From: Michal Suchanek <hramrach@...>
Date: 2008-10-20T21:32:57+09:00
Subject: Re: I found way to protect Source Code! :)

On 18/10/2008, Alexey Petrushin <axyd80@gmail.com> wrote:
> Thanks for advices :)
>
>  So, as I understood, there are:
>
>  - Software as a Service, with owned hosting.
>  Yes! This is the best one, but sometimes clients wants something
>  'physically' tangible :).
>
>  - JRuby Compiler (http://wiki.jruby.org/wiki/JRuby_Compiler)
>  It's fully finished and ready to use.
>
>  Translates <name>.rb => <name>.class and because it's not one to one
>  mapping there is an information lost, that can be seen as the
>  obfuscation.
>
>  There is no .class to .rb decompiler, and (though, I'm not sure) these
>  .class files cannot be decompiled even to .java ones.

It can be decompiled easily, there are decompilers for a long time already.

>
>  - Zenobfuscate (http://blog.zenspider.com/zenobfuscate/)
>  Has some limitations.
>  I've choose Ruby for all it's goodnesses, and don't want to give back
>  any of it. I'll better leave the product open than will agree to any
>  limitation.
>
>  - rubyencoder (rubyencoder.com)
>  Somehow they do it, don't know though how.
>
>
>
>  It seems, that JRuby Compiler is really what i need :).
>
>  I just want to rise barrier, to buy time if some company will try to
>  build a copy-product. For sure they'll can reverse engineer it, but not
>  so fast as if they will have original sources.
>  There is no need to protect from hackers & cracks, my product will be
>  free (but not open).

I would really like to understand the thinking of the 'freeware' authors.

Since the software is free anyway there is no need for competition to
develop a copy-product. They can have it, and for free.

On the other hand, if they want to improve on the product it is easier
if it is opensource, and you as the author of the original can have
the improvement then as well if you choose a license that warrants
that.

The most annoying part of 'freeware' is when it contains a bug or is
incompatible with a newer system, and the original author is no longer
reachable or won't bother to fix the problem.

But since it's your software use whatever feels right for you.

I am free to use the software - or not use it. Or perhaps only to not
use it if you translate it into java classes, and I am by chance
sitting at a system for which there is no decent Java runtime.

Thanks

Michal