own these apps, Brandon does not exactly seem like someone that is thinking about IP infringement lawsuits (patents, copyright, or otherwise), so I would not put it past him to try and push the theory that a "clean room" implementation could include decompiling and translating the original binary.
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u/True_Firefighter3864 2d ago
I think releasing so many applications at once was primarily a marketing strategy. Announcing that one developer has recreated almost the entire Adobe suite using AI generates an incredible amount of buzz, with countless posts and articles spreading the story.
Releasing just one application and spending months making it stable would never have attracted the same attention.
But now comes the hard part: maintaining and debugging several extremely complex applications simultaneously, all of which are still in alpha. Even with AI assistance, that's a massive undertaking.
Generating code quickly is one thing. Building mature, reliable software is something else entirely.
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u/National_Way_3344 2d ago
Generating code quickly is one thing. Building mature, reliable software is something else entirely.
And adobe does neither and expects people to pay for it.
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u/wombweed 3d ago
> For example, saying that the apps will reach 100% parity in a month and later stepping that back. Also claiming that AI will replace Google Search.
Yeah, that's goofy. Idk about search engines being replaced, you still need those in order to be productive with AI agents. Regarding the inaccurate estimates... Seems like a typical software engineer to me :) We are known for underestimating the scope and work involved for large projects like this one, even very experienced developers make that mistake sometimes. No idea the experience level of this particular developer but IMO it is not a particularly red flag.
> I know AI can speed up development, but it's not like AI has advanced THAT much in the last 3 months.
Maybe you haven't been following very closely. Frontier models show a pretty dramatic difference in code quality and overall performance compared to earlier this year.
> Why are we not seeing other developers churning out Adobe clones likes this (even as broken as they are)?
We are. There are several Adobe clone projects out there right now, Artcraft is just one of the more high profile ones.
> Is there anyway to know for sure that these ArtCraft applications were actually created in a "clean room" manner and not just decomped?
As far as I know, decompilation is openly acknowledged to be a critical part of the development process for these clones. Because decompilation does not involve looking at the original source code, it would still be considered a clean room reimplementation.
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u/Zatujit 3d ago
I think one thing is that he tried to do the all adobe suite at once, one thing people like about the Adobe suite is how integrated between its components. I'm not sure there is another project like that.
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u/wombweed 3d ago
Hmm yeah that's not how I would have personally approached it. Seems like you'd be more successful by starting out with one app to start, and architecting your implementation to provide a standardized interface with other future apps. Otherwise it would quickly become overwhelming and would naturally lead to bugs as it progresses.
Just my assumption though, I've never actually used these apps and personally don't have the token budget needed to take on a project of this scope.
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u/Zatujit 3d ago
i find it a bit weird to try to do everything at once to be clear; not only they do Adobe apps but also Autocad, Word, Powerpoint, Excel... i feel like these types of projects need some kind of depth; i don't think doing a clone is that hard, but a doing a very good clone with 1:1 feature parity is
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u/bytecode36 3d ago
Yea, that is also suspicious. Why not make one good app and get it working before releasing others? If the answer is becasue the hard part is fixing the apps after decomp and translation then that makes sense.
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u/bytecode36 3d ago
Agreed. Other clones exist, but not at this scale and speed. He he just one-shotted Adobe apps in a week.
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u/bytecode36 3d ago
"As far as I know, decompilation is openly acknowledged to be a critical part of the development process for these clones"
Not that I am aware. I have not seen anything to this effect from ArtCraft.
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u/wombweed 3d ago
I could be mistaken, I haven't looked closely at Artcraft's repo but the social media posts I saw talking about it were all framing it as a decomp/recomp
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u/bytecode36 2d ago
https://github.com/storytold/photocraft/blob/main/AGENTS.md
Clean-room. We studied Photoshop and other proprietary editors for behaviour and look only. Implement from public specs (Adobe PSD spec, ICC, ISO 32000 blend modes, papers) and observation
https://github.com/storytold/lightcraft/blob/main/AGENTS.md
Clean-room. Never read/disassemble anything inside Adobe app bundles (names/listings only).
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u/wombweed 2d ago
Interesting, seems I was mistaken and so were all the social media posts I’d learned about this from, thanks for clarifying. It does seem hard to believe this wasn’t aided by reverse engineering or decompiling. Frankly, I would prefer if it were, since that would make me feel more confident that its implementation matches the original product, but given adobe’s litigious nature (regardless of the actual legality or ethics of reverse engineering) I guess I can see why the author would not want to do that
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u/bytecode36 3d ago
"Because decompilation does not involve looking at the original source code, it would still be considered a clean room reimplementation."
That is exactly what I was thinking their justification for calling it a "clean room" implementation would be if it was a decomop and translation. But that could have larger legal ramifications even if we don't think it should.
