Time sensitive program?

[mknabster]

Hey guys, i'm looking for a program to make powerpoints, pdfs, word docs, etc, time sensitive, and after a certain time period, will not be able to be opened. Can anyone recommend a software to do this, or can it be done at all on Mac?

[mknabster]

Sorry I forgot to mention that I'm broadening the search for PC programs too

[alanebro82]

I don't believe there is anything like that for Office products. They aren't designed to be security suites. You'd have to use a 3rd party encryption tool of some sort.

Why do you need this?

[mknabster]

Yea that's what i'm looking for, a 3rd party tool/program. I mainly would like this for security reasons for school. I have emailed assignments to people who have asked for them as references, but then they end up passing it along to their friends. I would like it to be time sensitive so if they don't use it in a certain period of time, it becomes unusable or unable to be opened.

[EzyStvy]

You'd need to fix it so they can't copy n paste while you're at it

[mknabster]

Now how's that done?

[Force Flow]

There's password protection available. One password to open (optional), one password to edit/save.

http://presentationsoft.about.com/od...07password.htm


Or, you can save powerpoint slideshows as a pps file, which is vew-only.

[shadowpr]

If the people you send them to don't respect your wishes and work, just stop sending them things.

That would solve the problem quick.

[mknabster]

Yea I know, but there's this one teacher I sent something to, who I later found out she doesn't give credit to people who she gets stuff from. Like I sent her a powerpoint I made up for another class, and some pictures for an art show which she never followed up on. So I would like to try to avoid that happening again.

[Statica]

What you're looking for is extremely difficult .. while a PDF format allows you to prevent copy and pasting and password protecting and prevention from printing, it doesn't quite lend itself to a time delay... and really a PDF is all we've got as a universal format for all the different file types you've required.

Have you considered putting your information up on a website .. granted, people could print out the information from the webpage etc etc .. but maybe security in this method is in its simplicity. At least for those that haven't printed the information out .. it would work, when you could just delete the webpage itself. You do have the option of further complicating things by having your information laid out in formats that wouldnt lend itself to printing very well .. I mean, what I'm suggesting here is to go very low tech on it, because there isnt a ready-made solution out there.

But finally, and I have to say this, if you've given the information out to people let them use it for what good it does them and so forth .. unless you believe it's plagiarism or encroachment of your IP .. let it go or confront the person about it. Sometimes being direct about it is far easier than being subversive