YTK Pro Now Available! *pre-release to release info tracking*

[good_dude20]

yes i got YTK the minute it was launched i love it. I have been waiting for this program for a long time and it is finally here. The new features are great. And a good fact i like YTK is that it can handle more iggys. It is cool. Thanks Torseq for a great program.

[Torseq Tech.]

It is cool.

It's about to get order of magnitudes cooler. BTW, Beta Build 244 is now available. =) It's much improved and the next release will even crush this release (as solid as it is). Keep the feature requests coming and many of them will make the next release I assure you. We plan on throwing in some of our own stuff we've thought of too. ;-)

[Ven0m]

I like how you say "crush".

[whatwasithinking]

When is the free version coming out? I have been hearing "very soon" for several months and still nothing. And what's with the non-existant "free activation code" notice that appears on the activation window??

I hate spending money for software that may or may not work. In fact, the software industry is one of the few industries where people will pay money for something with known and sometimes planned design flaws. And considering the extent and severity of Yahoo booters it seems highly unlikely that any program will do the job. In fact, YTunnel has become so prone to booters it is not much better than Messenger alone.

A lot of people don't know how bad this situation has become, instead they try to convince people a lot of the "booting" is just Yahoo logging you out of chat or a problem with your ISP connection. Believe me, after your computer freezes up the CPU begins to overheat and the whole thing needs to be shut down by pulling the plug you will not think it is Yahoo logging you out. It's not an urban legend that these boot attempts can harm your computer.

[Ven0m]

YTK Basic will indeed be coming out soon enough. The largest reason for such impedances in the development and production of YTK Basic is the simple fact that there are so many satisfied YTK Pro users that the developers (mind you, there are only 2 of them) have become overwhelmed with feature requests and improvements for those that have indeed purchased copies of the product. You seemingly understand a bit about the business world, surely you realize that priorities have to be established; YTK Pro takes priority over YTK Basic.

It is indeed understandable that you have had bad experiences with getting 'booted', and from the sounds of it, you were hit pretty hard. You are correct, it does happen, and it is devastating when it does. (The concept of actual damage to your PC is debatable, but I'd like to not go into that here.) YTK Pro is, as of now, is 100% unbootable with the features that it now includes.

You can read more about how and why here, and you can also seek the testimonials of any of the current YTK Pro users, even myself. =) Being on dial-up internet, I too am completely unbootable. I hope that helps reassure you. Now as far as Y!Tunnel is concerned...I'd like to tread lightly so as not to implicitly slander or insult the program or its author, as they're both respectable. Y!Tunnel has only 1 author, who is and has been undoubtedly hard pressed to keep the protection schemes up-to-date and efficient. As time has proven, the unyielding wrath of programmers across Yahoo! have proven to be more than 1 person can cope with. YTK Pro, however, has 2 developers that are dead-set concerned about your security, privacy, and overall protection on Yahoo!.

The apparent insistence and importance Adam and Brock take in the protection of their customers is evident throughout the release notes and explanations they give on the YTK Pro forums. As far as the excuses and for lack of a better word, bullsh*t that people make up when you do get booted, that is a mere history lesson as far as YTK is concerned. If you're having an issue, I, and everyone else on the support team will be unwavering in our continual support and assistance to the utmost extent of our capability. =) If you, or any user reading this thread for that matter ever have a problem, do not hesitate to request help at the YTK Pro Community Support Forum. We greatly hope this helps you conquer your stereotypes and misunderstandings. =)

Venom (aka kingofchaos6669) and the YTK Pro Staff

P.S. For those who keep track of this topic, Build 254a has been released, with 2 new anti-boot options, including C-Mode and Gawd Mode (Gawd Mode provides 100% unbootability). Find information about build 254a here and like mentioned above, you can find information about C-Mode and Gawd Mode here.

[whatwasithinking]

Thanks for the link to the info. However,I fail to see how "Gawd Mode" is of benefit. If you have to enter the room with an additional id that is easier to boot can't that alias be booted and result in a crashed computer that kicks BOTH id's out of the room? In addition, if the alias is booted consistently upon entering a room you won't be able to see much of what is being posted in the room. Unless you have full functionality, i.e. being able to post and view room text, enable voice, as well as send and receive pm's what is the point?

