And for a license manager that depends on it to identify the machine, there's the problem of users copying /etc/hostid from machine to machine, not to mention the fact that there's nothing stopping the distro from generating the same /etc/hostid for every installation.
On Sparc, hostid is stored in chip. But you can reprogram it, and assigne whatever hostid you want. This is preatty handy if you have software licensed from comapany that doesn't exit anymore, and you need to move it to new box :-)
Conclusion: Using the hostid to identify a machine is silly. Why do proprietary licensing systems persist in doing so?
Any copy-protection or licensing scheme is silly and more or less easilly brakeable (there's a few paragraphs about this in Bruce Schneier's book "Secrets and Lies: Digital Security in a Networked World"). Basically, they are made to prevent grandma Betty (who first sat infront of the computer in her late 70s, and is using it to send pictures of cute Disney creatures to her grandchildren) from copying the software, not to prevent a person with medium level of technical knowledge.
-- Aleksandar Milivojevic <amilivojevic@xxxxxx> Pollard Banknote Limited Systems Administrator 1499 Buffalo Place Tel: (204) 474-2323 ext 276 Winnipeg, MB R3T 1L7
