Building a secure add-in

J

Jeff

I want to build an add-in and distribute it, but would like to secure it as
much as possible. From other comments it is obvious that just putting a
password on the project is not very secure.

Does anyone have any suggestions.

Jeff
 
B

Bob Phillips

The only secure way is to create it as a VB DLL, but that requires a full
version of VB, and is much more work.

Oh, there is also XLL, but I have never used these so I cannot comment on
what is required, how difficult it is, or how secure.

--

HTH

Bob Phillips
... looking out across Poole Harbour to the Purbecks
(remove nothere from the email address if mailing direct)
 
S

Simon Murphy

Jeff
there are 3 main options for addins

xla - basically a hidden workbook, easy to
install/distribute, easy to break into

COM DLL - compiled code, so more complex to break into,
requires registry access to install

XLL - native code, simple install, no registry required,
even harder to reverse engineer, generally harder to write
(need c++, or delphi or another language that can complie
to native code (ie not standard VB))

a rough indication of relative effort
xla are the easiest, com dlls could take approx 2-4 times
as long to build and test, xlls maybe a bit longer,
although it totally varies with the type of add-in

Which you choose depends on your target audience,
performance, functionality, potential loss due to
compromised code, etc etc
Many organisation make a happy living using xlas, as most
users are fairly honest.

cheers
Simon
 
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