Av been in the programming line for 3yrs now. As God may have. It has been wonderful. Now i just finished building an application using visual studio. Vb.net to b precise and its a windows application. I want to assign a licenses key to it so dat it wl be use during installation. Then if u don''t have a licenses key, it wl allow you use the product for 15 days, den it deactivate the product until you insert a licenses key. This is my major headache right. Please, any help will be appreciated. Thanks in advance my fellow programmer. We network the world.

Kirusky4life: Av been in the programming line for 3yrs now. As God may have. It has been wonderful. Now i just finished building an application using visual studio. Vb.net to b precise and its a windows application. I want to assign a licenses key to it so dat it wl be use during installation. Then if u don''t have a licenses key, it wl allow you use the product for 15 days, den it deactivate the product until you insert a licenses key. This is my major headache right. Please, any help will be appreciated. Thanks in advance my fellow programmer. We network the world.

you need to learn cryptography and hashing, google should be a starting point

You will need to get the hardware details of each computer the software is installed.
encrypt it and check for modification each time the software is started.

you use Mac address and append unique codes to it

@Ababi, pls bro. is there a code for me to get the system mac address of each system.

ABAboi: You will need to get the hardware details of each computer the software is installed.
encrypt it and check for modification each time the software is started.

you use Mac address and append unique codes to it

mind u mac address can be tampered with

my best advice is use registry

Using a Mac Address of a NIC is a pretty lame idea... The user can simply change MAC addresses to that of his friend and thus hav d same key.

Learn Cryptography, hashing and salting as mentioned earlier, you may use the windows registry (Software trick-locks)

the most convenient way to do it is via software locks but it offers least protection. For higher protection, you may use HARDWARE locks, like generating a license key based on the Partition ID of Windows Hard Disk partion.

For example, the ID is "2AC7xxx...etc" then you have 2 algorithm.
The 1st algorithm ALGO1, salts it via methodic process(there are many types of salting techniques.) by probably converting all Characters to ASCII, do cyclic addition (with modulo). If the ascii was
51, 97, 99, 56, x, x, x etc. You may now do.
5+51, 3+97, 1+99, -1+56, 0+x, .. 2+x, ...4+x. ...etc.
(in sequence of 2. If adding factor is less than 0, change starting point, and direction)
then send the salted value to you the software maker.
You use the 2nd algorithm ALGO2 to transform that into a unique key.

You now send the user that key. And the software(having ALGO2) uses it to verify equality.

Though its quite expensive for Nigerian market if you do not have a website or the clients lacks internet.
You can have them SMS or mail you!
Thats that! But for offline licensing, you cant enjoy that easily... But you still have options, like Software locks, ... Hiding and masking(using different entries under different unrelated names) registration key and installation time in the Windows registry is the easiest.

... ..... Regards,
. . . . . . . . . . WhiZTiM.

no matter the logic you apply, win32dasm and numerous hex editors exists to bypass the license logic
any solution that does not check a remote server for license can be cracked
the host file.

You could use the FlexLM API for VB applications. There are countless software license manager APIs floating around but FlexNet(just mentioned) is one of the most popular. There are also some open source license managers.

I am assuming you will be interested in either maintaining your own license server for end-users to authenticate against it or you could rely on any of the numerous cloud-based license management services.

Start your search here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_manager

Regards.

Fact remains that most licensing process can be hacked.

I am assuming that the project he is working on is not as sophisticated as you guys think.

Kirusky, try using the My.computer.X.X Namespace to get various computer properties.

Encrypt the values and save it locally. Validate the file content with the computer property each time you execute your program

ABAboi: Fact remains that most licensing process can be hacked.

I am assuming that the project he is working on is not as sophisticated as you guys think.

Kirusky, try using the My.computer.X.X Namespace to get various computer properties.

