The Protector
   *************

   Version: 1.0, Release date 31/7/94

   Copyright (C) 1994 Sonic UK.


   ---------- Footnotes ----------

   (1)  This program is freeware. You may freely distribute it as long
as you don't charge more than nominal fee for copying it (max £1.50)
and no deletions is made to the original package. You may also include
it to freely distributable disks such as Fred Fish collection.

   This program is distributed without warranty of any kind. So I take
no responsibility about this program, its documentation, functionality
or damages it may cause.

Introduction
************

   Nearly everyone who has had an Amiga for a while has no doubt come across
a virus of some kind. Some have been harmless while others have done
irrepairable damage to IDE hard drives. Floppy disks are inexpensive to
replace but hard drives - well!

   I had looked through PD to see a hard drive protector but couldn't find one
of any use. The ones I found didn't do what I wanted. So I decided to write
one myself.

   The function of this util is to render a hard drive READ only! In the
main it will stop any Virus from writing to a hard drive while the program is
running. It is full multitasking and once activated can be left alone and
forgotten about!

   Also, it will not allow a hard drive to be formatted accidently or through
misuse. Any BBS out there will soon see how useful this proggy will be.

   This program will not write to the hard drive but make an AmigaDos call to
lock the relevant device. A warm reboot (Ctrl,LAmiga+RAmiga) will deactivate
the program and return the device to read/write no matter what state it was in
before the reboot.



Installation
************

   Just copy this executable to your C: workbench directory!



CLI usage
*********

   My advice to anyone using this AmigaDos extension is to execute it from
the Workbench startup-sequence. The usage is :


HDProtect DeviceName Status(1 Lock/0 ULock) Code




Explanations
************

DeviceName - This is the AmigaDos low level call to the device, not the name
             of the volume in the device. Internal HDs are usually DH0: DH1:
             etc. and Overdrives AQ0: AQ1: etc. Remember - its not the name 
             (Work: System:) but the physical drive!

Status  -    This is the desired state for the device. 1= make drive read only
             2= make drive read/write

Code  -      This is a password/code used to lock the drive. It can be a
             combination of numbers and text to make it harder to unlock a
             drive by a hacker/virus. It is necessary to use the same code
             to unlock the device that was used to lock it. Make sure you
             can remember the code!





An example of the startup line might be :


HDProtect DH0: 1 Pass1234word


The above would make drive DH0: read only and would need the password
Pass1234word to unlock it.

To unlock the above you would need to enter a shell and type :


HDProtect DH0: 0 Pass1234word




BBSs and Sysops
***************


   With a BBS things can be a bit difficult as files will be updated whilst
the BBS is running. My advice to Sysops is to Assign where possible the files
which will be updated to an alternative device thereby leaving the device
holding the skeleton files for the BBS available for locking. If possible
protect the workbench partition/device too.

   If you can do this it will not be possible to delete the BBS from the
drive or format the drive.

Any problems leave me mail around about the program and I'll reply ASAP.





   Ah well, enough of coding for a while...  :-)

Seya.



Sonic UK.