Lothar Scholz [mailto:mailinglists / scriptolutions.com]: > Hello Will, >> Just for a little bit of fun, I wrote a dumb obfuscator. It >> takes a ruby script and converts it to a C integer array with the >> ASCII values increased by array size and the letter's index in >> the array. This is then included in a C source file. This then >> converts the code back to a char array in dynamically allocated >> memory and evaluates it with rb_eval_string_protect. [...] > This is not obfuscated ruby. As i said it takes 3 min to add the > following 4 c lines into the parse.c file Actually, yes, it is. Obfuscated != pirate-proof. Obfuscated != hard protection. Obfuscated simply means that it's just a bit harder to deal with for the casual person -- and *this* is all that the OP wanted in the first place. It's not necessary to have something by cryptographically secure before it is considered acceptable for a person's needs, as long as the limitations of the approach are understood. Obfuscation isn't security, but it sure helps prevent your average user from doing something they shouldn't. -austin -- austin ziegler * austin.ziegler / evault.com