[erlang-questions] Stand Alone Erlang or Equivalent

[David Hopwood]

Benjamin Tolputt wrote:
> Vlad Dumitrescu wrote:
>> Erm, if the byte-code is encrypted, how would you replace a beam file 
>> with a different one without breaking the encryption?
>
> You wouldn't. Like most "single player" games, you would simply "patch" 
> the archive containing the beam files "as a whole" (i.e. as a binary 
> patch to the archive file rather than individual patches to the files 
> contained therein).

I think you missed Vlad's point: it is the encryption, alone, that puts
obstacles in the way of "unauthorized" changes. Whether the files are
stored in a single archive or separately has nothing to do with it.

> In summary, we KNOW DRM (i.e. "client side" encryption & single archive 
> deployments) are not the best (or even a completely successful) method 
> of protecting the application from unauthorized copying/changing.

Any generic support for copy protection in the VM could easily be
*generically* bypassed, for all applications that used it. If you want
to obtain security through obscurity, it has to be done for each
application independently, otherwise it is not "obscure" in the sense
required. So, why are you asking for this as a generic feature?
(The VM is open source; encryption of beam files is easy to add.)

> It, however, is necessary to get the publishing deals for PC games (the 
> target market).

It would also add complexity to the VM and have a performance cost.

-- 
David Hopwood <david.hopwood@REDACTED>