English

Apple SSAFE Project

From "Vadermeer": Yesterday at the Seattle Goodwill Outlet, where everything is sold by the pound, I noticed the Apple logo on letterhead sticking out from a bin of books, so I started digging. What I found were the 1979-1980 files of Jack MacDonald, manager of system software for the Apple II and /// at the time. They tell the story of project "SSAFE" or "Software Security from Apples Friends and Enemies." This was a proposal to bring disk copy protection in-house to sell as a service to outside developers. Inter-office memos, meeting notes and progress reports all give a good idea of what a project lifecycle was like. Different schemes and levels of protection are considered, as well as implementation primarily on the Apple II+ and the upcoming SARA (The Apple ///) and Lisa computers. Randy Wigginton is featured prominently throughout, along with mentions of Woz and many other familiar names. The documents were all a jumble so I've put them in chronological order and scanned the collection, please enjoy.

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