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- Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc,comp.lang.c,comp.unix.admin,comp.security.unix
- Path: netcom.com!henderso
- From: henderso@netcom.com (Mark C. Henderson)
- Subject: Re: binaries (generated from "C" code)
- Message-ID: <hendersoDoy5yx.6GF@netcom.com>
- Organization: Netcom
- References: <4j7pge$9ga@xanadu.io.com> <4ja11e$e1m@mpro1.mpro.net> <4jbpkj$eo5@clark.net> <slrn4ljapj.ar.gjohnson@dream.season.com>
- Date: Wed, 27 Mar 1996 22:18:33 GMT
- Sender: henderso@netcom8.netcom.com
-
- In article <slrn4ljapj.ar.gjohnson@dream.season.com>,
- Reality is a point of view <gjohnson@dream.season.com> wrote:
- >
- >I have a fuzzy memory of cripple tactics like the above being
- >illegal. But it might have been specific to consultants and
- >time bombs (used to ensure a clients timely accounts payable).
-
- So many people implement schemes to try to "enforce" licence agreements,
- that it would surprise me if it were illegal.
-
- I'd rather there were no licence managers, and that vendors trusted
- their paying customers.
-
- On the other hand, the licence managers do play one important role,
- that is, tracking of licence usage. In that sense they help a company
- keep track of what licenses it is using, and avoid the situation
- where a company inadvertently is pirating software, because they only
- have a certain number of licenses for a certain feature, and they
- have exceeded it.
-
- So, what I'd really like is the best of both worlds. A licence
- tracking scheme that would allow the users to continue to use the
- application if too many licenses were being used, but one that would
- notify me of the situation so that the appropriate corrective action
- can take place. In the case of too many users, either we buy more
- licenses or ensure that their are fewer users.
-
- The essential problem with most licence managers is that their
- default, if they can't verify that there is a valid licence available
- for the application in question, is to deny someone access to the
- application. Better, let the user run the application and notify the
- user and/or the systems administrator that there is a problem with
- the licensing.
-
- Licence tracking without denial of service in the case of licensing
- problems would provide a service both to the vendor and the customer.
-
- --
- Mark Henderson -- markh@wimsey.bc.ca, henderso@netcom.com (personal accounts)
- ViaCrypt PGP Key Fingerprint: 21 F6 AF 2B 6A 8A 0B E1 A1 2A 2A 06 4A D5 92 46
- http://www.squirrel.com/squirrel/ - change-sun-hostid, unstrip for Solaris,
- computer security, TECO, FGMP, Sun NVRAM/hostid FAQ, Wimsey crypto archive
-