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How to restrict a VMWare Linux from distribution, e.g. restrict the copy and move to another computer?

In a case, I have sold a specific VMWare Linux (which contains a specific software) to someone and I want to restrict him/her from distribution of that VMware Linux! How can I do that?

Gilles 'SO- stop being evil'
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Majid Rafei
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  • Th's is not viable. Your going to have to make your software phone home if you want to prevent it's copying. However that is usually the wrong way to go. – coteyr May 25 '15 at 14:27

1 Answers1

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I don't think there's a built in feature in VMWare to protect virtual machines (I might be wrong). However you can bind your linux installation (or installed software) to the machine UUID that you can get by (as super user):

cat /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/product_uuid

In real machines (not virtual) this information is written in the hardware and cannot be changed and uniquely identifies your computer. I don't know how virtual machines generates this. It could be bound in some way to the hosting real machine (in this case it will change when running to virtual machiene to another host) or it could be written somewhere in the virtual machine image. My suggestion is to run that command above in the same virtual machine but running on two different hosts. If the output value changes then you can use that in some startup scripts (or even in your software) to prevent running it on other hosts.

lviggiani
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  • Thanks. I have checked the command for the same VMWare Linux in two different computers as you said. But, I received the same result! So, VMWare produces an optional fixed information resulted from this command. – Majid Rafei May 25 '15 at 16:25