Advanced Office 95 Password Recovery: README
============================================

Contents
--------

  Program information
  Company information
  Description
  Requirements
  Usage
  Technical support
  Registration
  Copyright and license
  Where to get the latest version
  Ombudsman statement


Program information
-------------------

Program Archive Name:
  ao95pr.zip
Program Name:
  Advanced Office 95 Password Recovery
Program Version:
  1.1
Program Release Date:
  January 4, 2000
Program Description:
  Retrieves the passwords for MS Office documents
Target OS:
  Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000
Software type:
  Shareware ($60 for personal license, $120 for business license)


Company information
-------------------

Company Name:
  Elcom Ltd
Contact E-mail Address:
  support@elcomsoft.com
Contact WWW URL:
  http://www.elcomsoft.com


Description
-----------

This program (Advanced Office 95 Password Recovery, or simply
AO95PR) can be used to recover your lost passwords for Microsoft
Office 95 (and older version, like Office 2.0 and 6.0) documents.
Supported versions of Office components are:

Word 6.0
Word 95 (7.0)
Excel 5.0
Excel 95 (7.0)
Access 95


Requirements
------------

- Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0 or Windows 2000
  running on x86 CPU
- Microsoft Office document you forgot the password for :)


Usage
-----

The program is a GUI application; you can run it by just
selecting the "Advanced Office 95 Password Recovery" menu item from
the appropriate program group created during installation.
Alternatively, you can double-click on "ao95pr.exe" in the folder
you've installed AO95PR to.

The main program window is quite simple, and contains just a few
buttons and status Window.

To open the document for password recovering, press the "Open
file..." button (the left one). If the file you select is a
valid password-protected file (it should have an extension "doc"
for Word files, "xls" for Excel files, and "mdb" for Access
files), the program will recognize the file format and show (in
the status window) something like:

Trying to open a source file F:\TEST\sales.xls ...
F:\TEST\sales.xls successfully opened.
Password to open:  'qwerty' (hex = 71 77 65 72 74 79).
Book protection password:  'zzyyyt' (hex = 7a 7a 79 79 79 74).
Password to modify: 'yyyyyc' (hex = 79 79 79 79 79 63).
Sheet #1 (1998) is not password protected.
Password for sheet #2 (1999): '===>==;' (hex = 3d 3d 3d 3e 3d 3d 3b).

All passwords are recovered instantly: to open/modify, document
protection passwords (Word), workbook/sheet passwords. Just note
that sometimes it is impossible to get the "original" password set
to the file (due to the nature of MS Office encryption algorythm).
But the passwords shown by AO95PR are valid anyway -- i.e. MS
Office will accept them without problems. And finally, sometimes
AO95PR cannot recover the document protection password for Word
files; however, it allows you to change it to any one of your
choice, or just delete it (make sure that "Backup document"
option is enabled).
                                            
After the ASCII represenation of the password, the program shows
the password in a hex form -- this might be usefull if some
characters are "unprintable" (i.e. cannot be typed on the
keyboard), or non-English.

Unregistered version shown only the passwords which are up to 3
characters long. For longer ones, only the password length is given
(and the password is printed using '#' symbols); and the hex
representation is not shown at all. Also, unregistered version
doesn't allow to change and delete the document protection
passwords.

If the file is not a Office document, or created in newer
version of Microsoft Office (for example, Word 97 or Excel 97),
or doesn't have the password at all, an appropriate message will
be displayed. To recover passwords for Office 97/2000 documents,
please use "Advanced Office 97 Password Recovery" program, which
is available at:

http://www.elcomsoft.com/prs.html

Please note that if the file you're recovering the password for
is created in non-English version of Microsoft Office, AO95PR
may say that this document is not password-protected at all, or
display an invalid password. If you'll get such message, please
send us your file -- we'll recover the password for it manually,
and build-in the support for such files into the next versions
of AO95PR.


Technical support
-----------------

For technical support, please contact us at support@elcomsoft.com.


Registration
------------

This program is distributed as shareware (look at "license.txt"
for details). Being unregistered, it shows only first three
chars of the password (the other chars are replaced with '#'
characters).

After you register (look at "order.txt" for details), we'll send
you your personal registration code. To enter it into the
program, just press the "Register" button on the main screen;
the program will display the small window dialog asking you to
enter the code. If the code is correct, AO95PR shows the message
that it is registered now, and so since than will show all
characters of the password.

Please note that your registration will be valid for all future
versions of AO95PR -- it means, that they will be free for you.


Copyright and license
---------------------

See "license.txt" file.


Where to get the latest version
-------------------------------

The latest version of AO95PR is always available from our
web page at:

http://www.elcomsoft.com/ao95pr.html

Please also have a look at other password recovery products made
by our company:

http://www.elcomsoft.com/prs.html

you will find the password recovery software for office 97
documents, VBA code, MS Outlook, MS Backup, ARJ and ZIP
archives, and NT users there; more products will follow. 

If you'd like to be notified about new releases of password
recovery software, please subscribe to our mailing list:

http://prsoftware.listbot.com


Ombudsman statement
-------------------

Elcom Ltd is a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals
(ASP). ASP wants to make sure that the shareware principle works
for you. If you are unable to resolve a shareware-related problem
with an ASP member by contacting the member directly, ASP may be
able to help. The ASP Ombudsman can help you resolve a dispute or
problem with an ASP member, but does not provide technical support
for members' products. Please write to the ASP Ombudsman at 157-F
Love Ave., Greenwood, IN 46142 USA, FAX 317-888-2195, or send email
to omb@asp-shareware.org.
