The Human Race – 10k. I did it!

From time to time when I visited this site from other machine I noticed that there is a weird component wants to install itself on that computer. I did not pay attention to it, until very recently.

It just started to bug me as I did not remember that I ever used this ActiveX so I did a quick search on google and found a topic in a forum suggesting that this might be a little more than an innocent mistake.

From time to time, I also received this dialog urging me to install OP component from HIPOINT Ltd. – I found not trace of them, when goggling them. I could not reproduce this problem in a consistent fashion, it just showed up randomly.

I was also suggested this article: Can you spot the fake. So I turned to Fiddler as well to find out what is going on.
“Fiddler is a HTTP Debugging Proxy which logs all HTTP traffic between your computer and the Internet. Fiddler allows you to inspect all HTTP Traffic, set breakpoints, and "fiddle" with incoming or outgoing data.”

I found the tinyurl.com reference really weird, as I never ever used this service on my blog, also I was quite positive that I never linked to vipasotka.com either. I also found references to golnanostat.com. I tried to search for these references in my pages, but could not find anything.

“ This website wants to run the following add-on: Microsoft Data Access - Remote Data services Dat… from Microsoft Corporation. If you trust the website and the add-on and want to”

Navigating to the tinyurl reference produced the well known message above and the dialog urging me to install the java component.

I also noticed that the very first request after my main page is to r52hosts.org and for the page /stat/wpjsofif.js. This does not ring a bell either. So I searched the html code that came from the www.littlebigtomatoes.com/blog , but again no luck. Then I tried all kinds of combination and found the following code snippet with comments

The javascript between the script tags was obfuscated, but debugging the script in the Visual Studio revealed that the script creates an iframe pointing to r52hosts.org and pulls in another encrypted javascript file.

After following and debugging several obfuscated scripts I got to the final page, that creates all the prompts in my browser. I still do not understand what the code exactly does, but it does not look very promising. Debugging the script shows that it is probing for class ids and the second screenshot shows that the script also tries to find the Start Menu Autostart folder. Also, it tries to run some kind of install.exe from http://golnanosat.com/adw.files/so14/7f751f….

After finding out these, I am convinced that this script is malicious and I do not want anyone to download it from my site. After removing the scripts from my wordpress template between the <!– start counter :rkgi58s:wpjsandif –> comments solved my problem. There is no more r52host.org references, when I access my blog.

Of course, I will keep monitoring my site as I do not exactly know, how this piece of script got there in the first place.

So I created a new project on codplex.com and uploaded all the sources. For this new start, I renamed QiiNinja to Shuriken. As you see there is even a new icon to reflect the name change.

You can get the binaries, the source and post bugs or feature requests at codeplex.com under the name Shuriken.

http://www.codeplex.com/shuriken

QiiNinja v.0.3.9.1 is out now. I recently switched from ClickOnce based deployment to .msi (Windows Installer and WiX) based installation and this release is focused on making the .msi installer working better. The short list of the changes:

• Changed .msi to detect prerequisites, such as .NET Framework v.20
• Changed .msi to add shortcut for QiiNinja in start menu.
• Changed .msi to launch QiiNinja during the installation.
• Changed .msi to add QiiNinja to the list of the auto starting application at system startup.
• Fixed smaller cosmetic issue on the UI.

Unfortunately, the .msi installer is not perfect yet. When the installer is launched on a computer, where QiiNinja is already installed the following error message is displayed:

Another version of this product is already installed. Installation of this version cannot continue. To configure or remove the existing version of this product, use Add/Remove Programs on the Control Panel.

I still could not figure out what is the root behind this message, but I am working on it. Until then, the only workaround is to remove the old version first and then install the new one. 

After 4 yours I felt that it is time to move on and try something new. I will join a very small company and will get back to coding. Although, I am really looking forward to do and create new things, I am sad too.

I love this company! A lot …

• “The [new Zune] touchpad works like a dream, letting you scroll through long horizontal and vertical lists–it may be the first portable player interface from a company other than Apple that’s an improvement on the original iPod clickwheel.”- Matt Rosoff, C|Net
• “Microsoft’s answer to iTunes….is quite attractive and makes iTunes seem like a big, boring spreadsheet” - Tim Gideon, PCMagazine
• "The upgraded Zune Marketplace promises to be the real draw to the new Zune."- Mark Hopkins, Mashable
• "The possibilities are endless with Zune Social…Using the site, music lovers can discover new music and artists and labels can promote their work."- Nick Paschal, ComputingNews
• “Zune Originals will blow you away: Microsoft is actually out-cooling Apple.”- Charlie Sorrel, WIRED

This exercise was definitely an eye-opener for me. It helped me to understand that I spend an awful lot of time doing stuff that results in little or no value. Feeling exhausted and uncomfortable when thinking back to how the day just passed, another day gone by and I did not achieve anything! Once I started to live by the rules, I noticed something weird. I had time and I got work done! I read books and actually finished them, instead of putting them down after reading 20-50 pages or just not touching them at all.

Another important thing was that I realized that I used these time-consuming tasks to postpone important tasks, to fill it up my time and make me look busy. When I had to write an important email, or do something that would move me out from my comfort zone, I always felt that I had to choose between the important stuff and the easy stuff. Of course, I did pick the easy ones 9 out of 10 times - "Reading the latest Micro ISV Digest or some other random article will do no harm."

But this time around, there was no straying off to read blog posts or browse the web, so that after a while, I had to force myself to do the important stuff and after a while I figured out that they are not that hard, and they can be done in no time. At the end of the day I felt that I had achieved something. This was a good feeling!

I also had a free day scheduled. Every Saturday, I would allow myself to do all the stuff that I couldn’t do during the week. I could finish reading every single web site and blog in about 2 hours on that day and it was just as much fun, but definitely taking less time than checking them twice a day. I guess batching works with blog reading, too!

After two weeks, I slowly slipped backed into my old habits, but I started to think about my tasks and their importance, and sometimes I can force myself to stop doing the easy things and start doing the hard ones! And this is promising, right? There is hope even for me!

QiiNinja Release History

QiiNinja is the tool I use in my work every day to launch and find applications and web pages quickly. It started out of frustration as I was spending more and more time trying to find things in my start menu on my Windows machine. I thought it would be nice to have a tool that would let me start things faster, so I can finish earlier. I started to write this tool in .NET and C# (I feel I need to mention this since I am a computer a geek), got to the working prototype in no time and I felt that this was really helping me.

Then I saw Quicksilver and it was love at first sight. I have never ever experienced something as seamless as this, never ever thought that an application could have had this great of an impact on my daily life. It was a Zen-like moment for me! It even made me to buy an iMac - purchase I will never regret - so I can get to know Quicksilver better. And while I am not hooked on OS X and the rest of the Mac things - I proudly run Windows on my machine - this perfect bond between me and Quicksilver has remained ever since. I thought that I needed to turn this tool of mine into something similar to Quicksilver, so I could experience the "act without doing" on Windows, too!

And here I am trying to fix a bug a day and add one more feature to QiiNinja, so it will be better and better each day, and in the meantime I am learning things that I would never have learnt without it.

This is an amazing journey for me and I am not quite where I want to be yet, but I am slowly getting there. It’s the tool I use every day.

Give it a try, and any feedback, positive or negative, would be appreciated.