CIS Planet

Alsalam alikom wa ra7mat Allah wa barakatoh

As we all know -and suffer- one of the biggest issues with applications written in .NET is that they are so easily reverse engineered.. Even after using obfuscator programs, the logic is still there in the assembly and it's still written in MSIL which is a very easy language to read and hence decompile.

Microsoft's offered a new product called Code Protector, which comes in the SLP (Secure Licensing and Protection) solution... and I'll try to briefly speak about the features it offers.

Let's declare something first:
- SVML (Secure Virtual Machine Language):
It's a language that .NET framework understands and can actually execute, this language has 2 features:
* It's secure (It's actually encrypted)
* It's one way transformation, any MSIL code can be converted to SVML but it can never be retrieved (something like a very powerful unique hashing)

The main features that SLP offers are:

1- Code Protection:
Code Protector allows you to select any number of methods (or classes) that you believe are potentially dangerous to be left unprotected (hard coded connection string!, license validation, server credentials... etc) and then with a simple click on the Protect button, nobody will be able to reverse engineer this part of code (hopefully) let's see a simple example..

1- Add Module browse to the exe you want to protect
2- Select methods/classes/namespaces that you want to protect
3- Click protected... bingo

Here is what happens when I tried to reflect the code..

A screenshot from Lutz .NET Reflector for an exe before applying any protection

A screenshot for the same reflected code after applying the protection, does it make any sense or does it give you any figure about what the original code was? for me, it doesn't...

That was the first benefit for using SLP...

2- Dynamic Licensing:
Companies that offer products with different types of licenses (Trial, Demo, Basic, Professional, Enterprise... etc) will really like this..
The usual way to offer multiple license is this scenario:
- Marketing guys do some market research and decide what features/licenses do they want to offer,
- They go back to the dev team and ask them to "modify" the code to check for those types of licenses
- The dev team go into the code, put some more checks to disable/enable certain features.. they recompile, test and then ship to the sales guys...

So long story... imagine if after this iteration, a customer declared that he is only interested in a set of features and they he's only ready to pay for those (and believe me, this is WHAT customers are looking for now..)... you will have to repeat this process again and again for every customer request... it's very very bad/costy (money & time) and moreover offers a reasonable opportunity to produce more bugs

Here comes this feature in benefit, when you select certain portions of code to be protected, you are also offered a chance to bind this with specific feature.. as the following screenshot..


Now, all what you will need to do when the marketing guys think of a new license type is to select the set of features you want to include in the new features set.

There is one thing I didn't mention which is the portal that allows you to generate licenses, prepare features sets track license usage... etc but it's straight forward and you can figure it out on your own :)

References:
SLP official website: http://www.microsoft.com/slps/ (Where I watched a video that explains everything in more details...)

Thanks,
Haytham Alaa

Alsalam alikom wa ra7mat Allah wa barakatoh

Sitting in a lot of public places (or even your house), you will usually find a list of Wifi networks available... like this:
And of course it doesn't let you access multiple networks at the same time...

Here is the deal, I'll let you connect to multiple networks but I'll slower each a little bit...

That's what the Microsoft Research project Virtual Wifi does... whenever you connect to a wireless network (using the Zero-Config utility that comes with windows) you can execute:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Research\Microsoft Research Mesh Virtual WIFI\Virtual WiFi\Binaries>VirtualWiFi.exe install -wep enable -auth open -key EnterYourKeyHere...
or whatever configurations your wireless network uses..

Virtual Wifi will create a virtual connection for the currently connected Wireless network..