As for the basic version, why develop something different? Just use the pro version with a free trial period.

[Torseq Tech.]

Being one of YTK Pro's developers, I'd like to comment on some of the following...

whatwasithinking wrote:

When is the free version coming out? I have been hearing "very soon" for several months and still nothing. And what's with the non-existant "free activation code" notice that appears on the activation window??

For several months YTK Basic and Pro were being talked about BUT YTK Pro itself was just released last month (November 12th to be exact). It's only been 1 month and a single week, of which we've released 5 new YTK Pro builds and one revision (A) to our fifth build. This totals 6 releases in only 5 weeks. This program, for the time being, is only $24.95 USD. This isn't a lot of money for all of what it can do. I've listed 1 bug (non-critical) on our bug tracker at Flyspray::**Default Project:** and within maybe 1 hour's time I had it corrected (which really took me only about 2 seconds to fix). This program is still a BETA and you'd be hard-pressed to find anything even slightly wrong with it's features or functionality so far.

And what's with the non-existant "free activation code" notice that appears on the activation window??

That button is there to request an evaluation code and is there from our license key activation provider, SoftWorkz. We implemented the SDK they offer for software activation and in turn this is why you see it. We are doing no evaluational "trials" with YTK Pro. When the Basic version is released this week it'll give you a glimpse of what the Pro version can offer you.

And considering the extent and severity of Yahoo booters it seems highly unlikely that any program will do the job.

Currently there are only 2 programs that can "do the job" completely and these are both YTK Pro and YMLite (which is a free client offered by Craig Capel). Both of these programs can offer you complete unbootability on the Yahoo! chat network and if you're not looking for 100% here (since it carries some restrictions) you can chat and still have much flexibility with high boot-proofing via the C-Mode protection scheme. These are just two anti-boot protection schemes that YTK Pro provides.

YTK Pro offers:

- Alias "Cloaking" (Old but originally discovered and used by Chet Simpson)
- Half & Full Flood Cap Control (Uses TCP Window Scaling for your chat session, discovered by myself for use in effective anti-boot choices)
- C-Mode (Successor to Alias Cloaking, discovered by Craig the author of YMLite)
- Gawd Mode (A 100% Unbootable option, discovered by myself as an offshoot to Craig's flexible yet protective C-Mode)
- Complete Group-based Management (Utilized virtually everywhere for finite control throughout all of YTK Pro's packet handling system)
- Packet Profiling (A technology we've created and named for use in YTK Pro to ensure proper packet validity)
- YMSG Protocol 'Reversion' (Allows for users to use previous protocol versions for their sessions instead of using natively higher protocol versions that match each new Yahoo! Messenger version made available)

This is a total of 7 protection schemes for anti-boot purposes, some of which are internal and some of which can work together to compliment another. There aren't any programs out there with this many to choose from *that are actually proven semi-effective to effective*. The closest you'll find is YMLite which is offered freely by Craig, his program uses the 2 most effective of that list (C-Mode & Gawd Mode).

However,I fail to see how "Gawd Mode" is of benefit.

Gawd Mode can undisputedly offer you 100% protection against anything thrown at you from a booter. This in itself is a claim that's never before been able to be made with complete confidence while using YMSG protocol.

If you have to enter the room with an additional id that is easier to boot can't that alias be booted and result in a crashed computer that kicks BOTH id's out of the room?

First off, you wouldn't enter the room to view chat text (while in Gawd Mode) with an alias on the same account in another client (or another instance of the same client). A separate account can be used to view the text while in Gawd Mode. This is just one way it can be used, which is the least desirable use for it since you're able to toggle Gawd Mode off/on in real-time during your chat session (obviously the preferred choice). This means you can be using C-Mode during your session and receiving chat room text as normal and you're able to activate Gawd whenever you need to and turn it off whenever you want springing from C-Mode to Gawd and vice versa. No relogging in required, this system is quite flexible.

