# SoK: Are LLMs Reliable at Source Code Recovery? A Taxonomy and Empirical Evaluation

> This SoK organizes LLM-assisted source-recovery designs and separates compilation, readability, structural and behavioral metrics. Its controlled study varies architecture, compiler optimization and symbol availability, with smaller ablations for input representation, model roles and source language.

- Authors: Varun Kohli; Lee Bing Cheng; Nur Hazim Ghazali; Gao Yuze; Daryl Poon; Dinil Mon Divakaran
- Venue: arXiv
- Status: Preprint
- Publication / posting date: October 8, 2026
- Date source: First arXiv submission date; no separate proceedings or journal publication was verified.
- First arXiv submission: October 8, 2026
- arXiv: 2610.11556
- Reviewed arXiv version: v1
- Sources reviewed: 2026-10-20
- Added to the catalog: 2026-10-20
- Original paper: <https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.11556>
- PDF: <https://arxiv.org/pdf/2610.11556v1>
- Code: <https://anonymous.4open.science/r/decompbench-65CB/>
- BibTeX: <https://awesomerea.org/papers/citations/paper-sok-source-recovery-reliability.bib>
- Catalog page: <https://awesomerea.org/papers/paper-sok-source-recovery-reliability/>
- Record JSON: <https://awesomerea.org/papers/paper-sok-source-recovery-reliability/record.json>
- Chinese version: [简体中文](https://awesomerea.org/zh/papers/paper-sok-source-recovery-reliability/index.md)

## Scope and limitations

The 45,000 cases are variants of 500 functions, not independent programs. Input/language ablations use 50 functions; translated language variants were produced with an LLM and checked using finite I/O tests. The study assumes a derivable call interface, is prompt-sensitive and cannot exclude ExeBench pretraining exposure. Test agreement and relocation-masked byte matching have different assumptions.

## Why it fits this collection

Adds a recent evaluation taxonomy and controlled evidence for comparing source-recovery methods without collapsing distinct correctness signals.

## Publication and review notes

The arXiv v1 article is CC BY 4.0. Its anonymous artifact was readable in a browser; the page shows an October 1 snapshot available until 2027-03-29, without a full Git commit. The inspected README says a fresh database cannot directly re-score shipped generation files; redrawing supplied CSV results is a separate step. Artifact licensing was not established from the inspected README/root list.

## Primary sources

1. <https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.11556v1>
2. <https://arxiv.org/html/2610.11556v1>
3. <https://anonymous.4open.science/r/decompbench-65CB/README.md>
4. <https://anonymous.4open.science/api/repo/decompbench-65CB/file/README.md?v=3a7167f7>

## About this entry

Reviewed against the paper and its primary sources. Cite the original authors using the linked paper or BibTeX.
Original editorial content: MIT. Linked projects, papers and assets retain their own rights and licenses.