
Ask HN: How do you protect your codebase from being stolen by engineers? - blacksoil
Hello all,
I want to start hiring engineers to help me with the codebase that I&#x27;ve single-handedly worked on. I&#x27;m curious about how you guys protected your code when you did the same? In particular, I&#x27;m using interpreted language -- node.js -- so I don&#x27;t have the luxury of distributing parts of the system as binary :(<p>Thanks for the advice!
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ingenuous2
This isn't a problem, but hiring people you don't trust is a problem. Part of
that is setting expectations with a contract. Most of that is accepting that
it's going to be a risk, no matter what you do (there's no DRM that will
protect your code from your own engineers).

I recommend you don't worry too much about this in particular. Have some basic
legal protection with a contract, that should prevent another company from
forming. Someone running off with your code and dominating your company
without a legal entity of their own... would be unexpected.

Also, your code is unlikely to be so particularly novel that the specific
implementation is your secret sauce. (Not trying to insult you -- maybe I'm
wrong -- but generally the idea of the source as a trade secret, unless we're
talking Carmak's inverse sqrt, it's not that big a deal)

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cjcenizal
Spend a hundred bucks and have a lawyer draft a contract for them to sign. You
could also see if LegalZoom offers anything like this.

