PowerShell / PowerShell/DSC

Enable Windows GUI apps to be resources

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#671 1 comment 2 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

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Issue-Enhancement Needs Triage
Dominant language
Rust
Stars
523
Forks
75
Avg merge
3d 16h
Merged PRs (30d)
24

Description

Summary of the new feature / enhancement

Windows differentiates GUI and console apps where GUI apps don't have a corresponding console created and thus dsc can't talk to it via STDIN, STDOUT, STDERR.

Proposed technical implementation details (optional)

Whatever communication mechanism we create, we need to ensure it's secure in the sense that an attacker can't squat on it and become a "man-in-the-middle" or pretend to be either side of the conversation. This means, for example, a well-known named pipe won't work.

It might simply require GUI apps to explicitly allocate a console when used as a resource: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/console/allocconsole

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with the issue's distinction between Windows GUI and console applications, then review the linked AllocConsole documentation and the security requirements for the proposed communication mechanism. The issue names no files or tests; done means GUI applications can be used as resources while preventing impersonation or man-in-the-middle attacks.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Domain
operating-systems, security
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Needs clarification
Newbie friendliness
25/100

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