If you are installing Windows Driver Kit (WDK) from Microsoft and you choose to install the Device Simulation Framework (DSF) for USB and such devices, then you need to have the DCOM Server Process Launcher service running otherwise you get errors as cryptic as:
Unexpected Installation Error. Error in installing.
I wish there was more information that could be given in the error. Since I figured this out with only trial and error, I thought I’ll post the solution to this error.

I was looking at some Oracle databases recently and I saw that the Oracle Auditing Tool (OAT) is an awesome toolset but you just need to download the classes12.zip which are the Oracle JDBC drivers for Java into that same directory. I downloaded the classes12.zip from the Oracle site and placed it into the same folder as OAT. On linux, the .sh files will then need some editing. Just replace classes111.zip to classes12.zip and off you go.
Patrik Karlsson has done an awesome job of providing these tools. You can do the whole gamut of operations using this tool from first guessing the Oracle SID to checking for default passwords using opwg.sh.
sudo ./opwg.sh -s 192.168.1.101
The above command will give you the Oracle SID for the remote database.
Once you have the sid and the credentials you can run queries using oquery.sh
sudo ./oquery.sh -s 192.168.1.101 -u DBSNMP -p DBSMP -d db_sid_found -q "select 1 from dual"
The source of the OAT is also provided here: http://www.cqure.net/tools/oat-source-1.3.1.zip. I found an interesting decompiler for Java too (when I overlooked that the sources existed on cqure.net website) and it’s called jd-gui. It works wonderfully on linux.

While compiling socat-2.0.0-b5 on cygwin (Windows) I got a few errors and here’s how I fixed it:
xioopts.c: In function 'applyopts_single':
xioopts.c:3998: error: 'struct single' has no member named 'fd1'
xioopts.c:4000: error: 'struct single' has no member named 'fd1'
make[1]: *** [xioopts.o] Error 1
Edit the file xioopts.c in your favorite editor and replace ‘fd1’ by ‘rfd’ in both lines (3998 & 4000). That fixed this error but then I got my next error.

xio-ip.c:480: error: structure has no member named `ipi_spec_dst'
Edit xio-ip.c and comment out the entire snprintf statement in xio-ip.c line 480.

Continue compilation and it should now work fine.

cURL (groks URL) can be used as a SOAP client to send XML SOAP requests to web services. But the problems that I was facing in sending the data directly with the -d switch of curl is that DOS command shell would greet me with an error message:

< was unexpected at this time.

But there is a great way to send data in the POST requests by using the -d switch with the @ symbol. For example to send the xml data in the xmlfilewithdata.xml in the POST request to http://www.somesite.com/thewebservice you could use the following command:
curl -d @xmlfilewithdata.xml http://www.somesite.com/thewebservice

Off go all the errors and there it is …. your SOAP client – cURL!

Yesterday, while searching for Web Services on the Internet I came across an old, popular web service called “Amazon’s mechanical turk” based on the mechanical turk trick from old magic days.
The gist is, you (“The requestor”) put in a HIT (Human Interaction Task) in amazon’s lingo so that some one on the Internet can solve it for you (“the worker”). Most of what I saw on the website seemed like random tasks being used by researchers, online yellowpages-like directories, marketing, classification of goods, etc.
What might also be an interesting application, and I’m sure it’s probably being used for is, captcha-solving for spammers.
Also, the Amazon Mechanical Turk terms of service don’t help and say the following (verbatim):
Amazon Mechanical Turk provides a venue for third-party Requesters and third-party Providers to enter into and complete transactions. Amazon Mechanical Turk and its Affiliates are not involved in the transactions between Requesters and Providers. As a result, we have no control over the quality, safety or legality of the Services, the ability of Providers to provide the Services to Requesters’ satisfaction, or the ability of Requesters to pay for Services. We are not responsible for the actions of any Requester or Provider. We do not conduct any screening or other verification with respect to Requesters or Providers, nor do we provide any recommendations. As a Requester or a Provider, you use the Site at your own risk.

Given this, and the rates prevalent (about a penny or so per task), I think spammers might have a free-run on this service. Of course, amazon has a conveniently available web service available at http://mechanicalturk.amazonaws.com/AWSMechanicalTurk/AWSMechanicalTurkRequester.wsdl.
Now, the key question is, suppose a spammer uses this service, who’s to blame…I wouldn’t imagine the solvers know what the intent of the act is, amazon (possibly) can’t be liable because the ToS is required to be accepted before use, and since the requestor is somewhere on the Internet, he/she possibly can’t be traced.
Of course, I’m not saying that Mechanical Turk is all bad, but like all walks of life there’s a positive or a negative use to everything.
As someone once said: “Every tool is a weapon if you hold it right”!

