Hardware keys for PaperClip 64 & Delphi's Oracle

[yoyodyne]

Hi,
I've got the hardware keys (dongles) for PaperClip 64
& Delphi's Oracle. Both plug into the joystick port. I will
never need them. I never received any software when I got these,
but I did try PaperClip with a copy of the program once, but the
disk was bad. Anybody want these? You pay for postage and
they are yours.


Thanks-
Brian

[Jeff-20]

I have several mysterious dongles... what exactly do these things do?

[carlsson]

A dongle often connect two (or more?) wires, possibly with some circuit to generate a pulse if it is advanced. I believe some may even be readable like a ROM.

[yoyodyne]

I think in this case the software *looks* for the presence of the
dongle, and if it is not there, does not run.

Copy protection.

Make as many copies of the disk as you want, but if you
loose the dongle, they won't work.

[Jeff-20]

It seems like an expensive way to copy protect.

[MacbthPSW]

It seems like an expensive way to copy protect.

Relatively expensive, but also very effective. Disks could be copied (I don't think anyone had thought of deliberately adding errors to disks at this point), codes/passwords ("software keys") could be copied, but it's very difficult to copy a dongle.

Of course, very simple dongles could be fairly easily patched out of software, but more complicated ones would require a major effort.

And the expense of the dongle didn't matter all that much to the companies involved - I'm quite certain they passed the extra cost on to their customers

Dongles are still in use today by some companies, particularly expensive niche software, such as some GIS software used by my employer.

[yoyodyne]

Dongles are still in use today by some companies, particularly expensive niche software, such as some GIS software used by my employer.

Thats interesting that you mention that, I used to work for
MicroImages in Lincoln. I remember taking customer support calls
for their GIS from some users in Canada ....

but that was about 15 years ago.