8 ms·

You could say that Mark Russinovich is a hacker's hacker, the foremost Windows hacker, and a reverse engineering wizard. It was he who discovered and blew the w

You could say that Mark Russinovich is a hacker's hacker, the foremost Windows hacker, and a reverse engineering wizard. It was he who discovered and blew the whistle on the Sony rootkit scandal, for example, after finding and reverse engineering it on his machine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk... He extensively reverse engineered and documented "Windows Internals" details before joining Microsoft (and before being "encouraged" to change the name of his business to Sysinternals). His writings and talks on "The case of..." are master classes on reverse engineering. https://youtu.be/GQ1EDqsA1yk https://youtu.be/GQ1EDqsA1yk https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-blog-archive/bg-p/Windows-Blog-Archive/label-name/Mark%20Russinovich https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-blog-archive/... I'm paying attention to him.

kramerger 4y ago
Well... He is also written some horrible fiction novels, so the guys is not perfect.
- imagine99 4y ago
  Why would you say that? They are all rated 4+ stars on Amazon (at first glance), so the general consensus is that they are probably not that "horrible". Personally, I enjoyed them a lot and I am actually a bit bummed that he stopped publishing new ones... Granted, I probably would not have read them had I not recognised his name on the cover (there is too much cookie-cutter stuff out there). But I did not regret buying them and I remember being impressed by the fact that this guy wrote Syinternals AND engaging fiction...
- Ygg2 4y ago
  Why are fiction novels relevant to field of computer languages? This seems like ad hominem.
  - kramerger 4y ago
    The books are about computer security. My impression from the first book was that the author has a very back and white view of the world. That could very well also affect his day job
    - cinntaile 4y ago
      You're really using a fictional story that he wrote to conclude that he has a very black and white view of the world? That's not proof of anything...
    - Ygg2 4y ago
      Sure, but a fiction book isn't written in a vacuum. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvaUwagX_uU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvaUwagX_uU For a light-hearted take.
  - alkonaut 4y ago
    This is a tounge in cheek jab at someone who is successful, rich, handsome, has a huge job title, is a famous programmer, and also sells a a lot books (because they are very popular). The fact that those books read like they were written by a 17 year old actually gives me some comfort...
blub 4y ago
You seem to be quite well versed in the persona of Mark Russinovich. Does he still develop the sysinternals tools? Does he program any more or has he settled into the life of an xTO? Rust, C++, what is he using? Did he port all his tools to Rust? Given that his reputation is in other areas I don’t immediately see what makes his proclamation noteworthy. As someone that read his book and used his tools I’m more puzzled by his statement than motivated to spring into action :-)
cvccvroomvroom 4y ago
Almost 15-20 yrs ago, before I deleted my LI profile, he was kind enough to have a look at some random malware at (big name) caught in the wild (because the org dragged its heels into any measurable security) doing actually weird and clever things to hide itself from all manner of scanning tools, including that 4 letter acronym collection package MSFT gave to customers to grab forensics. Back then, they also taught MSFT NT kernel devs for a time how their own stuff worked. Satya Narayana and company out of Azure are a tribe of forward thinkers who rescued MSFT in the long-term by adapting and embracing without as much extinguishing. PS: Unnamed yours truly is now around the corner from where Winternals was. Small world.
zerr 4y ago
With all due respect, this is coming from a Win32 API C programmer who happens to save the code in files with .cpp extension. In other words, not familiar with modern C++.
- aspyct 4y ago
  What's wrong with .cpp extension?
  - dale_glass 4y ago
    The implication is that he's mostly writing C despite the file extension suggesting they contain C++. C++ changed a lot over time, and the way modern code is supposed to be written is very distinct from "C with classes", but you still can do that if you want.
    - palata 4y ago
      Wut? Makes no sense to me.
      - dale_glass 4y ago
        Here's an example of C++ code written intentionally with all the latest C++ features: https://gist.github.com/caiorss/c7db87df674326793431a14006aa21f6 https://gist.github.com/caiorss/c7db87df674326793431a14006aa... It looks pretty much nothing like a C program doing the same job. A lot of those features were made to make C++ a safer language to use. Eg, with a construction like: for(const auto& it : ast){ You can't accidentally walk past the end of the array by going one item too far. But C++ still allows you to write code the way you'd do it in C.
        ithkuil 4y ago
        Why some functions are declared like: void foo() { .. } And others auto foo() -> void { .. }

kramerger 4y ago

Well... He is also written some horrible fiction novels, so the guys is not perfect.

