File Hiding utility (dbfhide)

Uses simple encryption to hide the contents of configuration files and initialization files.

Syntax 
dbfhide original-configuration-file encrypted-configuration-file
Option Description
original-configuration-file Specifies the name of the original file.
encrypted-configuration-file Specifies a name for the new obfuscated file.
Remarks

Configuration files are used by some utilities to hold command line options. These options may contain a password. You can use the File Hiding utility to add simple encryption to configuration files, as well as to .ini files used by SQL Anywhere and its utilities, and thereby obfuscate the contents of the file. The original file will not be modified. Once you add simple encryption to a file, there is no way to remove it. To make changes to an obfuscated file, you must keep a copy of the original file that you can modify and obfuscate again.

For more information about using configuration files, see Using configuration files to store server startup options.

For more information about encryption, see Keeping your data secure.

Hiding the contents of .ini files

In many cases, SQL Anywhere expects an .ini file to have a particular name. When you want to add simple encryption to a file whose name is important (such as saldap.ini), you need to save a copy of the original file with a different name when you add simple encryption to the file. If you do not keep a copy of the original file, then you cannot modify the contents of the file once it has been obfuscated. The following steps explain how to add simple encryption to a .ini file.

To hide the contents of a file

  1. Save the file with a different name.

    rename saldap.ini saldap.ini.org

  2. Obfuscate the file with the File Hiding utility, giving the obfuscated file the required file name.

    dbfhide saldap.ini.org saldap.ini

  3. Protect the saldap.ini.org file using file system or operating system protection, or store the file in a secure location.

    To make a change to the saldap.ini file, edit the saldap.ini.org file and repeat step 2.

Caution

You should not add simple encryption to the system information file (named .odbc.ini by default) with the File Hiding utility (dbfhide) on Unix unless you will only be using SQL Anywhere data sources. If you plan to use other data sources (for example, for MobiLink synchronization), then obfuscating the contents of the system information file may prevent other drivers from functioning properly.

This utility does not accept the @data parameter to read in options from a configuration file.

Example

Create a configuration file that starts the personal database server and the sample database. It should set a cache of 10 MB, and name this instance of the personal server Elora. The configuration file would be written as follows: 

# Configuration file for server Elora
-n Elora
-c 10M
samples-dir\demo.db

(Note that lines beginning with # are treated as comments.)

For information about samples-dir, see Samples directory.

Name the file sample.txt. If you wanted to start the database using this configuration file, your command line would be: 

dbeng11 @sample.txt

Now, add simple encryption to the configuration.

dbfhide sample.txt encrypted_sample.txt

Use the encrypted_sample.txt file to start a database.

dbsrv11 @encrypted_sample.txt
Copyright © 2008, iAnywhere Solutions, Inc. - SQL Anywhere 11.0.0