Encrypt the values and save it locally. Validate the file content with the computer property each time you execute your program

. Tanks guy am very grateful. But am not a he. Am a she. Happy nu yr

Using a server time stamp would work, get user hardware ID (Board serial), Current Server Date and other info you think is best(Do Not use Hard Disk serial because that changes at every format...I could even develop a small app to change Hard Disk serial without formatting the drive)and SEND to server for stamping.Each time the application is launched, it confirms with the server before use. The disadvantage however, is the fact that users will require internet to use your app. Personally I don't do web things...I am strictly a desktop app developer, but all my apps have cloud capabilities. I had to develop a keygen which will combine the username of the PC and board serial to generate a unique serial key which cannot be used on another PC.

webdezzi: no matter the logic you apply, win32dasm and numerous hex editors exists to bypass the license logic
any solution that does not check a remote server for license can be cracked
the host file.

GBAM!!!

CodeHouse: Using a server time stamp would work, get user hardware ID (Board serial), Current Server Date and other info you think is best(Do Not use Hard Disk serial because that changes at every format...I could even develop a small app to change Hard Disk serial without formatting the drive)and SEND to server for stamping.Each time the application is launched, it confirms with the server before use. The disadvantage however, is the fact that users will require internet to use your app. Personally I don't do web things...I am strictly a desktop app developer, but all my apps have cloud capabilities. I had to develop a keygen which will combine the username of the PC and board serial to generate a unique serial key which cannot be used on another PC.

pls how do i get the hardware board ID & username ppty and how do u integrate those values for producn a unique serialID.
A code snippet wil help
2. Which installer creator could b usd 4ds unique serialID..?

I have successfully made an executable program using html code,it has features like serial key,licence number and validity period.No need of passing thru d hurdles of syntax error!...besides you're using VB,it wud hav been more easier if u were using delphi IDE.

@Danyl what language are you using? one of the best way to curb piracy of your app (offline apps) is to call users or have them call you for the serial key..that way you'd have a database of your clients. I believe your application is a desktop app (not html or any site things...)? Do not bother about the keygen...I will compile a small app, which will be integrated into your application as the registration module (this registration module will automatically get the username of users pc and the hardware ID. Users will call(toll free, I believe) or use short code sms...which ever way to get the key to activate the application...They will send you the username and hardware ID from which you will generate a serial key (Note: serial keys generated is unique and do not repeat,therefore two users can't use one serial key since it is system generated and uses MD5 encryption algorithm) Note: I am going to be using my compiler to dev a keygen for you (I have been using it over the years and it is confirmed to work)

2. I believe with whatever language you are using, you could develop your own installer. You do not need any installer to create the unique ID, The keygen would solve that problem. But if you can't code an installer, you could use inno setup to distribute your app.

Here's a screen shot of my serial generator! There are two parts to it, first part is integrated in your app, which is to automatically get the username of users pc and unique hardware ID, after which they are to send you that so as for you to use the serial keygen (second part) to generate a unique serial key for the application - 30days, 90 days, or full version

@codehouse, thanks for you response. Iam using Java to develop and am also using Innoset compiler but i dont really like the unique ID being generated by Innosetup compiler but i will like to have this your unique serial ID generator and how to integrate it into my application.

Hi mate! Sorry it took this long to reply to your post, recently..last month precisely, I got roobed of my laptop (..all my apps, source codes and development tools all gone...ufff!) If your app is a window based app, with native .exe or msi extension..do send me just d name you intend to use for your app, so I can write a front end for it which will include the serial module. My mail paulodiete@gmail.com

CodeHouse: Hi mate! Sorry it took this long to reply to your post, recently..last month precisely, I got roobed of my laptop (..all my apps, source codes and development tools all gone...ufff!) If your app is a window based app, with native .exe or msi extension..do send me just d name you intend to use for your app, so I can write a front end for it which will include the serial module. My mail paulodiete@gmail.com

really sori 4ur loss,i'll send u a mail... I nid it as wel. My email addr is: danoxgroup@gmail.com & olabiyi007@gmail.com.