jat@xavax.com (John Tamplin) (01/26/91)
In article <91@tdatirv.UUCP> sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) writes: >Hmm, I have yet to see a truly non-intrusive scheme. I would require the >following before I considered a scheme non-intrusive: > >1. Allows backups to be made of the software, which can be used to restore > the protected software in case of media failure. > >2. Does not require any special hardware to run (the least intrusive system I > have yet seen appears to require a network conection to the vendor! Not > all of my systems have any netowrk capability) > >3. Does not require any user validation beyond normal login procedures. > (e.g. no extra passwords to run the package) > >4. Can be reinstalled on a new machine immediately in case of major > hardware failure. I personnaly favor floating license schemes. You tie a license to a particular license server (with some serial number or Ethernet address) and the info is protected cryptographically. If your license server goes down, call up the company, give them the new serial # info, they give you a password to allow those licenses to run on the new server. The license numbers would still be the same, so the software could detect duplicate licenses on the network. Of course, this doesn't stop you from putting them on separate networks (or even locations). A way to fix that is to have the licenses expire after some period of time. This would also allow the user to pay so much per month per user or even per hour of usage, and it would probably mean lower costs since the vendor wouldn't have to recover their development costs on a one-time fee. Demo licenses would work exactly the same way -- you could give someone a fully functional copy of your software with a 30-day license. In summary, I think floating licenses are the most flexible form of copy protection (both to the vendor and the user), and are the most unobtrusive. Additionally, it makes new forms of software marketing viable. I speak both from an end-user's and a software developer's point of view. -- John Tamplin Xavax jat@xavax.COM 2104 West Ferry Way ...!uunet!xavax!jat Huntsville, AL 35801