Slashdot Mirror
Marking Your Cyber Territory?
NoOnesMessiah asks: "I recently finished a relatively major webmail install for a large company and it all went very, very well. I left a '/.cornerstone' file for posterity (with names, dates the disks started spinning, 'asbuilt' notes for apache, php, etc) so that future generations would know who to blame (or call) in 3 to 5 years. I have also done this in various and sundry places within my network infrastructure while I wore the mantel of Senior Systems Engineer and even in bits of a major mp3 player's website while it was growing up on our network. Hell, even the concept of the 'asbuilt' is more than 14 years old to me. How was PHP built? Look at the "asbuilt" file for configure or compile-time options... This got me to wondering; How do Slashdot readers mark their territory so future generations know they were there? Certainly I'm not the only one who does this. I would think that most people do, even in some small way. Do you mark your own personal mailer, web server or desktops in the same fashion as you might for your employers or clients?"
I created a web page for a historic hotel a few years back(2000). It was up still unchanged until late last year. In the code, I put my name and email indicating that I wrote it and also put my name at the bottom of the visable page. Whoever changed it left the code mostly unchanged except for removing my info from the site.
Now you'll never know it was me!
But they kept the same images that were edited using GIMP!(My name is still in the comments within the pictures)
gt
First I build most servers from an autoinstall image like Redhat's Kickstart. I'm sure to include the kickstart config in /root. Everything else is built using package management tools and the source rpms/debs are kept on the machine for future generations to easily reproduce the exact same machine. Then finally keep /etc in CVS.
:)
For things that I may not want to take credit for, or not want some people to know who did this work[1] I put a seemingly random string in somewhere, usually out of sight, but visible to anyone who looks for it which is the md5sum of some string. If I want to prove that I wrote it, I can produce the string which generates the same md5sum, nobody else can. Also, if you put the string somewhere out of the way later coders ignore it and/or believe that it's important in some way they don't understand and leave it alone
[1]: I do a lot of work on IRC, you really don't want to put "Trojan detector 2002 By Isomer" all over it coz the kiddies whose trojans it detects will DDoS you instead...
I don't mark things, I don't put my names on programs, and I don't leave files around on servers so others can see who done what.
I do computer work because it's fun and it pleases me. I don't care what others think of it.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
I've installed quite a few dedicated communications systems that, while controlled by computers, leave little room for creative configuration in the "OS". I still find my ways..
On one system, I'd configure the IP address and netmask for an interface that was never enabled, with the ASCII numbers for my initials and the date, 255.78.74.66 / 6.28.20.3 for today, for instance.
On another, it was possible to create files with arbitrary names but not put anything in them. A few zero-length files with a hello-message did the trick.
My favorite machine allows hand-editing of an ARP-like table for an obscure routing protocol. Handily enough, this entire interface is never enabled, so I can stuff the table with things like "INSTALLEDBY-00:00:DE:AD:BE:EF NJBANDCREW-00:00:00:00:00:00 JAN01FEB01-00:00:00:00:00:00".
Even on dumb equipment like wiring blocks, I always scratch my initials into the backside before closing the block, so later when the system is tested and mistakes are found, I can defend myself. I've tried to make it standard protocol among the installers I've trained, since it saves everyone grief and encourages responsibility.
More than once, I've jotted notes on the bottom of steel equipment frames before bolting them to the floor, to be seen by the crew that tears them out in 30 years. Anything from "Kilroy was here" with the accompanying graphic, to "Help! I'm trapped under the rack!".
I've been responsible for installing some things I'm not always proud of. Personalization can also be a way of disclaiming responsibility.
Wiring junction boxes frequently contain notes jotted on gray electrical tape. "Approved by engineer Larry 5/22/01; says the NEC doesn't apply here. Black:Hot White:Neutral Green:Ground BlackW/tape:Messenger WhiteW/tape:Magic. If this box is smokey, check the one at the other end of the aisle too!"
My favorite thing is finding notes and doodles left by previous generations. Once I saw a pile of boards torn out and waiting for material reclamation (gold chipleads and stuff), so I dug through the pile admiring yesteryear's design. One controller board had a profusion of "green wire", added by a field tech to update the board to a new revision. In some unused space in the corner, a little smiley face had been elegantly needlepointed into the perfboard.
Makes you wonder how much personalization goes undetected in the products we use every day! Spend some time in the Silicon Zoo checking out the art inside chips themselves.
you should PGP it all and keep the passphrase somewhere safe with a note regarding what its for. That way they'll get it if you die, but not if they lay you off without notice :-)
Typically anything I write has "~mikeg" or "mikeg: [some date/time stamp] - watever I changed" or my email address (mikeg@whatever-company.com) stuck in a comment somewhere.
/usr/local/*, excepting "biggies" like a database server or web server (web servers go in /home/web or /home/www, database servers usually reside in /usr/local/[db_software_name]). A /usr/local/src directory with the source code for EVERYTHING I've installed, as well as a "bigmake" script which rebuilds it all the way I had it stays on the machine for future generations.
Often something of that nature will appear if you do a "strings" on the executable if the language I was working in is a compiled one, typically my email address works its way into the code somehow (help screens, version info, etc.)
For systems hardware, a large cursive MG in green or black marker on an inside surface, usually under the motherboard or on the bottom of drive bays, indicates that I built the system. Smaller MGs (in blue or black), usually with dates, indicate service done (these are sometimes on a frame bar or even a removable panel). When a machine finally reaches the end of its life, I initial it with red marker and leave it open until it is stripped and disposed of.
I understand the signing practice used to be quite common with mainframe service techs but has become less so with PCs and cheap servers - I for one would love to see it revived as it makes it easy to know who was the last person to work on machine X.
For an OS build, my footprints are unmistakeable - anything outside of the OS goes in
This script is used when upgrading software, or when rebuilding from scratch, and usually has a whole load of variables in it to turn off/on various parts of the build (for example, on my FreeBSD systems the first stage of this script is to cvsup and rebuild the OS/kernel - probably not something you want to do if you're just upgrading apache).
/~mikeg