Virtual Wifi is a utility under research and is released under a shared source license. Don't expect it will be perfect but it worth a trial :)

You can visit it's website here

Alsalam alikom wa ra7mat Allah wa barakatoh

"I Won't Give Up Like Others Or Like I had Made Last Time".....
i have said these words when i began to get bored or get puzzled when i was using Ubuntu Operating system and the devil says to me : " What makes you use it and there is another operating system more comfortable , and what makes you use such complications while you are having some other more simple"
when i listened those words from that devil of mine i remembered that i had made setup for Ubuntu 3 times before and i removed it for the same reasons ... really i think that anyone in my shoes might say to him self these words but Now i ill list you the advantages of using Open and free sources:

Free software is a matter of the users' freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. More precisely, it refers to four kinds of freedom, for the users of the software:

• The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
• The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
• The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
• The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits (freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

A program is free software if users have all of these freedoms. Thus, you should be free to redistribute copies, either with or without modifications, either gratis or charging a fee for distribution, to anyone anywhere. Being free to do these things means (among other things) that you do not have to ask or pay for permission.

You should also have the freedom to make modifications and use them privately in your own work or play, without even mentioning that they exist. If you do publish your changes, you should not be required to notify anyone in particular, or in any particular way.

The freedom to run the program means the freedom for any kind of person or organization to use it on any kind of computer system, for any kind of overall job and purpose, without being required to communicate about it with the developer or any other specific entity. In this freedom, it is the user's purpose that matters, not the developer's purpose; you as a user are free to run a program for your purposes, and if you distribute it to someone else, she is then free to run it for her purposes, but you are not entitled to impose your purposes on her.

The freedom to redistribute copies must include binary or executable forms of the program, as well as source code, for both modified and unmodified versions. (Distributing programs in runnable form is necessary for conveniently installable free operating systems.) It is ok if there is no way to produce a binary or executable form for a certain program (since some languages don't support that feature), but you must have the freedom to redistribute such forms should you find or develop a way to make them.

In order for the freedoms to make changes, and to publish improved versions, to be meaningful, you must have access to the source code of the program. Therefore, accessibility of source code is a necessary condition for free software.

One important way to modify a program is by merging in available free subroutines and modules. If the program's license says that you cannot merge in an existing module, such as if it requires you to be the copyright holder of any code you add, then the license is too restrictive to qualify as free.

In order for these freedoms to be real, they must be irrevocable as long as you do nothing wrong; if the developer of the software has the power to revoke the license, without your doing anything to give cause, the software is not free.

However, certain kinds of rules about the manner of distributing free software are acceptable, when they don't conflict with the central freedoms. For example, copyleft (very simply stated) is the rule that when redistributing the program, you cannot add restrictions to deny other people the central freedoms. This rule does not conflict with the central freedoms; rather it protects them.

You may have paid money to get copies of free software, or you may have obtained copies at no charge. But regardless of how you got your copies, you always have the freedom to copy and change the software, even to sell copies.

Free software does not mean non-commercial. A free program must be available for commercial use, commercial development, and commercial distribution. Commercial development of free software is no longer unusual; such free commercial software is very important.

Rules about how to package a modified version are acceptable, if they don't substantively block your freedom to release modified versions, or your freedom to make and use modified versions privately. Rules that if you make your version available in this way, you must make it available in that way also can be acceptable too, on the same condition. (Note that such a rule still leaves you the choice of whether to publish your version at all.) Rules that require release of source code to the users for versions that you put into public use are also acceptable. It is also acceptable for the license to require that, if you have distributed a modified version and a previous developer asks for a copy of it, you must send one, or that you identify yourself on your modifications.

In the GNU project, we use copyleft to protect these freedoms legally for everyone. But non-copylefted free software also exists. We believe there are important reasons why it is better to use copyleft, but if your program is non-copylefted free software, we can still use it.

See Categories of Free Software for a description of how free software, copylefted software and other categories of software relate to each other.

Sometimes government export control regulations and trade sanctions can constrain your freedom to distribute copies of programs internationally. Software developers do not have the power to eliminate or override these restrictions, but what they can and must do is refuse to impose them as conditions of use of the program. In this way, the restrictions will not affect activities and people outside the jurisdictions of these governments.

Most free software licenses are based on copyright, and there are limits on what kinds of requirements can be imposed through copyright. If a copyright-based license respects freedom in the ways described above, it is unlikely to have some other sort of problem that we never anticipated (though this does happen occasionally). However, some free software licenses are based on contracts, and contracts can impose a much larger range of possible restrictions. That means there are many possible ways such a license could be unacceptably restrictive and non-free.

