http://qs1969.pair.com?node_id=363556


in reply to Super Search searches scratchpads which are not public

What's the problem? You get to know that princepawn has an interest, and he gets the privacy. If he doesn't respond to a /msg, you can at least look at his nodes for a clue.

After Compline,
Zaxo

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
•Re^2: Super Search searches scratchpads which are not public
by merlyn (Sage) on Jun 12, 2004 at 13:24 UTC
    Well, with regex searches, and enough hits to the host, you could use binary searching to figure out the exact text of the scratchpad. Presuming printables (and newline) only, it'd take only 6 or 7 hits per character you wanted to guess. Look for /^[a-m]/ and if that fails, look for /^[n-z]/, otherwise look for /^[a-h]/ and so on. As you get each letter, you add it to the beginning: /^v[a-m]/.

    So, yes, this is a leak, but a slow leak.

    Hmm. That'd be an interesting article about why not to allow regex searches against text you can't eventually see. >>todo.

    -- Randal L. Schwartz, Perl hacker
    Be sure to read my standard disclaimer if this is a reply.

      How can you do a regexp search? I thought that super-search would allow only fixed text.