In the past few days, coincidentally I’ve been thrown into situations where packet forgery has been required. So I thought it’ll be a great moment to enumerate some good options that network or security professionals have. The basis for most of these tools lies in libnet and libpcap which are some of the most wonderfully functional libraries out there.

• Packetforge-ng – On the wireless side this utility allows you to capture wireless packets and create legitimate packets with a pre-determined payload that can then be replayed using tools such as aireplay-ng
• Scapy – This is a python based tool and can be extended to write custom Python scripts to custom create packets. This library has great functions to form packets layer-by-layer and other functions such as fuzz() that allow fuzzing of packets out of the box. The greatest utility comes by the use of python language to create custom tools. Imagine creating custom thick clients just by using simple python scripts. The capabilities with this library are endless!
• TCPReplay – Just convert your pcaps into traffic by replaying them. An excellent tool but be careful if you’ve sniffed some ARP packets. You could end up corrupting the ARP table entries (unless that’s exactly what your intentions is 😉
• file2air – An excellent tool by Joshua Wright to replay packet contents.
• Packit – A really easy to use and functional linux based packet injection tool.

A moratorium for 3 months on the blogspot. The things have changed dramatically when it comes to the life. A lot has happened in my life since the time I left Los Angeles, CA to come to New York, NY. The two of the biggest cities of not only the USA but in the world as well.
First things first…got a job for Ernst & Young’s Advanced Security Center and so like most of the people who work in New York I live in Jersey City, NJ and travel to work. The travel is not too bad as it takes about 45 mins door-to-door. Also, by living in New Jersey instead of 5 boroughs (New Yorkers call the collection of 5 islands of Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, Bronx, Statten Island as the 5 boroughs) one saves the 4% annual New York city tax.
Now for the topic of this blog which is “Moving”…which is probably the most troublesome experience that people have. It wasn’t too good for me either but it could have been worse if it were not for the help of some good friends. People say that you realize the truthfulness of your friends during the time of adversity. It was exactly what I found. Whereas some people came to the fore to help me in all the ways they could, some stayed at the bay (and in some cases … making sure that the buoy of my life was in doldrums). Well…having said that life is but a bunch of grapes … some sweet and some sour (this is something I heard in the Hindi Movie “Khatta Meetha”)!
Finding apartments in the New York area can be a harrowing experience, especially if you are hard strung on budget. That was exactly what I found. The best places to look for are New Jersey Craigslist and New York Craigslist. Other places are Rent.com and Apartments.com but I did not find them much useful. I found that New York had some really good places to rent even with a tight budget. All these places were in Queens (Rego Park, Forest Hills). The good part was one could get a 2BR for $1450+ in these places. These places were not too far from the Subway stations and had a travel of 40-45 mins to Manhattan and 1 hr to Long Island (using Long Island Rail Road aka LIRR).
Jersey City in NJ is also a very good bet. But there are some places in Jersey City that are posh as hell but you have to pay the price for the class. Exchange place and Pavonia/Newport are examples of these places (with prices around $1700 for 1 BR) . Grove street is also a place which is somewhere in between the posh and the not-at-all posh. Even though the prices in Exchange place and Newport are really high but the class is well worth the money. Especially when you consider that getting a similar type of apartment in Manhattan will cost at least twice or may be thrice as much. Another avenue for exploration is Hoboken, NJ. Hoboken was personally my favorite place to look for an apartment because it is a place with a vibrancy associated with it. Almost looks like a European city bustling with restaurants and youth on the streets! It is also not too far from New York. However just like Pavonia/Newport & Exchange Place this fun doesn’t come cheap! The apartment costs are similar. The difference between Newport – Exchange Place & Hoboken is that the construction in Hoboken is older and you need a realtor for getting an apartment more than you need in former. Realtors have standard 1 month rent as the fee as their service charges.
In case you are wondering what a realtor is – a realtor is a person who searches for an apartment for you that fits within your budget and choice. But when it comes to realtors one must be wary of them because they can sometimes be a dangerous bet to pick!
West coast was much easier to find apartments in from my experience but it could be because I was looking for apartments in a University area which is probably easier.

-Rajat
http://rajatswarup.blogspot.com/