Mudge

I really appreciate the work of the Broadcom exploit by P0 (cool that Halvar gets a shoutout)!

Constructive observation:

I wish people writing exploit-reports would start with the reveal or outcome and *then* show how they got there.

Too often the author takes the reader on the full journey from the the start. The problem is that the author already has end-result context but the reader does not.

The reader, at the end, is forced to re-parse earlier elements when they get the final context.

Apr 4, 2017 at 4:52pmAmaroq
Show threadJP AumassonApr 4, 2017
@Mudge European vs American approach to writing :)
Show threadCollinApr 4, 2017
@Mudge it is a bit like reading academic papers, read the abstract, introduction and the conclusions before the rest of the paper
Show threadnoid ✅Apr 4, 2017
@Mudge Back when I was in the MSRC I always appreciated the vuln reports we got from ZDI. They'd start with the end result 'double free in IE 7 results in privilege escalation', then give more detail around the 'why', then you'd get the dump at the end that my V&M team could use to repro. Should be an industry standard format
Show threadxy22y ✅Apr 4, 2017
@Mudge I agree, and same thing holds with other forms of writing too. Working toward a big reveal can put people to sleep before you get there.
Show threadChris John RileyApr 5, 2017
@Mudge This is a common failing in tech writing I find… it's hard to write as if you have no context when you know the punchline.