[Haskell-cafe] Software Deployment and Distribution - WAS Re: CUFP mailing list

[Erik de Castro Lopo]

Günther Schmidt wrote:

> I've written a commercial Desktop application in Haskell for the Win32 
> platform.
> 
> The one thing missing is Software Copy Protection, ie. a software 
> licensing mechanism. When I google for "Software Copy Protection" I get 
> a lot of results, commercial products themselves, which is fine, but I 
> can't tell which ones are any good or worth their money.
> 
> I've never seriously done C#, VB or whatever people mainly write Win32 
> apps in, so I don't know any mailing lista or forums where I could ask 
> this question. This list has pretty much been the only list I used for 
> more than 2 years now.
> 
> I've never seen a similar issued raised here before so I thought the 
> CUFP mailing list is a better place for this.
> 
> 
> Can anybody here recommend a good software for this then? I do not want 
> to code it myself and would prefer a ready to use solution, it it's not 
> free that fine too.

Well that certainly is an unusual question.

There are large companies like Apple, the RIAA and the MPAA who have put
large amounts of time, money and effort into copy protection schemes only
to have them broken, sometimes in as little as a day or two.

In addition, by the time you have a copy control mechanism that is
partially effective your users may find the experience so painful that
using cracked copies is easier. There is a common theme here:

    http://i.imgur.com/GxzeV.jpg
    http://www.bradcolbow.com/archive.php/?p=205
    http://xkcd.com/488/

Erik
-- 
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Erik de Castro Lopo
http://www.mega-nerd.com/