Hiding an executable

[Bruce]

Hello and happy holidays everyone!

I heard this was possible but can't remember where I saw it, I want to "Rename" the .exe to somthing else but still have it retain it's ability to be an executable. Any thoughts?

[TJ_Tigger]

I had some issues in trying to rename files and have them opened with AMS. What I did to protect the files is put them in a password protected self executing zip file and the password is in AMS on the button that launches the .exe. If you browse the CD and double click the exe it will ask for a password. Although not the safest method to hid a file it worked for me.

[Bruce]

Well Tig what I'm trying to do is this, I have an existing indexing music program on a CD. Once loaded on the end users PC, it will always work as long as the CD is in the drive. I'm adding a 30 Day expiration for that specific PC. After 30 days, it will execute an open CD tray program that I made. It's that executable that I want to hide. Although, the end user could simply disable the auto insert for that drive....a little of something is better then a lot of nothing! LOL

[TJ_Tigger]

You could have it in a password protected .zip file that is self executing, then have it unzip to the %TempDir% on the pc then launch it from %TempDir%\cdeject.exe. During the unzipping process you would have the password as part of AMS.

Probably not the best way to make it work but it is the best my egg-nogged brain can think of at this time.

Can you remove the .exe and have it still launch from the CD. With out the extension it will not look like a program but will AMS execute it? Use File.Execute rather than File.Open.

Just a thought

[kpsmith]

I'd just rename the the cdeject.exe to something like support.dat. You can then execute the program from within AMS... AMS will still know it is an executable.

That way it is not obvious what the file is.

[Bruce]

That's what I did, works very well, thx!

[Worm]

As an added thought, could you make the program take a command line paramter that you could pass from AMS (i.e. hiddene_exe.hid /true) so that if the end-user double clicks on your "hidden" exe, it would simply fall through and do nothing without the command line.

[Bruce]

Hummm...Worm, how would that work without jack-in up AMS?

[Worm]

You're doing a File Execute to run the cdeject.exe, that allows command line parameters. In an earlier post, you said that you wrote a CD Eject program. What I was saying is to modify your CD Eject program so that it takes a command line parameter to actually eject the cd. I was thinking it would help keep a user from stumbling onto the hidden EXE since it would do nothing without the command line parameter you hard coded in.

BUT... I played around and changed the name of an EXE to see if I was sending you down a road that needn't be traveled. Guess, what, I think I am. When I double clicked on the renamed EXE, Windows wasn't smart enough to execute it, so a user would hardly stumble upon it.

[Bruce]

Thx Worm!