Is there a code obfuscator for PHP? [closed]

Has anybody used a good obfuscator for PHP? I've tried some but they don't work for very big projects. They can't handle variables that are included in one file and used in another, for instance.

Or do you have any other tricks for stopping the spread of your code?

Solution 1:

You can try PHP protect which is a free PHP obfuscator to obfuscate your PHP code.
It is very nice, easy to use and also free. EDIT: This service is not live anymore.

As for what others have written here about not using obfuscation because it can be broken etc:
I have only one thing to answer them - don't lock your house door because anyone can pick your lock.
This is exactly the case, obfuscation is not meant to prevent 100% code theft. It only needs to make it a time-consuming task so it will be cheaper to pay the original coder. Hope this helps.

Solution 2:

People will offer you obfuscators, but no amount of obfuscation can prevent someone from getting at your code. None. If your computer can run it, or in the case of movies and music if it can play it, the user can get at it. Even compiling it to machine code just makes the job a little more difficult. If you use an obfuscator, you are just fooling yourself. Worse, you're also disallowing your users from fixing bugs or making modifications.

Music and movie companies haven't quite come to terms with this yet, they still spend millions on DRM.

In interpreted languages like PHP and Perl it's trivial. Perl used to have lots of code obfuscators, then we realized you can trivially decompile them.

perl -MO=Deparse some_program

PHP has things like DeZender and Show My Code.

My advice? Write a license and get a lawyer. The only other option is to not give out the code and instead run a hosted service.

See also the perlfaq entry on the subject.

Solution 3:

Nothing will be perfect. If you just want something to stop non-programmers then here's a little script I wrote you can use:

<?php
$infile=$_SERVER['argv'][1];
$outfile=$_SERVER['argv'][2];
if (!$infile || !$outfile) {
    die("Usage: php {$_SERVER['argv'][0]} <input file> <output file>\n");
}
echo "Processing $infile to $outfile\n";
$data="ob_end_clean();?>";
$data.=php_strip_whitespace($infile);
// compress data
$data=gzcompress($data,9);
// encode in base64
$data=base64_encode($data);
// generate output text
$out='<?ob_start();$a=\''.$data.'\';eval(gzuncompress(base64_decode($a)));$v=ob_get_contents();ob_end_clean();?>';
// write output text
file_put_contents($outfile,$out);