Giggly Posted July 25, 2019 Posted July 25, 2019 PagePlus has an important PDF export feature: the ability to set a master password to set PDF permissions including: No document printing No content modification No editing of comments and form fields No content copying Does this exist in Publisher? I own Publisher, Designer and Photo. Quote
Giggly Posted August 2, 2019 Author Posted August 2, 2019 Why not? As I documented, it was in PagePlus. It's a basic and critical feature for those of us that need to secure and protect our works. Quote
Fixx Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 It is not considered core functionality. Those who need it can do it with separate apps or web services. Of course, if devs have nothing else to do it might be useful feature to add. PaulEC 1 Quote
Giggly Posted August 2, 2019 Author Posted August 2, 2019 It was core functionality for PagePlus for years so they obviously already have the code that they can port to Publisher. It's core functionality to me and anyone who wants to secure and protect their intellectual property. Who determined it wasn't core functionality for Publisher? Quote
mac_heibu Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 19 minutes ago, Giggly said: Who determined it wasn't core functionality for Publisher? It was me! Fixx and garrettm30 1 1 Quote
MikeW Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 34 minutes ago, Giggly said: It was core functionality for PagePlus for years so they obviously already have the code that they can port to Publisher. It's core functionality to me and anyone who wants to secure and protect their intellectual property. Who determined it wasn't core functionality for Publisher? It takes me less than a second to remove password protection on a pdf. I use a standalone application, but there are even online sites one can use to do so. Like was mentioned, who knows if Affinity applications will add it or not. Serif is using the same pdf library as they did with the Plus line. Quote
Giggly Posted August 2, 2019 Author Posted August 2, 2019 And what percent of the population are nerdy enough to use a standalone application to hack a pdf? 99% of the population is not and that's good enough for me. They have the code. It should be a simple matter to port it to Publisher especially since, as you said: 1 hour ago, MikeW said: Serif is using the same pdf library as they did with the Plus line. Quote
MikeW Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 3 minutes ago, Giggly said: And what percent of the population are nerdy enough to use a standalone application to hack a pdf? 99% of the population is not and that's good enough for me. ... It's not a hack, per se. As to your question about percentages...I don't know. Do you? What I do know is that if the content is desirable, people will search for a means and they will find a way, free or paid. That applies to any copy protection for anything. I wasn't dissing your request. I was just letting you know that pdf password protection like is commonly used has an element of false security. (There are applications that can truly protect a pdf as regards "hacking" pdf security, which are very expensive and a brute-force attack on them can take a week or more of constant running to remove the security. However, even with these, one can take high-res screen shots and OCR them...) Quote
PaulEC Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 25 minutes ago, Giggly said: And what percent of the population are nerdy enough to use a standalone application to hack a pdf? 99% of the population is not and that's good enough for me. It's not so much the percentage of the population, as the percentage of people who want to hack PDfs. If it's something you want to do, you'll find a way to do it! "Google is your friend"! Quote Acer XC-895 : Core i5-10400 Hexa-core 2.90 GHz : 32GB RAM : Intel UHD Graphics 630 : Windows 11 Home Affinity Publisher 2 : Affinity Photo 2 : Affinity Designer 2 : (latest release versions) on desktop and iPad "Beware of false knowledge, it is more dangerous than ignorance." (GBS)
Giggly Posted August 2, 2019 Author Posted August 2, 2019 Any security is false security since anything can be hacked. Research quantum computing for more details. You can even resort to google if being complicit in your own self-surveillance is your thing. Otherwise try DuckDuckGo. Password protecting original work is another explicit layer of unequivocally stating that the work is copyright protected. Someone breaching that security is absolutely a hacker. So while one can do it that person is breaking the law. That is enough to deter 99% of the population who live on social media and communicate in 120 characters. I am familiar with expensive, elaborate and convoluted separate applications that provide a greater false sense of security. I prefer to have the functionality that PagePlus already has, and therefore Serif already has, simply added to Publisher. Quote
PaulEC Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 6 minutes ago, Giggly said: Any security is false security since anything can be hacked. This is true. It reminds me of a friend, who was a builder, looking at a security fence aimed at keeping people out, saying that it would only keep the honest people out! MEB 1 Quote Acer XC-895 : Core i5-10400 Hexa-core 2.90 GHz : 32GB RAM : Intel UHD Graphics 630 : Windows 11 Home Affinity Publisher 2 : Affinity Photo 2 : Affinity Designer 2 : (latest release versions) on desktop and iPad "Beware of false knowledge, it is more dangerous than ignorance." (GBS)
MikeW Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 1 minute ago, Giggly said: ... So while one can do it that person is breaking the law... No, removing pdf security is not illegal. Any illegal part has to do with what one does with the content. Removing signed certificates is illegal. Quote
Giggly Posted August 2, 2019 Author Posted August 2, 2019 3 minutes ago, MikeW said: No, removing pdf security is not illegal. Any illegal part has to do with what one does with the content. Right.... and breaking into a bank is not illegal, only if you take the money with you... and breaking into a car is not illegal, only if you drive away with it... and breaking into someone's house is not illegal, only if you take take a TV with you... Except, wrong. That's why they call it "breaking and entering." Everything on a website is automatically copy protected. Erecting a pay wall, or pdf security, is another level of copy protection explicitly stating that the content is not to be copied for any reason. Quote
MikeW Posted August 2, 2019 Posted August 2, 2019 1 minute ago, Giggly said: Right.... and breaking into a bank is not illegal, only if you take the money with you... and breaking into a car is not illegal, only if you drive away with it... and breaking into someone's house is not illegal, only if you take take a TV with you... Except, wrong. That's why they call it "breaking and entering." Everything on a website is automatically copy protected. Erecting a pay wall, or pdf security, is another level of copy protection explicitly stating that the content is not to be copied for any reason. Your first two paragraphs don't correlate with law as regards pdfs. Content can/does fall into the fair use law(s). None of this (removal of pdf security) has anything to do with who owns the material copyrights. Of course the originator (may) own the content copyright. They (may) also own a copyright for putting the "art" into a fixed and final form. But that doesn't mean that the use of such material (may/does) fall into the fair use law clauses. I'll leave this alone now. Quote
Giggly Posted August 2, 2019 Author Posted August 2, 2019 I am explicitly protecting my original works. Serif should simply port code they already have in PagePlus into Publisher. There is no fair use argument for content secured behind a paywall or password protection. Quote
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