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Development Of A Mobile Agent For Preventing Software Piracy On A Network
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1.5 RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND HYPOTHESES
Would
it be that software users are not educated about software piracy or
does it mean it still appeals to them ethically to still engage in
software piracy even when they are educated enough about software piracy
and its effect on the world economy. Would it not be appropriate for
software vendors to work very hard in order to safeguard their products
even if it affects the time they should have put in the development of
new products or enhancing available ones for a better users’ experience?
Most software products initially come with some features with the
inclusion of more features gradually over time in the name of release of
new versions of the same product. This indeed is more revenue for the
software vendors but causes regular budgeting for software costs by
users. The following questions could thus arise: Are these frequent new
releases strategies for making more money by the vendors, maybe to make
up for losses caused due to software piracy? Did these frequent needs
for users to pay and upgrade to newer versions lead to or encouraged
more piracy? Is it that the users of pirated software are not having in
mind the profitability and business sustenance of the vendors who claims
to have the needs of their clients in mind? Is there an expected end to
software piracy? Finally and more importantly, is technology really
needed to combat software piracy and how has technology applied in the
past able to fight piracy.
1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The
proposed study has Educational, Technological and Economic significance.
It is of educational significance to students, IT instructors and
lecturers in IT field who can use the study as instructional reference
for self study and tutorials when referring to software, piracy, coding
and also to ICT-driven services. It is also of educational significance
to researchers in areas of software piracy as a review study.
Technologically, it is of significance to software developers who engage
in seeking new systems of preventing software piracy through technical
means especially means relating to mobile agents or a combination of
mobile agents. The study will also be useful technologically and
economically to software vendors who has need to identify usage and
control installation limits of software as a way of frustrating piracy
and preventing financial losses.
1.7 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY
One
shortcoming of this study is based on the fact that the software
installer will encapsulate both the mobile agent and the actual software
which altogether forms a single unit that is copied to a CD or uploaded
to the vendor’s site, maybe as a single .php file. Only a few
professional programmers though can de-encapsulate this unit to separate
the component and run the actual software independently, though he will
need to do that faster if he knows the algorithm used for the
encapsulation. Therefore, this information should never be provided by
the vendor as a way of overcoming this shortcoming. Also the amount of
time that will be required for this de-encapsulation can discourage the
pirate. If the programmer-user eventually succeeds in de-encapsulating
the various components, he can spread the actual software to
non-programmer users and the spread continues from there. Another
limitation is the TUSRUC feature of the mobile agent system which is
though designed to make up for unforeseen contingencies on the side of
the users. The feature ensures that even if the software is made to be
installed on many computers, after the first installation, the
software/serial key combination enters a TUSRUC period which must elapse
before the software can be installed on the rest of the computers.
1.8 SCOPE/DELIMITATION OF THE STUDY
This
study is focus on preventing software piracy through technology. This
technology is the use of a mobile agent. The study will cover the
encapsulation of the actual software with mobile agent codes. It shall
also cover the coding and the development of the remote server/web
interface. The interaction between the mobile agent codes and a remote
server hosted on the site of the vendor during the authentication stage
of the software installation will also be covered. TUSRUC algorithm
function will also be studied which shows the way the system handles
cases of unforeseen contingencies during the “first time†period of
using the software product. This study however, does not cover the
de-encapsulation process. The actual software to be installed will only
serve as test software, its development process or coding will not be
covered.
1.9 OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF THE TERMS
-Activation Code:
Some software needs an activation code to unlock it for use. Without
activation code, such software cannot be functional (Bahar Reuben,
2011).
-Algorithm: A step-by-step method of solving a problem or achieving a task.
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