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FreeFalcon / freefalcon-central

A campaign based, multiplayer, open source flight simulator.
http://freefalcon.org/
BSD 2-Clause "Simplified" License
157 stars 99 forks source link

FF Copyprotection stragneness #16

Open PeterMeyer opened 11 years ago

PeterMeyer commented 11 years ago

I just got the Info out of the Community, thadt our Friend Fred BaldEgale has done some nasty things in one of the most used tools for modding (LODEditor) wich has its Counterpart in FFViper.exe See the text below.

In the Contribsection there is some Code of LODEditor Maybe we should check the code and tell our Userbase not working with the blackboxed, harmfull LODEditor Version.

LODEditor 7.0.2.4 and later

Commandline switches:

-dxl -ffdev

-ffim -hires -dxl -ffdev -adm1n -unlkdb -qed -debug

-hisw

Menu: Dev Utilities "Lock DB", "Unlock DB" and "Check DB Status" functions.

The current security DB status has a check mark next to Lock DB or Unlock DB.

To lock and unlock the DB or check its status, use LE with "-ffdev" commandline switch and the Dev Utilities "Lock DB", "Unlock DB" and "Check DB Status" functions.

d:\FFalcon\files.dir

moved to:

d:\FFalcon\Sounds\files.dir

d: = FF install drive

RedViper.* and FFViper Config Editor.exe are zeroed out when FFViper.exe is run.

For FFViper KoreaObj.dxh Parent record nDOF and nSwitch variables were put in variables that can hold bigger values. When KO.dxh is "Locked", Falcon 4 versions other than FFViper, will crash due to the original nDOF and nSwitch variables being set to zero. "Unlocking" KO.dxh copies the new nDOF and nSwitch variable values to the original variables.

d:\FFalcon\terrdata\objects\Falcon4.* files (except Falcon4.phd and Falcon4.pd)

The number of entries (records) in the file is moved to the end of the file and zero is put in the number of entries position (first 2 bytes).

FFViper.cfg must have "set b_gFFDBC 1" for FFViper.exe to work. All other exe's will error out. (This method will be used for release of FF 5.x).

Added "safe" DB access (detects the DB status) for LE and FFViper. (This method will be removed for release of FF 5.x).

To lock and unlock the DB or check its status, use LE with "-ffdev" commandline switch and the Dev Utilities "Lock DB", "Unlock DB" and "Check DB Status" functions.

End of File

vinnydiehl commented 11 years ago

Can FF run with an unlocked DB? I'd rather have everything unlocked and open.

PeterMeyer commented 11 years ago

Hmm, i dont know. But we should make clear it can run locked and unlocked beacause many of the Databases is made with this Tool. We have LODEditor in the Contrib Section, but i depends of lots on Falclib and other parts wich belongs to FFViper itself. I think we must provide an own version of it if FFViper is running or the Community is forced to use this Blackboxed thing who nobody knows what the good Fred is doing and hiding.

vinnydiehl commented 11 years ago

Think it would be better to just release new mod tools and redesign how modding in Falcon is done rather than fix the current modding interface/tools?

PeterMeyer commented 11 years ago

Hmm why not? As far as i can see. The Cockpitfiles are plain Textfiles. This type of Files can be editet manually. The other thing is Terrain. As far as i know, this is compiled into an BSP File, like the old Quake2 ones. I never cared about modding but i will find out. Maybe we should consider changing BSP to Octree for volume spacing, BSP is not the best Solution for OpenTerrain stuff.

PlutoniumHeart commented 11 years ago

File structure change like this: "d:\FFalcon\files.dir

moved to:

d:\FFalcon\Sounds\files.dir " is very important to know, if I have known this some of the commits to fix the error reading file would be unnecessary.

Do we have more of those changes?

PeterMeyer commented 11 years ago

This File is used to enforce the Copyprotection. i believe. I hope this is the only nasty thing. for me its now not clear if there is an link between LODEditor and this but our primary mission should be make thadt damm thing fly again.