Howardism: Protecting your Software Investment

Protecting your Software Investment

I recently picked up a software program for my kids. The software, instead of installing itself on your computer, it runs off the CD and demands that the CD be mounted on the system.

That's a recipe for trouble as grimy little fingers are *help themselves* by inserting and removing the CD. Yeah, go open your DVD cases of your movies, and you'll see the results of kid lick in one of its many forms.

Here is a solution that often works and doesn't require any additional software… just the stuff that already comes with your Mac. Sorry that it is all command line, but don't worry about it, you'll feel like a true geek when you're done.

Step 1. Figure out the Filesystem

Before we can do the work, we need to know the filesystem device. Open up the Terminal program (under Applications/Utilities) and type df:

$ df
Filesystem     512-blocks      Used     Avail Capacity  Mounted on
/dev/disk2      976101312 678451320 297137992    70%    /
devfs                 239       239         0   100%    /dev
fdesc                   2         2         0   100%    /dev
/dev/disk3s2    976101344 629263616 346837728    64%    /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
map -hosts              0         0         0   100%    /net
map auto_home           0         0         0   100%    /home
/dev/disk4s1s2     849392    849392         0   100%    /Volumes/Some Software

Note: In all my examples, the character, "$" is the prompt. You will most likely have some other text in front of this character (like the name of your machine and your account name). I've simplified my prompt for these examples. You will type everything after the prompt.

Find the name of the CD that you've inserted into your computer. In this case, it is Some Software. Look at the beginning of the line where it starts with /dev: that is what we are looking for.

Step 2. Unmount, but Don't Eject

We need to have the computer forget about the CD, but we can't just eject it. We need to umount (un-mount) the CD. Type the following:

$ sudo umount /dev/disk4s1s2
Password:

Notice I used the file system device we figured out in step 1. Also, we need to do this as "root", so we use the sudo command. Just type in your password, and you should be good. (Of course, that is assuming you are using your system as a user who has administrative privs… if you aren't… well, that would another entry in this series).

Step 3. Create the ISO Image

We are going to use the dd command in order to create a file that contains the contents of your disk. We are going use the *file system device* that we've used before.Type:

$ sudo dd if=/dev/disk4s1s2 of=SomeSoftware.iso
849410+0 records in
849410+0 records out
434897920 bytes transferred in 145.167758 secs (2995830 bytes/sec)

Step 4. Mount the ISO Image

The last step is to have that ISO image available to be mounted. Usually, you can just double-click it from the Finder, and pretend that it is the actual CD from that point.

Often, I get a warning, but you can ignore the warnings.

You can use the hdiutil command to mount the ISO image as part of a script.

$ hdiutil attach /path/to/SomeSoftware.iso
Are you sure you want to open this disk image? (Y/N) Y

Or better yet, get rid of the warning, via:

$ hdiutil attach -noautofsck /path/to/SomeSoftware.iso

Optional. Automatically Mount

I figured it would be easier for my kids if the CDs I've backed up were automatically mounted. We can pass our step 4 to launchd in order to have it automatically mounted.

$ sudo launchd  -d -- hdiutil attach -noautofsck /path/to/SomeSoftware.iso

Tell others about this article:

Click here to submit this page to Stumble It


	I Made the Switch My Mac Depends on Perl?! 4 out of 5 Geeks Prefer Macs for their Patients Relieving Eye Strain through Better Scripting Cool Software for Mac OS X I Found an Easter Egg Apache on Mac OS X Mac OS X Tweaks Installing SSH Public Keys Read other entries in Macintosh...	Protecting your Software Investment I recently picked up a software program for my kids. The software, instead of installing itself on your computer, it runs off the CD and demands that the CD be mounted on the system. That's a recipe for trouble as grimy little fingers are help themselves by inserting and removing the CD. Yeah, go open your DVD cases of your movies, and you'll see the results of kid lick in one of its many forms. Here is a solution that often works and doesn't require any additional software… just the stuff that already comes with your Mac. Sorry that it is all command line, but don't worry about it, you'll feel like a true geek when you're done. Step 1. Figure out the Filesystem Before we can do the work, we need to know the filesystem device. Open up the `Terminal` program (under `Applications/Utilities`) and type `df`: `$ df Filesystem 512-blocks Used Avail Capacity Mounted on /dev/disk2 976101312 678451320 297137992 70% / devfs 239 239 0 100% /dev fdesc 2 2 0 100% /dev /dev/disk3s2 976101344 629263616 346837728 64% /Volumes/Time Machine Backups map -hosts 0 0 0 100% /net map auto_home 0 0 0 100% /home /dev/disk4s1s2 849392 849392 0 100% /Volumes/Some Software` Note: In all my examples, the character, "$" is the prompt. You will most likely have some other text in front of this character (like the name of your machine and your account name). I've simplified my prompt for these examples. You will type everything after the prompt. Find the name of the CD that you've inserted into your computer. In this case, it is Some Software. Look at the beginning of the line where it starts with `/dev`: that is what we are looking for. Step 2. Unmount, but Don't Eject We need to have the computer forget about the CD, but we can't just eject it. We need to `umount` (un-mount) the CD. Type the following: `$ sudo umount /dev/disk4s1s2 Password:` Notice I used the file system device we figured out in step 1. Also, we need to do this as "root", so we use the `sudo` command. Just type in your password, and you should be good. (Of course, that is assuming you are using your system as a user who has administrative privs… if you aren't… well, that would another entry in this series). Step 3. Create the ISO Image We are going to use the `dd` command in order to create a file that contains the contents of your disk. We are going use the file system device that we've used before.Type: `$ sudo dd if=/dev/disk4s1s2 of=SomeSoftware.iso 849410+0 records in 849410+0 records out 434897920 bytes transferred in 145.167758 secs (2995830 bytes/sec)` Step 4. Mount the ISO Image The last step is to have that ISO image available to be mounted. Usually, you can just double-click it from the Finder, and pretend that it is the actual CD from that point. Often, I get a warning, but you can ignore the warnings. You can use the `hdiutil` command to mount the ISO image as part of a script. `$ hdiutil attach /path/to/SomeSoftware.iso Are you sure you want to open this disk image? (Y/N) Y` Or better yet, get rid of the warning, via: `$ hdiutil attach -noautofsck /path/to/SomeSoftware.iso` Optional. Automatically Mount I figured it would be easier for my kids if the CDs I've backed up were automatically mounted. We can pass our step 4 to `launchd` in order to have it automatically mounted. `$ sudo launchd -d -- hdiutil attach -noautofsck /path/to/SomeSoftware.iso` Tell others about this article:
	2014, Howard Abrams Some rights reserved	Originally written on 9 April 2009. Updated on 8 February 2014.