Mini-Contests for the HHV

[SmittyHalibut]

Started in the "Ideas for next year" thread, I wanted to break this discussion out into its own thread.

I personally think mini-contests in the HHV woudl be FANTASTIC. Let me just summarize what has already been suggested:

1: Badge hacking. Not really a mini-contest, but warrants attention since it will likely be happening.

2: Grab-Bag-Build-Off. As described by SugarDaddy:

I had proposed to Russ a mini-contest where small teams of people are given boxes of parts along with a uC and they have a build off. The coolest thing wins as judged by some group in the HHV. No real prizes involved (unless we come up with something) but it gives folks some incentive to get their hands dirty building stuff and messing with the hardware.

3: "HW-CTF." As described by SugarDaddy:

Another option is similar to Tie Short's idea. If we had some embedded systems available that could be pwned then it would like a mini-ctf. It would tie in the hardware with the security aspects.

I'm not sure this is what TieShort suggested, but it's a cool idea in and of itself. Find ways to pwn hardware. Hijack serial lines for sniffing (anyone feel up for hijacking Ethernet? Without being noticed? ;-) I have some ideas...), reflashing embedded devices with your own code (BIOS hacking?), etc. This could be a lot of fun for a more advanced contest.

4: "Black Box Reverse Engineering." As described by TieShort:

I have an idea for a contest in the HHV that could be worked similar to the locks in the Lock pick village. There would be series of black boxes, with some test equipment. Each box would have points assigned for figuring out what it did, with larger points for more complicated boxes. It would probably take up some space, so we may have to break into two sky boxen to do it. May be it would be less intimidating than that "other" box contest people go on and on about.

5: "Something To Do With Robotics." So eloquently described by SugarDaddy:

Not sure what but I bet we could come up with something if there was interest.

That's the list that I've seen suggested so far. If I've missed anything, or if you have any other ideas, please post them. I'll try to keep this post up-to-date with suggestions as they're made.

[SmittyHalibut]

Re: Mini-Contests for the HHV

I was going to follow up that post with my thoughts on which of these contests I preferred, but honestly, I think they're all great ideas. So instead I'll follow up with which ones I might be interested in helping with.

I think the Grab-Bag-Build-Off would tie in to my suggestion in the "Ideas for next year" thread about kits. We could reserve a few kits for use in the contests and see who can build the coolest widget given only the hardware available in the kits in one hour, or something like that. If we did it this way, or even if we built a kit specifically for the contest, I'd be willing to help put things together and design the kits with enough useful bits to make something cool.

The HW-CTF idea is something I would REALLY like to participate in myself. I'm envisioning something similar to the Mystery Challenge in that it's a relay: You're given details on the first challenge. Solving the first challenge gives you the details for the second challenge, to solution to which gives you info for the third, etc. Scoring would be a combination of timed and style: Get "minute" bonuses based on the elegance of your hack, whether it's detectable, how damaging it is to the original, etc.

Wow, I'm almost stupid. I was just about to post a number of ideas I have for the HW-CTF challenges, then realized this is a public forum. Glad I caught that. How 'bout I just hang on to these ideas until we get a team of people who are interested in running this and start a mailing list.

Who's interested? I can setup a mailing list for this. email me: mark at that fish in my handle dot com.

[bombnav]

Re: Mini-Contests for the HHV

Sounds like a blast!!
I'm In!.

[afterburn188]

Re: Mini-Contests for the HHV

Sounds like a blast!!
I'm In!.

Let's start this mailing list! I'm in!

[SmittyHalibut]

Re: Mini-Contests for the HHV

To be clear: I've got an email list started already. If you want to be put on it, please either DM me here, or send me an email: mark at that fish in my handle dot com.

[SmittyHalibut]

Re: Mini-Contests for the HHV

I've started a mailing list for HW-CTF so we can keep planning out of the public forums. Are other people thinking about other contests? I encourage folks to take an idea and run with it.