Blogs
Random long thoughts I had over the years...
Topics range from programming, math, to my views of school
Dev Blog - Bufferoverflow
February 12, 2022
Being bored and not wanting to study, I randomly checked up my Github repo and realized the static analyzer flagged a critical vulnerability in my code. For those of you not familiar with static analyzer, it is a security tool that reviews/analyzes code to determine if there are any obvious security vulnerabilities in your code. On Github, there is a pipeline workflow feature that allows you to execute specific scripts/actions for any code changes you push called Github Actions. Github has made it convenient to setup security analysis on your repo. The static analyzer I am using is called CodeQL,...
How to Check if an Application is PAM-Aware
February 6, 2022
PAM stands for Pluggable Authentication Module and its purpose from my understanding
is to separate application developers from writing an authentication scheme into their
program. Think of it as an authentication “API” for “privilege granting” applications but
is flexible how each application authenticates the user. System administrators
are given the control and decision to how each application authenticates a user by modifying
PAM configs (policies) that could be found in locations such as /etc/pam.d (location may vary depending
on the OS).
You shall not slay the client
January 31, 2022
Recently, I got the opportunity to attend a two-week-long training in Real-Time Programming For QNX Neutrino RTOS
where I am learning the ins and outs of QNX, a real-time microkernel operating system that is a UNIX-like OS.
On one of the demos, the trainer showed us a behavior that I thought was impossible. This shook the foundation of my
understanding of IPC (Inter-Process Communication) and on signals. However, this is a feature in QNX that does not
exist on Linux from my understanding.
PHYS1001 - A Review on Foundations of Physics 1
January 1, 2022
TLDR:
Intimidating at first especially to freshman students new to the University
Prepared for a lot of Derivations
Be comfortable with Math
Labs take a lot of effort and time
Do not take Monday 8am labs