The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

The Uninstalling Installer

by Remy Porter in CodeSOD on 2013-12-09

From a technical standpoint, Digital Rights Management is a WTF- it’s a crypto system which requires the user to have access to the key, and simply hopes to make getting the key out of the device too cumbersome to be worth a pirate’s time. The shoddy technical reasoning behind it sometimes leads to shoddy technical implementations.

Benjamin tried to help a friend install a DRM client on their machine. The installer continuously failed, and perhaps foolishly, Benjamin decided to run it with elevated permissions. After restoring from backup, Benjamin cracked open the installer and looked at some of the shell scripts that it ran.

Managed Order Management

by Remy Porter in Feature Articles on 2013-12-03

Hiro’s employer, an international consultancy firm, hosted a number of applications for “enterprise” customers. They provided everything from HR solutions to order management tools. Each local office was independent, but a central corporate office would issue decrees to be obeyed as divine law.

One such decree ordered them to upgrade customers to a new, internally developed order management package, ASAP. Corporate had put a lot of time and effort into the tool, and wanted a successful roll-out. Hiro’s office did what they were told, and to prove their loyalty to their corporate overlords, they started by bringing their largest customer, Initech, on line. Hiro’s management proudly reported a successful migration.