Some uses for "Gawd Mode":

- Use in an auto-trigger anti-boot protection system to stuff boot attempts if detected.
- Manual use to stuff boot attempts that have been foreshadowed from the get-go.
- On top of C-Mode's protection this mode covers the rest of the bases that couldn't be covered before. Room boots (chat message flooding through the room) are useless against it.
- Can be toggled back to C-Mode on-the-fly to receive chat room text again if desired.
- Offers the ability to totally lock down your YMSG session (like a firewall would in this identical mode) so if you're away from your computer there's no reason to worry about what might be happening while you're not around.

As for the basic version, why develop something different? Just use the pro version with a free trial period.

Thanks for the suggestion but we're quite capable of making this decision ourselves. What's planned is a stripped down version of YTK Pro for the free Basic version offering a balance of usability and a nice but limited feature set. There will be no evaluations for the Pro unless I change my mind at any point in time which I may or may not do.

Before the questions hit about what features will be available in the free Basic version... I'm not at liberty to list them here at the moment. I may list them here in this thread within the next couple of days or we may just release the Basic version and let users see for themselves. The latter probably won't happen first but it is a remote possibility.

[Torseq Tech.]

As of approximately 2 hours ago YTK Basic is now going to be referred to as YTK Lite. The word "basic" sounds too limiting and YTK Lite won't be "basic" it'll offer some significant features for a program retailing at the price of $0.00 USD as a 1st party client enhancement.

The feature list for YTK Lite has now been set and agreed upon and we've bumped it's release date up to be sooner than expected (you never know how soon/when =).

For those that are wondering how it will compare to the older Y!Tunnel Basic application... YTK Lite will be much more capable.

Stay tuned...

[whatwasithinking]

Sorry if I don't quite understand the benefit of "gawd mode". As mentioned earlier one would enter a room in gawd mode but not be able to view room text. One would then have to enter the room using another chat client with a different account ID in order to view the text. Presumably that second account would be very bootable with voice and pm's enabled. When that second account is booted repeatedly one won't be able to see much room text. And, ultimately when the second account is hard booted the pc will freeze and require shutdown and obviously ends the chat session. Yahoo still thinks you're in the room, however, and you can't re-enter until your ID is cleared.

I've used YMlite for about a month and find it very frustrating and awkward to use.

P.S. Thanks for the sarcasm. I wasn't trying to make any decision for you. I was merely asking a question.

[Torseq Tech.]

As mentioned earlier one would enter a room in gawd mode but not be able to view room text. One would then have to enter the room using another chat client with a different account ID in order to view the text.

You're still clinging on to the least desirable way of using Gawd Mode. I clearly stated that you can switch between C-Mode and Gawd Mode in real-time during your session whenever you need/want to. For the time you're in Gawd Mode you won't care if you can see the room text or not because chances are you've enabled it to combat a room boot attempt and will only have it enabled temporarily. After you believe it's over you switch back to C-Mode and not only do you have room text again but you're still protected.

Presumably that second account would be very bootable with voice and pm's enabled. When that second account is booted repeatedly one won't be able to see much room text.

If you were to use the least desirable method for using Gawd Mode, being using another account to view room text, yes the other account would be susceptible to being booted and if successful you have no "eye" for the room text (back to square one). However, who's to say you couldn't enable C-Mode on your additional account used for room text viewing? If this is done your other ID won't be very easy to just boot off to where you lose your room text viewing ability.

P.S. Thanks for the sarcasm. I wasn't trying to make any decision for you. I was merely asking a question.

As for the basic version, why develop something different? Just use the pro version with a free trial period.

If you notice your line above it did indeed start off as a question but the last sentence of that line was a direct suggestion/recommendation to me pertaining to what form we should go about offering our program to non-customers to try out.

When I said:

Thanks for the suggestion but we're quite capable of making this decision ourselves.

I don't find that sarcastic at all, maybe a little short but not sarcastic. It originally sounded to me like you believed that we were incapable of making this decision ourselves or perhaps I should say the "correct" decision in your eyes hence why I made that comment.