distributing apps without the Python source?

[Joe Strout]

We have a client who's paranoid about distributing the Python source
to his commercial app. Is there some way I can distribute and use
just the .pyc files, so as to not give away the source?

Thanks,
- Joe

 

[Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch]

We have a client who's paranoid about distributing the Python source to
his commercial app. Is there some way I can distribute and use just the
.pyc files, so as to not give away the source?

Yes. Just use the *.pyc files.

Ciao,
Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch

 

[skip]

Marc> Yes. Just use the *.pyc files.

Though of course there is decompyle to consider, assuming Joe's client is
truly paranoid.

Skip

 

[Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch]

Marc> Yes. Just use the *.pyc files.

Though of course there is decompyle to consider, assuming Joe's client
is truly paranoid.

Simply don't tell the client. All he has to know is that it's basically
the same as Java *.class files. Most paranoid clients are fine with
that. Unless you tell them there are decompilers for *.class files.

Ciao,
Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch

 

[Bruno Desthuilliers]

Marc 'BlackJack' Rintsch a écrit :

Simply don't tell the client. All he has to know is that it's basically
the same as Java *.class files. Most paranoid clients are fine with
that. Unless you tell them there are decompilers for *.class files.

FWIW, even native binary code can be 'disassembled' and hacked.

 

[Paul Boddie]

I must point out though that if your client
is paranoid for intellectual property reasons
(ie: protecting his assets), then you should
be aware that even if you can decompile
a Python compiled module (or a compiled
java class), it's generally pretty useless in this
form to any would-be-thief.

I beg to differ on the usefulness of the decompiled code: Python
bytecode is pretty high-level stuff, and it doesn't leave that much to
the imagination. It may not give you nice source code, but if you want
answers to questions on how some mechanism in the code works,
decompyle does a reasonable job.

Decompiling/Disassembling never gets you
the original source code back.

True, but that's not always what you want, anyway. Some more opinions
on the subject can be found here:

http://wiki.python.org/moin/HowDoYouProtectSource

Paul

 

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

We have a client who's paranoid about distributing the Python source
to his commercial app.

"Commercial" is not synonymous with "closed source". If he wanted to keep
the source closed, Python was a poor choice. You could redo it in C or C++,
and charge the client appropriately* for all the extra time and effort etc.

*i.e. lots