Selling Python Software

[Radovan Garabik]

Will Stuyvesant <hwlgw at hotmail.com> wrote:
> Suppose I want to sell a (small, 1000 lines) Python program.  It is a
> commandline program for database applications and I have a customer. 
> The customer wants to "try it out" before buying.  The try-out version
> should be a full, complete, version.
> 
> As much as I like the opensource movement, I have a problem now.  If I
> just give them the Python source code then they can show it to their
> programmers and they have no reason anymore to pay money to me.  Sure
> that would break our agreements, but you know bussiness, legal issues.
> The thing the customer is interested in is the algorithm used in the
> program.  Not much I could do about such a scenario effectively.
> 
> I tried py2exe before, but someone told me it is always possible to
> decompile...revealing the source code.
> 
> Anybody has a solution to this, besides more legal paperwork (I am in
> europe...forget about claiming your rights here)?  Is it not possible
> to give away a Windows .exe file that can not be decompiled (or only
> with *extreme* difficulty)?

use upx to pack it. Of course, it is always possible to unpack
the executable, but if an effort to do so is bigger that money they would
pay you, it would not be in their interest. Or enter into google
"encrypt executable" and it will give you a plethora of links.

-- 
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| Radovan Garabík http://melkor.dnp.fmph.uniba.sk/~garabik/ |
| __..--^^^--..__    garabik @ kassiopeia.juls.savba.sk     |
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