How to bypass trial restrictions with vmware thinapp (Use it forever)

Disclaimer :- I don't support cracking/bypassing any software in any way. The information is for educational purpose only, use at your own risk. 

This post will explain how we can use vmware thinapp and run any trial application forever with little hassle and outside help. 

You will need Vmware Thinapp (and Vmware Workstation/Player for using this). There me be other free alternatives but i have not explored them as of now. I'll give example of using SSH Explorer  for demonstration.Please see disclaimer, and buy this software if you like, it will help fund many software engineers around the world.

I have windows 7 installed in Vmware Workstation, with Vmware thinapp installed on the same.
Although you can see guides for Thinapp for Virtualizing SW, i l illustarate settings for ssh explorer here in Section 1. you can off course modify many stages using other tutorials on thinapp.

The applications are tested on Vmware workstation as well on the real system, I'll show the illustration on workstation only.

The main point that enables use trial SW for ever is that Thinapp allows us to store all the information that the application needs, wither registry/programfiles/settings etc in single directory. It is in a way similar to trick application that its still running in past by changing system date/using SW that makes it run in particular date. But many SW which synchronize with internet wont work in this fashion.

Section 1: Make the Single EXE for application using Thinapp.I'll illustrate for SSH Explorer only

1. Using Thinapp, do a prescan of the system, please keep the installer of your application in the OS before doing prescan. As thinapp compares prescan and postscan to package the data into single exe (you dont want your installer to be included in package as well :)
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
2. Install the application (in this case ssh explorer), don't close the thinapp window. 
3. Do a post scan
   
   
   
4. Select the entry point, off course for simple application you only want the application itself not the uninstaller and stuff. Entry point is the Exe that will be run when click the generated EXE. For products like adobe CS 4, you'll use multiple entry points. Here i use only one.
   
   
   
   
   
5. Enable all groups to run package (Or use a particular group if you want to).
   
   
   
   
   
   
6. You dont want your application to write data here and there (offcourse for using trial unlimited), so use restricted write access.
   
   
   
7. Now select same directory as application, this is again for the same reason, you will delete the application data folder as illustrated below (after saving settings).
   
   
   
   
   
8. Helping Vmware or not, is your choice (Popup to send data to vmware on usage pop)
9. Inventory name is the folder were the generated Exe will be stored, and the application specific data will be kept of the final generated exe. Choose accordingly.
   
   
   
   
   
10. Primary data container is read only file, so keeping it within exe does no harm. MSI is not generated in this case neither the package is compressed (might affect later performance also).
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
11. Warnings are usually for files that are not copied (like log files etc, you can skip those or retry if the application fails in the end) (click next here)
    
12. Click build to generate  final single exe of entire application.
    
    
    
13. Click finish to open folder to see the generated application and other files if you choosed them (here only single exe is shown).
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
14. Copy these exe for using the SW forever :) See Section 2 for how to

Section 2:  How to make the application run forever 

Now each application has its own data (like personal preferences, connection settings etc). You will need to look for the generated folder for the settings.

In this case settings are stored in the folder SSH Explorer\%ProgramFilesDir%\SSH Explorer

Copy the files conn.ini ,settings.ini and snippets.ini for later use (you dont want to reconfigure the SW again). 

Delete the folder "SSH Explorer" , the folder you provided for Inventory name. All the registry and other settings will be erased. 


Start SSH Explorer again and you will have your folder recreated, replace the files we copied earlier. and voila you are done :). 

Similar procedure is to be followed for all other SW.