This is a manual for "The Super Console Defender", the utility
to lock out the keyboard and mouse while you are away.
I. Two words about the Defender and its history.
This utility was made when some important files were deleted
from the author's computer while he was out to lunch. Although
those files were successfully recovered ( after 2 hours of a
search of that backup disk), the idea of a program which would
prevent unauthorised access to computer while the person is away
was born. Small non-resident program (versions 1.xx) was written
to accomplish this task. On one hand, that was enough, on the
other hand, you would have to quit or shell to DOS to lock your
computer. That's why a new version was written a year or so later.
This new version (2.xx) was written in C language and was a real
TSR program. Now it was easy to lock the computer at any time.
There was only one small drawback: the utility took 14K of
conventional memory and was ver naughty when loading into the
upper memory.
Finally, the state-of-the-art assembler version was written.
This version (3.1) needed only 3K of memory and loaded easily
into upper, conventional or high memory areas. However, due to a
missed line in the source code it didn't have full functionality
of the previous releases. One and a half months later, this bug
was fixed and "The Super Console Defender" became almost what you
can see today.
Since then there were several new releases which:
- Shrinked the program to less than 2K
- Added a total mouse locking features
- Removed the built-in backdoor to the console
Starting from version 3.36 the utility was included in the
FreeDOS.
The current version at January 18, 1996 is 3.37. The
executable file of the English version of "The Super Console
Defender" may be called C_LOCK37.COM, C_LOCKE.COM or C_LOCK.COM
depending on the time when and/or place where you have got this
utility. Likewise, newer versions may appear with executables
named C_LOCKxxy.COM, where xx stands for the subversion number
and y stands for the language code.
II. About this manual.
You will find the description of the interactive user
interface in this manual as well as the description of the
command-line options. As the time goes newer versions are likely
to appear (sometimes they appear few times a day). As a result,
some changes and feature not reflected in this manual may appear.
However, I promise that these changes are not going to be global
and you still be able to use the program using this manual.
III. The Copyright, Credits and Disclaimer
This program is the intellectual property of Maxim Raevski
who is the author of the program. Therefore, any utilisation or
reproduction of its code as a whole or in parts without my
agreement is illegal. However, this is only a formality. You will
find the program's source code on the FreeDOS project's FTPs.
This program is subject to GNU free software licence. You
can understand this as the program's being FreeWare. You can
freely copy this program to and/or from any media, including but
not limited to those intended for sale.
I carry no responsibility for any damage direct or indirect
resulted from the usage of this program. This does not mean that
there is a virus built-in the program, but in spite of very
careful programming some computers might turn out to be
incompatible with this program resulting in a loss of data and/or
damage to the hardware.
The presense of uncompressed program's executable file on
any user's media indicates the agreement with the license.
I would like to thank Vladimir V. Ravdin for his invaluable
help in the creation of the program. I am also grateful to all
computer-crazy teenagers at school 1229 (81) in Moscow who did a
lot of testing.
IV. How to use the utility.
╔══════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
║ Before we begin I recommend that you rename the ║
║ executable file of "The Super Console Defender" ║
║ from whatever it is to C_LOCK.COM. ║
╚══════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
Now back to the defense strategy. Let's start from loading.
Enter C_LOCK at the command prompt. The Super Defender will be
loaded in memory, will display brief information about the
program, its author (that's me, all right) and some basic
information about very hot keys. It will also say something about
the password. Now, some theory is required.
The Super Defender acts very much like a conventional
doorlock. For those of you who don't know: a doorlock locks the
door and you need a key to open it. Naturally, the Defender locks
your keyboard the way your keyboard lock is intended to and you
need a password to unlock. A password is a word or a phrase
containing up to 25 characters (latin or cyrillic letters and
some special symbols) which is known only to you. You can use any
word you like down to easy-cracked "ASDF". The Super Defender
takes it one step further beyond conventional keyboard key - it
locks the mouse too. That makes clear what made me write this
program instead of using that key: it doesn't switch the mouse
off. And then you can lose the key (if there was one).
So, following the message you press CTRL-ALT-INSERT. (This
means press and hold CTRL and ALT keys and then pressing the
INSERT or INS key.) If you videocard is in text mode, something
like this will appear:
╔═ The Super Console Defender ══╗
║ _ ║
║ Enter a password for defense ║
║ ║
╚═══════ (c) RaMax 1996 ═══════╝
Now you are able to enter your password (you don't have to use
the same password every time). All the characters you enter will
be displayed as asterisks on the screen. This is done to prevent
others from seeing what you are typing in. If you feel something
is wrong with your password, you can delete one two symbols or
all the password with BACKSPACE key. Or you could press ESC and
close the window. After you press ENTER, the password will be
transformed to the upper case and transmitted to the internal
buffer. Starting from this moment neither mouse nor the keyboard
will respond. Good to know, isn't it?
You will see some video effects now - the display's red
frame will start blinking. You will not see the mouse cursor
anywhere on your screen and the keyboard won't respond even to
NUMLOCK or CTRL-ALT-DEL. This is PROTECTION IN ACTION.
Now you shouldn't panic. You will be able to open the
keyboard. All you have to do is to press CTRL-ALT-INSERT again.
A window similar to this will appear:
╔═ The Super Console Defender ══╗
║ _ ║
║ Enter the password to unlock ║
║ The Console is locked ║
╚═══════ (c) RaMax 1996 ═══════╝
Now you enter the password in the same manner you did before and
press ENTER. If the password is correct, the console will be
released and the mouse cursor will appear. You can continue your
invaluable work!
In the unlikely event of enter an incorrect password the
picture will change again:
╔═ The Super Console Defneder ══╗
║ ********** ║
║ ║
║ Incorrect password_ ║
╚═══════ (c) RaMax 1996 ═══════╝
All you can do now is press any key. The window will disappear,
but the console will remain locked. You have to try again.
For your convinience there is another hot key in this
program: CTRL-ALT-END.
This program works in graphics mode as well. But you will
never see that friendly window. Instead, green frame will start
blinking. The procedure of entering a password remains the same.
And now about command-line options. You will find the list
of switches below. Switches are not case-sensitive and can start
with either '-' or "/" (dash or forward slash).
The most often used switch is 'unload' (/r or /u). The
program will unload itself from memory only if it is safe, i.e.
no other program working with the keyboard is loaded after the
Defender. Anyway, the program will inform you about the situation.
The next switch toggles that blinking frame on or off (/l).
You might want to use this option with some older EGA cards. My
advice will be to keep the frame on, because it shows anyone that
the console is locked.
One more key - C (/C:password). It instructs The Super
Defender to copy the "password" to its internal buffer and close
the console. Pay attention: you must put colon before the
password and it must not contain any spaces. I use it to launch
the Defender from my AUTOEXEC.BAT to lock the conolse right from
the boot-up.
And finally, you can get help by running the program with
the help switch (/? or /h)
V. The resident version of the Super Console Defender allows
some other program to run while the console is locked. You can
use this to run virus scan on an unattended computer withour any
fear.
This is all I can tell you about The Super Console Defender.
Don't worry, This is Protection in Action!
éæàâäÇ "æπ»Ñα çáΘ¿Γ¡¿¬" ¡áñѪ¡« ºáΘ¿Γ¿Γ!!! (tm)
