Protection from emulators.

Has anyone thought about the subject?

I currently know only 3 methods to distinguish real hardware from emulators -
checking the operation of the commands ld a,i or ld a,r with interrupts allowed,
checking the execution time of individual commands and performance in In general,
checking the operating time of individual commands in 1818VG93, and for the most buggy
and ancient emulators, you can try to check the correct emulation of the
R register and the F register. Trying to use undocumented commands is, IMHO, useless.

For many emulators definitely have problems with the speed of their work relative to the speed of interruptions and all existing commands ld a,i and ld a,r with correct emulation (at the moment when an interrupt occurs). There are other problems with the VGshka - not all computers have the ability to easily and most importantly quickly read its registers.

But it is not enough to provide for a simple check, because bad emulator developers can
take a debugger and fix everything. It is necessary to decipher the program code, taking into account
all the differences between emulators and Spectrum. But this is not enough - the computer on which the emulator is running very often runs many times faster than the Spectrum, which means the emulator operator can write a program to correctly decipher the code. To ensure more reliable protection against the emulator, you should duplicate all checks multiple times in all parts of the program,then if an emulator developer wants to run this program, he will have to do a lot of manual work.

Now bad emulator developers can write that I’m buggy and accuse me
of being an emulator guy too. But I know for sure that it wasn’t me who came up with protection from the emulator, which means it’s not only of interest to me. I know that there is a computer magazine for Spectrum in which a whole range of protective measures against the emulator is used. But I don’t know what it’s called and of course I don’t have it :-(

Why am I talking.... It’s high time to systematize all the knowledge regarding protection from bad emulators and apply this very protection wherever possible, and first of all in new programs.

Kirill

24/03/99, 18:02. Kirill Frolov writes All :

KF> regarding the speed of interruptions and all existing commands ld a,i and ld a,r with correct
KF> emulation (at the moment when the interruption occurs).
Well, you Kirill is quite behind the times here. ZX Emul 0.33 emulates
EVERYTHING you wrote here. The only thing is that VG works too quickly.

KF> Why am I saying this.... It’s high time to systematize all the knowledge regarding
KF> protection from bad emulators and apply this very protection wherever possible
KF>, and first of all in new programs.
WHY? Why are you so angry? And if a person sold the Spectrum, like me, and
continues to engage in Speccy on the PC? Do you feel sorry?

p/s Sorry for the offtopic. It just became offensive. :(

Fuck you, Kirill... That's it... Bye...
I.

So that fewer people would use the program?

Wolf of eTc/Scene

sce...@usa.net for letters
real...@usa.net for files

... ·∙■▀■▄■ ·e∙T∙c· ■▄■▀■∙· WHQ: Ukraine∙Cherkassy∙South-West

Thursday March 25, 1999 17:19, Alexander Kulik (2:4635/8.18) wrote to Kirill Frolov:

AK> Well, who are you telling tales to, who will blame you? Every
AK> normal person will understand that if a program on an emulator does not work, then it is necessary
AK> to look at this program on a real spec.

Or ask the author where and why he learned to code ;)

AK> So that fewer people would use the program?

So that hackers don’t die out ;) No, seriously, stupid and a mediocre idea... it would be better to do something useful than to play dirty tricks on others...

AK> Wolf of
AK> eTc/Scene

Sincerely, Dmitry (OLDMAN). 500:095/100.1@ZXNet
old...@i-connect.ru

KF> regarding protection from bad emulators

Done.

KF> and apply this same protection wherever possible, and
KF> first of all in new programs.

The most reliable method is the method based on the discovery of Ivan Roshchin... Although,
as shown life, everything was stolen before us and this method was first used by the bourgeoisie, and Roshchin only documented it. In Russian. ;)

KF> Kirill

With respect, Alex Noman.

AK>> Every normal person will understand that if a program on an emulator does not
AK>> work, then you need to look at this program on a real spec.
DG> Or ask the author where and why he learned to code ;)

We will ask DR when the CIS will be released (Flyer seems to have said that since
the magazine does not work everywhere)... :) If it comes out, of course... Although I spoke to Artie the other day, he replied that after the CC99 invitation one should wait. ;) We can't get used to it. ;)

So that they are not run in emulators. When was the last time you turned on the Spectrum? Or do you not have it?

Kirill

Wolf of eTc/Scene

sce...@usa.net for letters
real...@usa.net for files

... ·∙■▀■▄■ ·e∙T∙c· ■▄■▀■∙· WHQ: Ukraine∙Cherkassy∙South-West

AN> The most reliable method is the method based on the discovery of Ivan
AN> Roshchin... Although, as life has shown, everything was stolen before us and
AN> this method was first used by the bourgeoisie, and Roshchin only
AN> documented it. In Russian. ;)

The method was used earlier in our country, for example, in Realsoft's protections in 1997
. However, it was undeniably Ivan Roshchin who unveiled the method.

I was with you http://ftl.da.ru ICQ:1939489
Ars^FTL E-mail:ars...@usa.net 500:17/1@ZXNet

Wednesday March 24 1999 18:02, Kirill Frolov ─── All:

KF> Has anyone thought about the subject?
Take the Oberon magazine somewhere around the third issue, and see how the definition is made there
emulator...

EM> Take the Oberon magazine somewhere around the third issue, and look
EM> how the emulator definition is done there...

It sucks. ;) Complete flight. :)) Read bd5, my friend. :))