During my recent exploration of Ukrainian online theater platforms, I made an interesting discovery: the majority of these sites are built on the DataLife Engine (DLE). This observation sparked my curiosity, as DLE is a content management system that has been around for quite some time, yet continues to operate effectively in 2025.

The Challenge: Encoded PHP Files

While investigating these platforms, I encountered downloadable archives containing PHP files that appeared to be encoded. At first glance, the code structure seemed unusual and obfuscated, making it difficult to understand the underlying functionality. However, upon closer examination, I realized that decoding these files was more straightforward than initially expected.

The Solution: A Comprehensive Decoding Script

To address this challenge systematically, I developed a script capable of processing all encoded PHP files within a directory structure. This solution eliminates the need for manual, file-by-file decoding, significantly improving efficiency when working with large archives.

Technical Implementation

The decoding process utilizes several fundamental Unix/Linux commands and PHP's built-in capabilities:

  • cat: For reading file contents
  • rm: For cleaning up temporary files
  • grep: For pattern matching and extraction
  • sed: For stream editing and text manipulation
  • php: For executing PHP-specific decoding operations
  • find: For recursive file discovery and processing

php encoded

php decoded

Key Features

The script provides:

  • Batch processing of multiple PHP files
  • Automatic detection of encoded content
  • Clean output generation
  • Error handling for malformed files
  • Preservation of original file structure

Link to the source code

php