passport/res/readme.txt

----------------Passport---------------
A 4am hack                   2017-03-XX
---------------------------------------

Passport is a cracker's tool that can
remove several forms of copy protection
from Apple II 5.25-inch floppy disks.

Minimum system requirements:
- Apple //e, //c, IIgs, or ][+ with 64K
- Two 5.25-inch disk drives(*)

(*) fully compatible with floppy drive
emulators like CFFA3000 and FloppyEMU.

Some fun facts about copy protection:

1. Many companies, especially smaller
   ones, outsourced their protection.
   I have seen byte-for-byte identical
   copy protection on disks from seven
   different companies!

2. Even companies that wrote their own
   copy protection would try to re-use
   it on multiple disks to get the most
   "bang for the buck."

3. Not everything has been cracked!
   Because there was so much piracy in
   the 1980s, some people assume that
   everything ever published has been
   cracked, digitized, and preserved in
   an emulator-friendly format. In
   reality, there are hundreds of disks
   that have never been cracked. Thirty
   years later, these programs are
   still trapped on physical media,
   literally rotting away.

                   ~

Using Passport is simple. After running
the program, put an original disk in
slot 6, drive 1 and a blank formatted
disk in any other drive. If necessary,
press "S" to cycle through your drives.
Then press "C" to start the cracking.

If all goes well, Passport will read
your original disk and write a copy in
a standard format, then remove any
protection checks from the copy. The
copy will boot and run just as well as
the original disk, but it will be
copyable with COPYA or any full-disk
copy program.

If all does not go well, Passport will
tell you where it all went wrong.

In any case, Passport will NEVER write
to or alter your original disk in any
way. And neither should you! Don't
reduce the number of original disks in
the world; they aren't making any more
of them.

                   ~

Passport targets common protection
schemes that were reused by multiple
companies. These types of protection
were common in educational software.

- Abracadata
  e.g. Design Your Own Home

- Apple "Special Delivery"
  e.g. Ernie's Quiz, Instant Zoo

- Blue Chip
  e.g. Squire, Baron, Tycoon

- DesignWare
  e.g. Spellicopter, Crypto Cube

- Developmental Learning Materials
  e.g. Curious George in Outer Space,
  Alien Addition

- Edu-Ware
  e.g. Decimals, Algebra 2

- Ellen Nelson Learning Library
  e.g. Science (series), House-a-fire!

- Focus Media
  e.g. The Time Tunnel (series),
  Travels with Za-Zoom

- Gamco
  e.g. Math Leap Frog, Math Football

- Grolier Publishing
  e.g. NoteCard Maker, EduCalc

- Hartley Courseware
  e.g. Chariots, Cougars, and Kings;
  Tim and the Cat and the Big Red Hat

- Hayden
  e.g. SAT Score Improvement System

- Heartsoft
  e.g. Electric Chalkboard, Tommy the
  Time-Telling Turtle

- Houghton-Mifflin
  e.g. Game Frame One, Math Masters

- HRM Software
  e.g. Gene Machine, Heredity Dog

- Josten Learning Systems
  e.g. Building Reading Skills,
  Explorations in Science

- The Learning Company
  e.g. Bumble Games, Gertrude's Secrets

- Learning Technologies
  e.g. Animal Hotel, Bike Hike

- McCarthy-McCormack
  e.g. Vowel Corral, Library Magic

- MECC
  e.g. Word Munchers, Clock Works

- Media Basics
  e.g. Return to Reading (series)

- Methods & Solutions
  e.g. Fantasy Land, Behind The Wheel

- Millennium Group
  e.g. The Brain Game, Concentration

- MindPlay
  e.g. Fraction-oids, Dyno-Quest

- Mindscape
  e.g. The Halley Project, Paperboy

- Optimum Resource
  e.g. Stickybear Math, Car Builder

- Pelican Software
  e.g. Dino Days, Graphics Converter

- Polarware
  e.g. The Electric Crayon (series),
  The Spy's Adventures (series)

