I've noticed a strange behavior in Rabbitsign-2.1. If an application's flash page ends at a location near the end of a page, by default, Rabbitsign automatically increases the page count by one, so that the signature can be saved. However, if the application is exactly n-page long (i.e. its size is exactly a multiple of 16384 bytes), Rabbitsign adds two pages instead of one.

For testing, I used this code snippet.


Code:

    ; Master Field
    .db 80h, 0Fh, 0, 0, 0, 0
    ; Name. Note that the name field reads 80 47 because the name specified here is 7 characters long.
    .db 80h, 47h, "AppTest"
    ; Disable TI splash screen.
    .db 80h, 90h
    ; Revision
    .db 80h, 21h, 0
    ; Build
    .db 80h, 31h, 1
    ; Pages
    .db 80h, 81h, 0  ; dummy number to test rabbitsign
    ; Signing Key ID
    .db 80h, 12h, 01, 0Fh
    ; Date stamp.  Nothing ever checks this, so you can put nothing in it.
    .db 03h, 22h, 09h, 00h
    ; Date stamp signature.  Since nothing ever checks this, there's no
    ; reason ever to update it.  Or even have data in it.
    .db 02h, 00
    ; Final field
    .db 80h, 70h
    ; There's no need for more padding here.  TI just starts execution after
    ; the last field.

ASMStart:
    .balign 16384


The assembler I used here is the GNU as, Z80 target. But it's only a detail and not important, all you should know is that it pads the program until the size is a multiple of 16384. Because our code is only one page long, it produces an output that is exactly 16384 bytes long.


Code:

$ ls -l data.bin
-rw-rw-r--. 1 gaizi gaizi 16384 Mar 29 07:58 data.bin


Now it's the time to test Rabbitsign.


Code:

$ rabbitsign -b data.bin -k 010F.key -o data.8ck -t 8xk -f -g
data.bin: warning: determined length: 16384
data.bin: warning: adding an extra page to hold app signature
data.bin: warning: application has an incorrect page count (actual: 3)
data.bin: warning: actual length: 32769


As you see, Rabbitsign attempts to add an extra page to hold the signature, but ultimately adds 2 pages and pads to 32769 bytes, instead of 1 page. If I remove 1-byte from the program, Rabbitsign produces an expected output.


Code:

$ dd if=data.bin of=data2.bin bs=1 count=16383
16383+0 records in
16383+0 records out
16383 bytes (16 kB, 16 KiB) copied, 0.0327535 s, 500 kB/s
$ mv data2.bin data.bin
$ rabbitsign -b data.bin -k 010F.key -o data.8ck -t 8xk -f -g
data.bin: warning: determined length: 16383
data.bin: warning: adding an extra page to hold app signature
data.bin: warning: application has an incorrect page count (actual: 2)
data.bin: warning: actual length: 16385


Now Rabbitsign pads the program size to 16385 bytes / 2 pages, instead of 32769 bytes / 3 pages. After digging into the source, I discovered the code responsible for calculating the program size after padding, in app8x.c, line 96.


Code:

  /* If necessary, add an extra page to ensure that the signature
     doesn't span a page boundary. */

  if (((length + 69 + 0x3fff) >> 14) != ((length + 0x3fff) >> 14)) {
    if (flags & (RS_ZEALOUSLY_PAD_APP | RS_IGNORE_ALL_WARNINGS)) {
      rs_warning(NULL, app, "adding an extra page to hold app signature");
      length = ((length + 0x4000) & ~0x3fff) + 1;
      addedpage = 1;
    }


It appears to me that "((length + 0x4000) & ~0x3fff) + 1" is trying to, (1) Round the size to a multiple of 16384, (2) Add 1 byte to the size. So an extra page can be calculated. For example, ((16383 + 0x4000) & ~0x3fff) is rounded to 16384, adding one and we have 16385. However, ((16384 + 0x4000) & ~0x3fff) == 32768, adding one and we now have 32769 bytes - two, not one pages are padded. Perhaps I am wrong and it's actually a feature working as intended, but I think it's really strange and I suspect it's an off-by-one bug in the code, the constant 0x4000 used here should really be 0x3fff, i.e. (size + 0x3fff) & ~0x3fff + 1, so that 16384 rounds to 16384 and gets padded to 16385 bytes / two pages, not 32769 bytes / three pages.

The README says,


Code:

Author
------

 Benjamin Moody / floppusmaximus@users.sf.net

 Bug reports, please.


Is Rabbitsign still being maintained nowadays? Does it still accept bug reports and patches? Should I submit a patch to Benjamin Moody?
No one uses rabbitsign.

But I imagine you can still try to contact him, or just make your own fork. Smile
MateoConLechuga wrote:
No one uses rabbitsign.

But I imagine you can still try to contact him, or just make your own fork. Smile

Yeah, Rabbitsign is an old program, 2.1 was released way back in 2009, but at least it still works for me for its purpose. Just came here to see if anyone is still using it or if anyone knows whether Benjamin Moody is still maintaining it, the answer appears to be a negative. I guess I'll just keep the patch in my hard drive for now.
  
Register to Join the Conversation
Have your own thoughts to add to this or any other topic? Want to ask a question, offer a suggestion, share your own programs and projects, upload a file to the file archives, get help with calculator and computer programming, or simply chat with like-minded coders and tech and calculator enthusiasts via the site-wide AJAX SAX widget? Registration for a free Cemetech account only takes a minute.

» Go to Registration page
Page 1 of 1
» All times are UTC - 5 Hours
 
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum

 

Advertisement