Zend Guard 5.5

December 1, 2010

Exclude resources of files or folders from the project tree
Support for non-English operating systems with source and output folders
Enhanced documentation about obfuscation and its implications
Bug fix - All sources are now searched during Export Candidates
Bug fix - "ignore-pattern" is now handled correctly in --export candidates
Bug fix - Backward support for Zend Studio compatibility is now supported
Bug fix - Wrapper now frees the Encoder library after failing to encode
Bug fix - It is now possible to integrate Zend Studio for Eclipse or other editors
Bug fix - No longer crashes while scanning a large amount of files
Bug fix - Working with encoded files only is now enabled only in the project level
Bug fix - It is now possible to enter a product name with spaces
Bug fix - "preserve-docs" now preserves docs
Bug fix - Marking files as ignored now shows the full path and is no longer confusing from the GUI
Bug fix - Newly created licenses now work if the locale is other than English
Bug fix - Encoding a Japanese source folder with the php4 option is now functional
Bug fix - When using header files or an exclude list, the exe now finds a tmp location
Bug fix - The command line now mentions the location of the binaries in the package
Bug fix - Disabling the "Override project configuration" checkbox for ignored resources is no longer redundant
Bug fix - The default location for installation in Linux is no longer 5_0_0
Bug fix - Uninstalling in Mac now removes the folders/shortcuts

Improved compatibility with Zend Optimizer 2.6
Improved 'mb_string' extension support
Added support for encoding files without a file extension
Improved support for non-English characters
Bug fix - Variables with same name and a different case no longer become confused
Bug fix – Using strong obfuscation no longer causes crashes
GUI - Added an option to close open projects
GUI - Bug fix - The "ignore pattern" (CVS) option now works

Encoding/obfuscation for PHP 5.3 is not compatible with PHP 5.2 and earlier releases, and vice versa. That is, a file encoded to run on PHP 5.3 will not be loaded on PHP 5.2 and vice versa. Workaround: Encode your application separately to run on PHP 5.3 and PHP 5.2.

Zend Studio cannot initiate a few instances of Zend Guard and can integrate only with a new one.

Relative names do not work with --ignore and -–exclude-file
Using inexact file names (different cases, / instead of \\, or not full paths) does not work with --ignore and --exclude-file (Windows only)
"Work only with encoded files" option does not work if it is not applied for all files
Extending stdClass gives a blank output when a file is encoded

Using mbstring.func_overload with obfuscation requires exporting functions that are overloaded.

Implementing PHP interfaces (such as Iterator) requires exporting interface methods
Autoloading does not work for obfuscated classes (due to different class names)
Obfuscating class and function names can break any code that accesses a function by string, such as calling a variable function like $func(), or calling a PHP internal function to access a class/function as a variable, such as call_user_func($func), etc.
--export-php may not automatically export some SPL iterator classes

Double-click on the self-extracting archive, and follow the instructions in the automated installation wizard.

Extract the downloaded tar.gz file: tar xzvf filename.tar.gz
As soon as the extraction is done, run the extracted binary (./ZendGuard.bin), and follow the instructions in the installation wizard.

Extract the downloaded .zip or .dmg file by double clicking on it.
Double click on the archive directory in order to start the Zend guard installation wizard and follow the instructions in the installation wizard.