Re: Protection for Ada Binary Libraries

[arny@wayback.UUCP (Arny B. Engelson)]

In article <324@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu>, eberard@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu (Edward Berard) writes:
> Suppose one is developing an Ada product which is to be used by Ada
> software engineers. Part of this product involves a library of Ada
> packages. The developer wishes to make the package specifications
> available to his or her clients, but wishes to protect the bodies of
> these same packages. The mechanism the developer chooses is to create
> a "binary" Ada library using the library mechanisms provided by Ada
> development system vendors. (For example, on the DEC VAX the developer
> will use DEC's Ada library mechanism, and on a Sun Workstation the
> developer will supply several libraries, e.g., one for the TeleSoft
> compiler, one for the Verdix compiler, one for the Alsys compiler, and
> one for the Tartan Labs compiler.)
 
> Everything appears to be in order until the developer discovers that
> by using the symbolic debugger supplied in some of these environments,
> a client can have access to all the source code for the bodies to the
> packages.
> 				-- Ed Berard



I am currently faced with a similar problem.  My (current) solution (using
DEC's VAX Ada) is to simply delete the .ADC (the copied source) files from
the Ada library for those units that the user doesn't need to see.  The user
can still compile and link his/her own units with mine, but when the symbolic
debugger is invoked, it only displays the source code for the user's units.
I suppose a really resourceful person may be able to extract more information
from the intermediate code files, but for my situation this is sufficient.


  - Arny Engelson
  {ihnp4,clyde}!wayback!arny