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https://github.com/zkxs/phish
Small Rust binary demo (1.2kiB)
https://github.com/zkxs/phish
rust small windows
Last synced: about 2 months ago
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Small Rust binary demo (1.2kiB)
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/zkxs/phish
- Owner: zkxs
- License: mit
- Created: 2024-04-01T17:22:37.000Z (9 months ago)
- Default Branch: master
- Last Pushed: 2024-04-04T23:49:00.000Z (9 months ago)
- Last Synced: 2024-04-05T01:21:26.574Z (9 months ago)
- Topics: rust, small, windows
- Language: Rust
- Homepage:
- Size: 83 KB
- Stars: 0
- Watchers: 1
- Forks: 0
- Open Issues: 0
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- Changelog: CHANGELOG.md
- License: LICENSE
Awesome Lists containing this project
README
# Phish
This is just a simple test to see how small I could make a Rust binary that does something simple. The application just
shows a Windows messagebox alert.
The current binary size is 503 bytes. Note that presently ~170 bytes (34%) of that are just the strings shown in the
messagebox. With shortened strings, ~333 bytes would be achievable.
Going much smaller than the present binary size would likely require handwritten assembly. If that sounds interesting to
you, take a look at [Alexander Sotirov's Tiny PE writeup](http://www.phreedom.org/research/tinype/).
## Usage
~~This project is useless~~ there are many ways to use this project. Here's how I personally use it:
1. build the project
2. rename the binary to `virus.exe`
3. send it to your friends with a message of "I sent you my malware pls respond 👉👈"
4. see how they react
This may make slightly more sense given a screenshot as context:
Yep, it's just an Albanian Virus clone.
## Build
1. You must install [Crinkler](https://github.com/runestubbe/Crinkler). I recommend doing this via
[Chocolatey](https://chocolatey.org/) by running `choco install crinkler`.
2. Run the following:
```shell
cargo +nightly build -Z build-std=std,panic_abort -Z build-std-features=panic_immediate_abort --target i686-pc-windows-msvc --release
```
## Appendix
This appendix section includes various interesting things I looked into while making this project.
### Sources
- [min-sized-rust](https://github.com/johnthagen/min-sized-rust)
- [min-sized-rust-windows](https://github.com/mcountryman/min-sized-rust-windows)
- [Making the smallest Windows application](https://davidesnotes.com/articles/1/)
### Executable Compression
[UPX](https://upx.github.io/) no longer works since phish version [0.2.3](CHANGELOG.md#023---2024-04-01), as the uncompressed binary is
already too small. Furthermore, since [0.2.7](CHANGELOG.md#027---2024-04-04) Crinkler is used for link-time compression,
so introducing an additional compressor would be redundant.
### Check Bloat
[cargo-bloat](https://github.com/RazrFalcon/cargo-bloat) can be normally be used to measure where space is being used, but it is unable to parse Crinkler's
binaries.
### Assembly Debugging
It's not really necessary, but you can use [cargo-show-asm](https://github.com/pacak/cargo-show-asm) to see the generated assembly:
```shell
cargo +nightly asm -Z build-std=std,panic_abort -Z build-std-features=panic_immediate_abort --target i686-pc-windows-msvc --bin=phish --profile=optimized-debug --intel --simplify --everything
```
There's not very much:
```asm
push 19 ; load the messagebox flags
push offset _anon.e8eee900910a047c66d8ad11464962b0.1 ; load the message title
push offset _anon.e8eee900910a047c66d8ad11464962b0.0 ; load the message text
push 0 ; null HWND pointer
call dword ptr [__imp__MessageBoxA@16] ; show the messagebox
ret ; exit the process cleanly using the above call's return value, which happens to be 2
```