- Quest Learning Systems
  e.g. Bingo Bugglebee Presents Home
  Alone, Outdoor Safety

- Queue
  e.g. Force and Motion, Practical
  Grammar

- Random House
  e.g. Snoopy to the Rescue, Charlie
  Brown's ABCs

- Reader's Digest
  e.g. Key Lingo, Cogito

- Scholastic
  e.g. Math Shop, Microzine

- Spinnaker Software
  e.g. Snooper Troops, KidWriter

- Springboard Software
  e.g. Early Games for Young Children,
  Puzzle Master, Mask Parade

- Sunburst Communications
  e.g. M-ss-ng L-nks, The Incredible
  Laboratory

- Troll Associates
  e.g. Dino Dig, Make A Face

- Unicorn Software
  e.g. Magical Myths, Ten Little Robots


The latest version of Passport can also
recognize and defeat the protection
used by some game companies. In general
there was more variation and "one-off"
protection in games than in educational
software, so your mileage may vary.

- Activision (patcher by TRex)
  e.g. Hacker, Rampage

- Atari
  e.g. Defender, Gremlins

- Border
  e.g. Arena, Early Bird

- Broderbund
  e.g. Where in Time Is Carmen Sandiego

- Data East
  e.g. Ikari Warriors, Batman

- Electronic Arts (patcher by qkumba)
  e.g. The Bard's Tale, Skyfox

- Epyx
  e.g. Summer Games, Deathsword

- Sierra On-Line (patcher by qkumba)
  e.g. BC's Quest for Tires, Sammy
  Lightfoot

                   ~

Passport is open source and is
distributed under the MIT license.

Passport
Copyright (c) 2016-7 by 4am

Permission is hereby granted, free of
charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated
documentation files (the "Software"),
to deal in the Software without
restriction, including without
limitation the rights to use, copy,
modify, merge, publish, distribute,
sublicense, and/or sell copies of the
Software, and to permit persons to whom
the Software is furnished to do so,
subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this
permission notice shall be included in
all copies or substantial portions of
the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS",
WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS
OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED
TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND
NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE
FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF
CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING
FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE
SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS
IN THE SOFTWARE.

                   ~

2017-03-XX
- NEW: patcher for Activision (by TRex)
- NEW: patcher for Electronic Arts (by
  qkumba)
- NEW: patcher for Sierra On-Line (by
  qkumba, replaces old patcher)
- NEW: patcher for Optimum Resource (by
  qkumba, replaces old patcher)
- NEW: patcher for Gamco Software
- NEW: patcher for Border Software
- NEW: patcher for Blue Chip Software
- NEW: patcher for Houghton-Mifflin
- NEW: detection of LSR $6A ProDOS RWTS
- IMPROVED: patcher for MECC
  (fixes Word Munchers v1.1)
- IMPROVED: patcher for Scholastic
  (fixes Bank Street Writer II)
- IMPROVED: patcher for Grolier
  (fixes Countries of the World)
- migrated build to ACME assembler and
  source code to GitHub (by qkumba)

2016-12-30
- add support for DOS 3.3P
  e.g. Ernie's Quiz, Instant Zoo
- improve support for disks created
  with MECC Database
- faster detection of 4-and-4 encoding
  and 5-and-3 encoding (neither is
  supported)
- various speed improvements

2016-09-02
- add support for Protected.DOS
  e.g. Moebius, Math Blaster
- add support for "JMP $B660" RWTS
  e.g. Verb Viper, Master Match
- add support for Datasoft encrypted
  bootloader
  e.g. Tomahawk, Video Title Shop
- fix bug in boot sector detection that
  erroneously claimed some disks were
  unreadable
- add informational messages about some
  RWTS variants (LSR $6A, BCS $08)
- refactor code in /id/ directory

2016-07-12
- initial release

------------------EOF------------------