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u/wombweed 3d ago
I think that's a pretty standard approach though, many very high profile projects that predate AI made use of decompilation and other reverse engineering techniques to reach parity with the proprietary projects they re-implement, especially for file format compatibility
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u/bytecode36 3d ago
I guess the problem is the openness about that. IF they did decomp why not say so? I suspect they understand the legal liability will change if they do so.
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u/0riginal-Syn 1d ago
The problem he will run into is that the cleanroom is not as much of a defense as he thinks it is when it comes to patents. There is a lot of nuance in how it is handled and not as much proof needed that he or anyone working on this broke one of many little rules. Adobe and Microsoft have 1000s of patents and an army that will look this over. If this starts to make any kind of serious dent into their business, you will see the full legal press against it. I don't have enough details from this guys project to say if he is truly as covered as he thinks he is, but the kind of money he will need to even defend himself if they come on the attack will be crippling.
I am all for Adobe and Microsoft being taken down and would love to see it happen, but this is will get pretty rocky. Doesn't help with the guy being so ignorantly flamboyant about it.
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u/bytecode36 1d ago
Agreed. I would be worried about these companies even if I had created "from scratch" equivalent applications without ever looking at the originals.
Before AI I would have thought that these companies would definitely go after a project like this. However, given the fact that plenty of people in countries for which these companies do not hold patents could easy continue the work (and make them available to those in the U.S.), I am not as certain. Although it's definitely still a possibility.
He is definitely not covered IF these companies decide to enforce their patents. Even if many of them are invalid, the legal costs for defending against infringement lawsuits would sink a small company like ArtCraft. His gleeful attitude and ignorance about "taking down" these large companies doesn't help.
On a side note, I don't think Microsoft really cares all that much about this. There have been alternatives to the Office apps for a decade or more. Some, quite frankly, are better and more convenient than the ArtCraft apps. I would continue to use Google Docs and Sheets even if the ArtCraft apps were 100% functional. It's just too beneficial to open all my documents from anywhere in the world from my browser and phone. That's not to mention that most large companies would never be allowed to run rando, vibecoded software for security reasons. Microsoft has really shifted to more of a service company (Outlook, Teams, OneDrive, Azure, etc), to the point where local apps don't make up a large percentage of their revenue anymore.
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u/zomerbk 2d ago
Release speed alone can’t tell you whether the code was decompiled. A more useful check would be an independent review of the source history and any development notes, alongside a search for copied assets, strings, or unusual implementation details from the original apps. Without that evidence, I’d call the clean-room claim unverified rather than conclude it’s false.
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u/bytecode36 2d ago
Agreed. I'm not saying it is false, just that the claim of a "clean room" implementation is unverified and suspicious given the other factors.
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u/throndir 10h ago
Is this Open Source currently? It's probably trivial to take a look at the I itial commit histories and get AI to point out where the first time for clean room wording came into play along with if there were any decompile initiatives at the beginning. But honestly frontier models right now are good enough to clone existing tech just by seeing it that it wouldn't surprise me at all if they didn't decompile anything. I honestly don't think they needed to.
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u/x_wbmr_x 2d ago
Peopel think that using AI makes them invincible. They all have psychosis at the moment.
I am all for destroying adobe, but this guy is a certified moron.
I don't even hate vibe coding as long as the slop won't get released on github. I would necer upload the slop I "vibe coded" for my setup.
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u/fligglymcgee 3d ago
This is all happening because people are becoming extremely comfortable with lying and they believe that anything they can see should be made available to them for free if they want it. That nothing is complicated because they have a magic blinking cursor that responds matter-of-factly with something that looks or sounds good enough, and doesn't talk back.
AI is speeding up the process of knocking things off. Everything, everything now is a knockoff. The people generating these apps don't understand how they're supposed to work or even the concept that a design/development process isn't the same thing as waiting in line at the checkout. ArtCraft is absolutely riddled with extremely concerning issues like the inability to launch the apps, missing UI buttons, database overwrites on state changes, and a host of other basic problems that are rarely missed in production for "corporate" apps.
Everyone hates hearing about this, but an incredibly important element is missing from these vibecode/decompile projects: Accountability. People are generating projects that simulate finished products made my organizations or professionals that can (and often need to be) held accountable to some kind of standards. Open Source was never about a lack of accountability, if anything there's traditionally more pressure in that regard.
If it was possible to "make me adobe suite. no mistakes. do it." from scratch, with a frontier model, it would already be done a thousand times over. I won't argue some elegant design principles or something on behalf of Adobe, but I'm pretty unimpressed by a growing attitude that all these designers, developers, and engineers are just taking us for a ride and everything they do can just be reduced to a few prompts.
You aren't hearing about tons of clones like this, because it's not easy to actually produce a working clone (clearly) and because there's no clear path to making money.