imagine99 4y ago
Why would you say that? They are all rated 4+ stars on Amazon (at first glance), so the general consensus is that they are probably not that "horrible". Personally, I enjoyed them a lot and I am actually a bit bummed that he stopped publishing new ones... Granted, I probably would not have read them had I not recognised his name on the cover (there is too much cookie-cutter stuff out there). But I did not regret buying them and I remember being impressed by the fact that this guy wrote Syinternals AND engaging fiction...
Ygg2 4y ago
Why are fiction novels relevant to field of computer languages? This seems like ad hominem.
- kramerger 4y ago
  The books are about computer security. My impression from the first book was that the author has a very back and white view of the world. That could very well also affect his day job
  - cinntaile 4y ago
    You're really using a fictional story that he wrote to conclude that he has a very black and white view of the world? That's not proof of anything...
  - Ygg2 4y ago
    Sure, but a fiction book isn't written in a vacuum. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvaUwagX_uU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvaUwagX_uU For a light-hearted take.
- alkonaut 4y ago
  This is a tounge in cheek jab at someone who is successful, rich, handsome, has a huge job title, is a famous programmer, and also sells a a lot books (because they are very popular). The fact that those books read like they were written by a 17 year old actually gives me some comfort...

blub 4y ago

You seem to be quite well versed in the persona of Mark Russinovich. Does he still develop the sysinternals tools? Does he program any more or has he settled into the life of an xTO? Rust, C++, what is he using? Did he port all his tools to Rust? Given that his reputation is in other areas I don’t immediately see what makes his proclamation noteworthy. As someone that read his book and used his tools I’m more puzzled by his statement than motivated to spring into action :-)

cvccvroomvroom 4y ago

Almost 15-20 yrs ago, before I deleted my LI profile, he was kind enough to have a look at some random malware at (big name) caught in the wild (because the org dragged its heels into any measurable security) doing actually weird and clever things to hide itself from all manner of scanning tools, including that 4 letter acronym collection package MSFT gave to customers to grab forensics. Back then, they also taught MSFT NT kernel devs for a time how their own stuff worked. Satya Narayana and company out of Azure are a tribe of forward thinkers who rescued MSFT in the long-term by adapting and embracing without as much extinguishing. PS: Unnamed yours truly is now around the corner from where Winternals was. Small world.

zerr 4y ago

With all due respect, this is coming from a Win32 API C programmer who happens to save the code in files with .cpp extension. In other words, not familiar with modern C++.

aspyct 4y ago
What's wrong with .cpp extension?
- dale_glass 4y ago
  The implication is that he's mostly writing C despite the file extension suggesting they contain C++. C++ changed a lot over time, and the way modern code is supposed to be written is very distinct from "C with classes", but you still can do that if you want.
  - palata 4y ago
    Wut? Makes no sense to me.
    - dale_glass 4y ago
      Here's an example of C++ code written intentionally with all the latest C++ features: https://gist.github.com/caiorss/c7db87df674326793431a14006aa21f6 https://gist.github.com/caiorss/c7db87df674326793431a14006aa... It looks pretty much nothing like a C program doing the same job. A lot of those features were made to make C++ a safer language to use. Eg, with a construction like: for(const auto& it : ast){ You can't accidentally walk past the end of the array by going one item too far. But C++ still allows you to write code the way you'd do it in C.
      - ithkuil 4y ago
        Why some functions are declared like: void foo() { .. } And others auto foo() -> void { .. }