🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <YFoj85AAqUE2EwCn@upthorpe.demon.co.uk>, Oz@upthorpe.demon.co.uk says...
;>
;>In article <6urf11$1j1$1@news3.cableinet.co.uk>, John
;><jps@peachworld.com> writes
;>
;>>Also does anyone know of any better ways to add copy protection to a program
;>>which can be easily implemented in TP7? I realise that no copy protection
;>>technique is perfect.
;>
;>I thought up one once, but never implemented it.
;>
;>The idea was to scratch (or dissolve) off a small patch of the mangetic
;>surface of a floppy and format it. One can then locate the areas that
>;have no surface and code that into each individual program. Each disk
;>would be different of course. Then a write to those tracks and sectors
;>followed by a read will always give a zero (or one, or whatever) for
;>that disk, but not for a copy. I would imagine it would be hard to
;>duplicate such damage exactly and it only requires some concealment of
;>the r/w code and that ought to put most people off.
;>
;>Anyhow, one can dream.
;>
;>-- 
;>Oz

It WAS done, it is called "laser marking", basically it meant that a
laser was used to burn small holes in the disk, with the same effect.
The pattern of holes would be unique.

Other techniques are to find and consult the network address in the
attached network card (obviously only for network programs), it is
said to be unique for every card.

There is a good rule of thumb for this kind of thing. If you are worried
about your code being ripped off enough to spend serious amounts of time
working on a copy protection scheme, then you don't have anything
really worth copying.

                                     [sam]