closed source

[Milos Prudek]

> Numerous (*many*) past discussions of this have occurred... check the archives.

I would. I could not find web-searchable archives.

> own server and make the algorithms available across the network.  If you
> don't want to do this route, your only other real choice is to accept a
> greater risk that someone will see your source (heaven forbid!) and mitigate
> that risk by having appropriate software licence agreements in place with
> your customers.

Perfectly reasonable. Source availability / decompile option actually 
helps protect the source, because source code theft can be easiliy 
proved. Very good point.

This will not protect against illegal copying, however. Let's say that I 
need to create a program that could be downloaded as a demo, with 
activation code sent to people who purchase the software. This code 
could be generated by a small C program that creates a hash of the 
purchaser's hardware config. Inside the main Python program there would 
be an extension written in C that would check the activation code 
against the purchaser's hardware.

The idea here is that C is much harder to decompile than Python.

Now, for popular software such as Windows or Dreamweaver any protection 
is useless, because the demand for pirated software is too strong and 
the best minds pit against this protection. The program I talk about is 
intended for a very small market, though.

BTW I am a huge fan of Open Source. This is simply a technical question 
that a client asked.

Is this protection implementable?

-- 
Milos Prudek
_________________
Most websites are
confused chintzy gaudy conflicting tacky unpleasant... unusable.
Learn how usable YOUR website is! http://www.spoxdesign.com