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Webservice Debugs Linux Binaries While-U-Wait

Posted by michael on from the laziness-and-impatience dept.

null-und-eins writes "A new webservice offers automatic debugging of Linux binaries. It takes a (with "-g" compiled) binary and two invocations where one fails and the other doesn't. The service repeatedly runs the two programs and tries to find the smallest difference between the two that causes the failure. Nice google-like interface with statistics about its own performance."

16 of 219 comments (clear)

  1. Let me get this straight... by Theatetus · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...these guys allow me to upload any linux executable, which they will then execute in a gdb context?

    Alfred, prepare the rootkit!

    --
    All's true that is mistrusted
    1. Re:Let me get this straight... by Hentai · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Let no good deed go unpunished.

      Hopefully they've thought of this and won't let it screw them up too badly. A shame that human nature is such that the first thing people think about when they see a nifty new service is how to shit in it and ruin it for everyone else. (witness /.)

      --
      -Hentai [in vita non pacem est]
    2. Re:Let me get this straight... by Space+cowboy · · Score: 4, Informative

      It mentions that the whole thing runs in debian 'woody' sandboxes when the code is run. Presumably you can only 'rootkit' the sandbox ...

      Simon

      --
      Physicists get Hadrons!
  2. One down, one to go by Space+cowboy · · Score: 4, Funny

    Now we've got it debugging the code, we only need to get it started writing the code, and we're sorted :-)

    Simon

    --
    Physicists get Hadrons!
  3. Why... by O2n · · Score: 4, Funny

    Why ask Igor when you can ask slashdot? :-)

  4. This is cool but by Safiire+Arrowny · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think this is a neat idea, but I wonder why it isn't a standalone program you can run yourself as well as/instead of a web interface.

    This is because I wonder why he wants to run the risk of running foreign binaries (sandbox or not) when he could have just not done that. There doesn't seem to be any advertising on the page, so that isn't it.

    Oh well, maybe he just thinks it's cooler this way, actually it kinda is, so long as it's safe for him I guess.

    1. Re:This is cool but by Andreas+Zeller · · Score: 5, Informative
      We're running AskIgor as a Web service (instead of a standalone program) for two reasons:
      • We get a set of programs for regression testing.
      • We get some ratings about the quality of our work.
      Although we did our best to give AskIgor a decent interface, it's still a research prototype, and there's many possible ways to go. Your submissions help us making these decisions, and guide our future development.
      --

      www.askigor.org - automated debugging service

  5. Re:Ok igor... by Andreas+Zeller · · Score: 5, Informative

    No problem. Igor runs your program in a sandbox whose contents get restored with each new submission.

    --

    www.askigor.org - automated debugging service

  6. Re:poor admin... by Andreas+Zeller · · Score: 5, Informative

    Most people coming from /. just have a look at the main site. By redirecting, we reduce traffic by about 50% and Apache load by 75%. If you want to go beyond (and maybe submit some buggy program), you're welcome!

    --

    www.askigor.org - automated debugging service

  7. Re:So... by bmorris · · Score: 5, Funny

    FYI, your problem is the extra "a" in "baar".

  8. Quick, someone upload Sendmail by SpaceCadetTrav · · Score: 4, Funny

    Find out what's wrong with that crap.

    --
    Life in Orange County
  9. Open-Source Community: Beta=Flaky, Mature=Stable by phorm · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You must be joking. While some of the more "mature" projects are definately solidly coded, some of the others are nightmares. Try mixing several different coding styles, nights coding on only caffeine, starting, stopping, and losing your place...leaving debug to-fix-later code in by accident...

    Open source suffers the same problems as closed. In some projects moreso, as the variance of different coding styles/standards-adherance can lead to very interesting things happening. Even some mature projects have this problem, I've heard of some common ones where a rewrite was considered, because as the code evolved and was added to, the author(s) learned much better coding as it progressed but left the core a bit flaky.

  10. Google-like... wait a second... by Elwood+P+Dowd · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Smart kids. Redirecting to their google cache.

    I wonder what happens on google's next cache update, if you're doing something like that. Do you get a google cache within a google cache? Or does google just forget about you?

    --

    There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
    1. Re:Google-like... wait a second... by Andreas+Zeller · · Score: 5, Informative

      We're redirecting only if you come from /.

      --

      www.askigor.org - automated debugging service

  11. Re:Question by Andreas+Zeller · · Score: 5, Informative
    The core technology behind Igor is delta debugging, a general method to determine the difference between a working and a failing scenario.

    While not applying AskIgor (being a huge mix of Python, PHP, and SQL) on itself, we have applied delta debugging on various parts of AskIgor to detect failure-inducing code changes, and especially failure-inducing GDB commands.

    We're currently working on Eclipse plugins written in Java, and working on Java - and these will work 100% on themselves.

    --

    www.askigor.org - automated debugging service

  12. google-like interface? by 3Suns · · Score: 4, Funny

    Nice google-like interface...

    What, you mean like a textbox?

    --

    -3Suns

    ~~~~
    The Revolution will be Slashdotted