In this first lesson I'll show you the different approaches you can use for cracking programs. Before you decide what approach you'll use, you first have to take a look at the program you want to crack, and ask yourself questions: "Does it has a registration possibility?", "Does it has a nag screen", "What are the limits of the shareware", etc... .
In general there are two big approaches:
- The 'dead listing' approach (with W32DSM)
- The serial fishing approach (with SoftICE)
If there is a registering option included, you could try and find the serial code with SoftICE, but as this is quite difficult for newbies, it's almost always possible to use the dead listing approach. Imagine you have a program with a nag screen and a 30 day trial and the possibility to register. Then you have 2 possibilities: 1. crack the program by finding a serial or 2. remove the nag screen and 30 day trial. N° 1 is done with SoftICE and N° 2 with W32DSM and a hex-editor. If you choose n° 2, you have again other possibilities: crack the program by letting it believe it's registered or remove the "draw nagscreen" procedure and time limit.....I would prefer to let the program believe it's registered......more on that can be read in my essay about Planet Zip.
Confused? Don't worry, start lesson2! A lesson that really explains how to crack a specific program....go for it :p
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