I have a nice one.
Maybe , cannot say if it can be of interest to any member of the Team Reboot (or to any other member of the reboot.pro board).
Holmes.Sherlock is officially excluded from taking part to this challenge (since he already knows the topic and has in his hands a possible solution ).
The challenge is the following:
- get here http://blog.didierst...ith-utilmanexe/ the C++ source code of a very simple program
- compile it/rewrite it in any way/programming language you see fit in order to make it into the smallest possible .exe that will be able to do the same thing, i.e. execute a call to CreateProcess/CreateProcessA and open a cmd prompt on the WinSta0\\Winlogon desktop (or find *any* other way, with or without calling an external function, to obtain the same result).
the program should run on *any* Windows XP regardless of SP levelthe program should run on XP SP 2 ONLY and if needed be easily adaptable to other SP versions by changing the Ordinal with which function(s) are called.- if by design, luck, or whatever other reason, the executable runs on more operating systems and SP levels without changes it will be a plus, but still the scope is to make the smallest PE.
- it is strictly forbidden, ad will cause the non acceptability of the solution the use of calling functions by Name, as it is now compulsory to call them by Ordinal (joakim made me do it ) Hey, pssst, come closer: If you manage to make the PE smaller calling the function by name I will change Rules again to make the solution valid.
- in order to further clear the scope of the challenge and to simplify, the proposed solution will be tested on XP SP2 and on XP SP2 ONLY, and if it works, points will be assigned along the formula P=512-L where P represents Points and L the length in bytes of the proposed solution.
The scope of the challenge is to make the SMALLEST sized 32-bit PE executable capable of obtaining the desired result.
Hint: We are talking here of bytes, NOT Kbytes.
No strict time limits, but a "reasonable" timeframe would be 1 month from now, i.e. submissions (if any ) won't be accepted past September 19, 2013.
Have fun, both if you take the challenge or if you don't .
Wonko
Note:
Rules amended to clarify matters by re-phrasing point 3 and adding points 4, 5 and 6 on 19th August 2013.