We can't possibly list all the ways that might happen. If a contract-based license restricts the user in an unusual way that copyright-based licenses cannot, and which isn't mentioned here as legitimate, we will have to think about it, and we will probably conclude it is non-free.

When talking about free software, it is best to avoid using terms like give away or for free, because those terms imply that the issue is about price, not freedom. Some common terms such as piracy embody opinions we hope you won't endorse. See Confusing Words and Phrases that are Worth Avoiding for a discussion of these terms. We also have a list of translations of free software into various languages.

Finally, note that criteria such as those stated in this free software definition require careful thought for their interpretation. To decide whether a specific software license qualifies as a free software license, we judge it based on these criteria to determine whether it fits their spirit as well as the precise words. If a license includes unconscionable restrictions, we reject it, even if we did not anticipate the issue in these criteria. Sometimes a license requirement raises an issue that calls for extensive thought, including discussions with a lawyer, before we can decide if the requirement is acceptable. When we reach a conclusion about a new issue, we often update these criteria to make it easier to see why certain licenses do or don't qualify.

If you are interested in whether a specific license qualifies as a free software license, see our list of licenses. If the license you are concerned with is not listed there, you can ask us about it by sending us email at .

If you are contemplating writing a new license, please contact the FSF by writing to that address. The proliferation of different free software licenses means increased work for users in understanding the licenses; we may be able to help you find an existing Free Software license that meets your needs.

If that isn't possible, if you really need a new license, with our help you can ensure that the license really is a Free Software license and avoid various practical problems.

{These info. in BLUE is copied for summing up what i have read from this link}

After reading these info. on the link i have attached in the previous note , i saw that Ubuntu is so delicious operating system to use because it is giving me the freedom by its benefits .... it respects my thoughts and appreciates my brain and needs my creations ..... really it varies from using a closed operating system like windows , even windows is a successful opertaing system to ordinary users , Ubuntu and its family still extra-ordinary operating systems ... and for me or anyone in my field of programming whether a beginner -like me- or an expert having large data of experience in that field THE IDEAL FOR OUR WAY OF THINKING ..... simply because it made us program it (OS) so it made us still on the track we are running on in our work and studdies (Programming)...

My last word... Don't Give Up .. it is so interesting to know about this world.. when you still illiterate about it think that you won't even know a new language in your field of programming....

For Me To Be a BASHMOBARMEGA ............I WON'T GIVE UP

N0Ga (Yasmeen)

I remembered the conversation on the MSN when i was talking to Hasan Ibrahim and i showed him the post which i was telling in it what i wish i have some blog like his
Gded ...... Modawana lel tekneyya ded el e7tekar
really what i am proud when i read a post on its pages
I remember Hasan's question when i showed him that post
He asked why don't you have one?
Now .. i don't remember my answer but all what i remembered that i answered an answer relating to that i haven't the heavy data to make a blog about open sources or about something technical
like Gded
But ... today Someone added my email from my blog (3akela 3ala ard el gnon)
and she didn't wanna have a blog even she is a good writer and she has good Arabic language .. she don't wanna have a blog .... i don't remember what made me remember Hasan's MSN conversation but i thought even she is'nt a good writer "What makes her don't make a blog????!!!!!"
And by solving the two equations by addition smultiniously we get:
Why don't i have One as Hasan said ??!!
So i started my first post In BASHMOBARMEGA Blog by a special thank to Hasan Ibrahim
Thanks Hasan
And thanks Samar the girl who made me think about this idea
At last..... i wanna say that i will summarize all my info. about programming which i will start from today ....
And summing up the info. that i will try to gather about Open Sources Linux Ubuntu and other operating systems that respects my own brain my own thoughts my own imaginations and ideas.
Thanks ... Ibrahim The Open Source FCISer


yours sincerely .....
N0Ga (Yasmeen)

As most of the developers are poor designers I think this site -User Interface Design Patterns- is very useful for a developer to structure his information about user interface design