Better........... I think I got it where it just about clips out of view if you get close enough to see it....

Although this would make it difficult, if not impossible to get a manifold mesh for printing.....

I believe that is not a good idea!

When you will make a Snap to the corner of this cube, if you don't care of the Name of the snap you will have all chance to snap on a numerous points of your "hidden" signature!
So false constructions in perspective! :)

And the numbers of surfaces & or Edges is always a revelatory of something wrong! :)

Code an hidden signature inside a texture seems very more powerful! :)

It was I who requested an anonymizing feature in the Rhino header block. I've written a special program to purge those, but it's not automatic.

Perhaps the most flexible approach is an edit field under Options?

Hi Martin,

>Between these two events I had a back-up drive go belly up on me and a lot of the files were heavily corrupted and >could not be salvaged from the drive, my model was among those files. I duly went and downloaded my work files >back from GrabCAD, but since it's a copy of a copy that's gone from one drive to another as a "new file" the dates and >times those files were created are all different from when i created the model, thus technically speaking, I can't prove >when I created the file any more leaving me wide open for someone else to claim its copyright based on date. I don't >mind in this case as I shared my file freely and I suppose one could say it's my own fault for sharing it. But it has >highlighted this issue to me should I produce something I might not want to freely share in the future.

Maybe you could do this to claim your ownership... Simply use the freely available GNU Privacy Guard (gpg), or the famous PGP, which is global email encryption standard since the early 90's, and create a detached digital signature for your .3dm file. This procedure would not touch your 3dm file and in case you lost your original and download an unmodified ver. of your file, the signature would be still valid... The signature contains your Public Key ID, Name, email address and the creation date/time, when a file was signed. So if you sign your .3dm files with a detached signature and put also the signature in a zip file along your model, this should prove hopefully your ownership. PGP/gpg engryption is secure.

As test i attach a simple .3dm file (a sphere) and a detached signature file, which can be verified by other gpg/PGP users.

(P.S. you can upload your Public gpg Key on public key servers:

https://keyserver2.pgp.com/vkd/GetWelcomeScreen.event

http://sks-keyservers.net/i/

and friends, workmates etc. can verify your sig for example. (my key id is 0x560007F8))


Best regards
Stefan

Hi Stefan - I did consider using PGP and email. but the problem arises out of the size of the file most e-mail servers don't allow files over 10mb and yes i could rar it up as separate volumes but at the time considered it to be too much hassle, lesson learnt on that the hard way. I know i didn't need to use email for the files encryption, I have been fortunate this time and gotten the other website to remove the files and the links to the web page under dispute, but I guess it's time i also looked into using something like a blue ray drive for creating backups that can then be hidden away.

Thanks for the suggestions though

Martin Spencer-Ford

Hi Martin,

the procedure i suggested was more meant that when you submit a .zip file archive to GrabCad or other 3D sites, where the file size doesn't matter, so that you can better prove that your are the owner.

Best regards
Stefan

Ahhh right - sorry for not understanding you correctly - I will look into the possibilities and how open/easily shared it becomes - good thinking though

Martin Spencer-Ford

Hey Frenchy......
I suppose we can try to find the signature on this?

http://moi3d.com/gallery/images/1wireframe.png

It's behind the third spark plug! :)

lol........ Good one.

Well i got a reply back from Brian @ McNeels and apparantly there is a Watermark feature in the open 3DM format

>> There are two command you could look at... 'ApplyWatermark' and 'FindWatermark' but they're not a guarantee that someone won't distribute your file.<<

@ Michael - Is there any way you can implement this feature within MoI ?

I had no idea it was there already!

Martin Spencer-Ford

Hi Martin,

> @ Michael - Is there any way you can implement this feature within MoI ?

Not that I know of currently - there does not seem to be any mention of watermarking features in the OpenNURBS library itself, so that must be something that's not directly a part of the library.

If you can find any documentation for how the watermarking process actually functions, then it could be possible for me to do it as well, but I suspect that they purposely do not want to document it.

But if you like you can ask them if there is any documentation for how other applications can apply or retrieve the watermarks.

- Michael

It apears to be a command in R5 ... http://docs.mcneel.com/rhino/5/help/en-us/commands/applywatermark.htm explains the process but does not provide any API library structure, and the same applies for their wiki http://wiki.mcneel.com/rhino/rhinov5status_watermarks, I have sent an e-mail requesting more information but will wait n see what comes back. I have a feeling that we may well find that this is just something unique to R5 and for obvious reasons would not be made public through their development kit as it would kind of compromise things i would think.

As always thanks for the speedy reply

Martin Spencer-Ford

Just out of curiosity, did a few google and google scholar searches for watermarking nurbs, opennurbs, and rhino.

From: http://docs.mcneel.com/rhino/5/help/en-us/commands/applywatermark.htm
"Disclaimer
Robert McNeel & Associates provides the watermarking tools "as is," without express or implied warranty. All implied warranties of fitness for any particular purpose and of merchantability are hereby disclaimed.
Robert McNeel & Associates will not disclose any more details about watermarking."


http://www-artemis.it-sudparis.eu/Publications/library/Mitrea-WSEAS-TransComm2004.pdf

http://asp.eurasipjournals.com/content/pdf/1687-6180-2004-681489.pdf

http://asp.eurasipjournals.com/content/pdf/1687-6180-2011-216783.pdf

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167839608001222 ($19.95)

-Brian

Nice finds bemfarmer - They are some seriously heavy reading for me, but i will give them a go when i get more time

Martin Spencer-Ford

News from McNeels ....

<< Mixed news. The command was only partially implemented and the current iteration of it in V5 is broken. Based on the low number of requests for it, we decided to push off further development to V6. So, we don't have anything currently that works. Sorry for the confusion.>>

Well now that's a bummer ... v5 was something like 4yrs in dev time so I better not be holding my breath on this feature any time soon :(

Martin Spencer-Ford

Could "watermarking" qualify as encryption and be subject to various laws?

What recourse would there be for misuse of another parties models?

Hi bemfarmer - Watermarking is just pretty much a stamp of ownership. Obviously there could be problems with people taking someone else's creation and claiming it as their own and, if the original engineer/artist did not use a watermark then he would have a pretty hard time proving ownership, especially if the thief (for want of a better word) does then apply a watermark. Once a watermark has been applied the copyright protection laws come into effect where the materials concerned would be either belonging to a company or an individual and would remain so for something like 70 years, so if anyone profited from that work without consent then they are going to be in a heap of trouble as large as the originator wants to make it

Martin Spencer-Ford

I use brail, it is just a series of bumps, placed somewhere on the model, where it becomes part of the model itself. Maybe this will interest some of you. I got the ideal from some of my customers who are blind.