python-licensing

python-licensing is a tool to protect your python scripts with a license that is provided by a licensing server. You can license functions via decorators or your entire script. python-licensing may be combined with pyarmor to obfuscate your script and embeds and hide this licensing logic, which is located in ./python-licensing. The licensing server implementation is located in ./server.

Audience

The initial audience were university students who work on their theses without getting paid. While pursuing their thesis work they sometimes develop software which is being used long after their departure. Since they are not getting paid, they individuals hold the rights to the software.

This software may be used to sell licenses to the professorships where the software is desired - redeeming some of the money they should have earned. Feel free to use it in any circumstances where you see fit.

Usage

Individual functions

import python_licensing as pl

@pl.licensed('https://my-licensing-server.example.com')
def my_licensed_function():
    pass

Have a look at example.py.

Installation

python-licensing tool

pip3 install python-licensing

License server

Using docker-compose (recommended)

docker-compose up -d

Using docker

docker run python-licensing:latest

Keep in mind, that you'd need to specify the environment variables and build variables by hand.

Obfuscating your script

1. Install PyArmor using pip:

pip install pyarmor

Obfuscate your script using the gen command. Replace your_script.py with the path to your Python script:

pyarmor gen your_script.py

This will create a dist directory containing the obfuscated version of your script and any necessary PyArmor runtime files. For more information visit dashingsoft/pyarmor

2. Delivering to the customer

Package the dist directory into a ZIP file or another type of archive:

zip -r your_script.zip dist

Send the ZIP file to your customer. They can run the obfuscated script using their Python interpreter:

python dist/your_script.py

Please note that the customer will need to have the same major version of Python that you used to obfuscate the script. For example, if you obfuscated the script using Python 3.8, the customer will also need to have Python 3.8.

3. Licensing

To add licensing to your script, you can use the python-licensing library as described in the previous sections of this README. You should add the licensing code to your script before obfuscating it with PyArmor.