I made a CTF challenge for this year's BSidesSF CTF where players were given a CDDA audio file (just raw PCM samples) which when burned on a CD-RW would produce an image of the flag. (The idea was not for them to burn the audio, since they'd need to guess my exact CD-RW or else they wouldn't get an image readable enough to be useful. Instead they were supposed to invert the process in software and simulate what a burned disk would look like, in a way that let them adjust disk parameters rapidly until they had a readable image.)
The challenge took me a few weeks to make because "calibrating" a disk (determining the geometry of the pregroove) is incredibly sensitive.
After the CTF I tried really hard to make a repeatable calibration process with the intent of building something releasable. I even ended up measuring the details on every CD-RW and CD-R I could buy on Amazon.
But despite trying very hard, I never did make calibration patterns that were reliable enough that I felt like other people would be willing to go through the process.
It seems someone else has succeeded where I failed. Great to see!
This is exactly the sort of thing the 2020's are missing. Something tactile and artsy, reminiscent of the early 2000s! Well done to the author
Animats
I used to have a label system called Neato, which provided round CD labels you could make on a printer, along with a tool to press them accurately onto the non-recording side of a CD-R. There were even transparent labels, so the resulting disk looked like a commercially produced disk.
I made a CTF challenge for this year's BSidesSF CTF where players were given a CDDA audio file (just raw PCM samples) which when burned on a CD-RW would produce an image of the flag. (The idea was not for them to burn the audio, since they'd need to guess my exact CD-RW or else they wouldn't get an image readable enough to be useful. Instead they were supposed to invert the process in software and simulate what a burned disk would look like, in a way that let them adjust disk parameters rapidly until they had a readable image.)
The challenge took me a few weeks to make because "calibrating" a disk (determining the geometry of the pregroove) is incredibly sensitive.
After the CTF I tried really hard to make a repeatable calibration process with the intent of building something releasable. I even ended up measuring the details on every CD-RW and CD-R I could buy on Amazon.
But despite trying very hard, I never did make calibration patterns that were reliable enough that I felt like other people would be willing to go through the process.
It seems someone else has succeeded where I failed. Great to see!
Throwback to lightscribe which I haven't thought of in many years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LightScribe
This is exactly the sort of thing the 2020's are missing. Something tactile and artsy, reminiscent of the early 2000s! Well done to the author
I used to have a label system called Neato, which provided round CD labels you could make on a printer, along with a tool to press them accurately onto the non-recording side of a CD-R. There were even transparent labels, so the resulting disk looked like a commercially produced disk.
Also see https://github.com/arduinocelentano/cdimage from a few years ago
I've always wondered if this could be used to create 3d holograms.
Wow! Light Scribe on the data side!
I suppose it has been awhile since LightScribe was a thing. People forget and reinvent so much these days it's funny.
Windows 2000 & XP discs had something like this, but on the label side.
Is anyone still making new optical drives?
This would be an absolute banger in 90s or early 2000!
Do they actually play?
star graph looks very inorganic
Do folks here know the data goes “into” the label through the clear plastic?
A fellow xth grader did a science project on this, and I’ll never forget it.
Truly, China has overtaken the Western world in innovation.
I wonder if the disk can still hold data at the same time.