Re: Commercial copy protection?

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Forgot to say, but backtracking a little, if I could just find a foolproof
way of determing the ACTIVE IP address of the PC on the network in XP, Win2K
and Vista, then this would solve my problem. Unfortunately even on my test
site, I have not been able to achieve this.

Best wishes

Paul Bromley



"Paul Bromley" <flyfisher@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:eI$POtHHHHA.1468@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Ok Robin and Cor,

I understand where you are coming from with this one now. They will be
fully informed. Better still I will be more than happy to give them a new
serial if this is the case - I have no intention of taking their money and
then stitching them up. Just the opposite as for the last 3-4 years the
users have been using my software for nothing. I am selling to sites that
are likely to install on 10 - 20 machines and do not want them buying one
copy when they should be buying more or a site licence. Until now I have
been producing time-limited software free of charge requiring the users to
use a new exe file every 6 months or so. This was to allow them to try it
out and for me to sort out the problems in the beta stage. These users are
now saying that they are more than happy to pay rather than keep messing
about with new exe files.

Paul Bromley


"RobinS" <RobinS@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:6_ednTrX8NsRqOHYnZ2dnUVZ_sWdnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I think he means that if you base the licensing on something in
the hardware, and they change the hardware, and your program
no longer works, you could be liable for damages, unless you
tell them about it up front.

Kind of like Microsoft's program disabled Windows on lots of
machines after they pushed out that program to check for
validity.

iTunes does this, too -- their DRM is based on something in
the hardware. When my drive crashed and I had to replace it,
the next time I tried to play some of my purchased music,
I had to register the computer as a new computer.

Cor, do I have that right?

Robin S.
-----------------------------------
"Paul Bromley" <flyfisher@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:ujpzHYHHHHA.420@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Hi Cor,

I am not sure what you mean by this. I am not doing anything malevolent
that would cause any damage. Can you clarify this? I assume from your
first paragraph that there is no unique identifier, although the hard
disk serial number is sufficient for me if it is available from XP,
Win2K and Vista.

Paul



"Cor Ligthert [MVP]" <notmyfirstname@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:%239jvyrFHHHA.1252@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Paul,

If what you ask was in the PC, would you think that Microsoft had used
the expensive to handle and not so customer friendly authentication
system.

I warn hundred times in this newsgroup that the route you are going can
lead to very high claim damages if you don't explicitly and very clear
tell in advance to the user that a damage on a part of the hardware can
mean that the program you are selling is completely not function
anymore, even despite your program has nothing to do with that hardware
to function.

Just my thought,

Cor


"Paul Bromley" <flyfisher@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> schreef in bericht
news:%235C2oRFHHHA.3540@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Hi Blake and all,

I have gone a long way to 'rolling my own' solution that would be
adequate for me. My main problem at the moment is trying to find a
unique identifier for a PC running XP, Win2K and shortly vista. All
PCs are connected to the internet generally with one NIC card, and
most PCs will be 'stable' - i.e. I do not need to worry about drives
being re-formatted. I would like to implement protection so that my
program be licensed in 2 ways - i.e. on a site basis, or as an
individual PC. On a site basis, I can easily obtain and check the IP
address of the server, as I can obtain this IP address from a piece of
software that I know all sites will be running. My main problem is the
other option of allowing licensing per PC - I need some unique
identifier for any PC - but this must cover Win2K, XP and shortly
Vista.

I have looked at the commercial offerings and I think they will not
cover the licensing schemes that I need. Also I need implementation to
be very simple - by way of my generating a serial dependant on
information they send to me relating to either the standalone PCs or
the server. I think most will go for the server option, but I also
need the standalone option. I have done all the work on the encryption
and checking side etc, and as I say I am not worried about someone
cracking what I am doing as it will not really hapen in the vertical
market where these products will go. I had looked at the commercial
options to save my time, but if I can quickly sort out a unique PC
identifier, then I have sorted what I wnated to do.

Last night I came across the Machine GUID in the registry - is this
present in XP and Win2K, and will this be resent in vista. I was
looking at the IP address, but on my development machine with a fixed
and wireless NIC, I have 3 IP addresses showing. Hard disk serial
number would be fine, but is this present on every PC that I am
targeting.

Any solutions to the unique PC identifier would be gratefully
received. I never thought that this would be so difficult. Note - I
need to pick this unique idnetifier up without my client base having
to install anything apart form my programs.

Many thanks,


Paul Bromley


"Blake" <blake.ackland@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1165745061.593072.168020@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Yes.

Implementing a 'Real' protection system is very very hard, if not
impossible.

He specifically stated that his intention is not to stop skilled
crackers, but rather stopping users passing around copies freely
within
his industry or org.

This should be fairly trivial.

A serial based on username and/or some hardware metric. (mac
address?)
would be enough to stop this type of piracy. No expensive 3rd party
sw
is needed for this type of protection.

Just enough incentive to make these users spend more of their bosses
money on a key rather than just moving an exe file to another pc.


Rad [Visual C# MVP] wrote:
On 9 Dec 2006 19:06:20 -0800, Blake wrote:

If you are not worried about skillful crackers breaking your
protection
system, why don't you roll your own? It should be fairly trivial
to
write a routine to validate a serial or key.

The hard part is keeping that routine away from prying eyes, but
as
you've stated it is not likely that 'real' crackers will have a go
at
your apps, so simply obfuscating your assemblies and including a
key
validating routine should be enough right?



Implementing your own protection system is much trickier than it
sounds. I
would not recommend going along that route. You need some
professionally
done system like xheo licensing
http://xheo.com/products/enterprise/licensing/default.aspx

If cost is an issue you can also check out OpenLicense
http://openlicense.tigris.org/, which is free
--
Bits.Bytes
http://bytes.thinkersroom.com













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