Grack
grack.com · Personal blog · on HN since 2009
Grack is the blog of a software engineer writing on CSS tricks, terminal tooling, Rust internals, and security incidents.
What HN saysHN links it for practical references like SSH escape sequences and life-before-main in Rust, and for browser hacks such as the History API abuse.
20HN people shared it
12linked it in comments
35stories submitted
918story points
2 months agolast shared
2009people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1Abusing CSS3's nth-child selector to invent new ones3 people · 93 points · first shared 2015 · 43 comments on HN
- 2Automatic file transfer in iTerm2 via ZModem3 people · 8 points · first shared 2011 · discussion on HN
- 3Deriving a bit-twiddling hack: signed integer overflow. (2022)3 people · 6 points · first shared 2022 · discussion on HN
- 4There Is Life Before Main in Rust3 people · 2 points · first shared 2026 · discussion on HN
- 5Abusing the HTML5 History API for fun (and chaos)2 people · 92 points · first shared 2011 · 18 comments on HN
- 6What's new in CSS Selectors 42 people · 72 points · first shared 2015 · 21 comments on HN
- 7SSH escape sequences (or “don’t kill -9 that process”)2 people · 9 points · first shared 2011 · discussion on HN
- 8Anatomy of a Failed (Nation-State?) Attack2 people · 5 points · first shared 2026 · discussion on HN
- 9Adventure2 people · first shared 2016
- 10Blog2 people · first shared 2010
- 11Why we’re really happy with AppEngine (and not going anywhere else)1 people · 174 points · first shared 2010 · 60 comments on HN
- 12USB-C and Modular Smartphones Are the End-Game for Convergence1 people · 162 points · first shared 2015 · 55 comments on HN
- 13Show HN: Opinionated Dress Color Simulation1 people · 134 points · first shared 2015 · 147 comments on HN
- 14The sorry state of Avira anti-virus heuristics1 people · 45 points · first shared 2010 · 15 comments on HN
- 15Solving the Carwoo code-breaking challenge1 people · 38 points · first shared 2010 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
mmastrac · 2009-12-13
MediaBeacon showed off a really cool GWT-based product at Campfire. They've built the equivalent of a desktop application inside the browser (full drag-and-drop, file management, etc). The video is up on their website: http://mediabeacon.com/
I'll also plug our GWT-based product, DotSpots. I'm dogfooding it on my blog at http://grack.com - just select one of the paragraphs or click one of the blue dots to see the UI. It's an example of a non-traditional GWT application: we're running our own GWT code inside of a foreign website. Our website is more of classic GWT application, but we compile both of those targets (as well as Chrome and Firefox extensions) from subsets of the same codebase.
efreak · 2017-09-07
Then you'll absolutely love the URLbar marquee[0]. Combine this with a page title marquee and you can grab attention even if the browser is minimized. (Can now only get results for maps to bars named Marquee...). Now just add fartscroll.js[1] and you're set with the most annoying website.
[0] https://grack.com/blog/2011/03/07/abusing-the-html5-history-api-for-fu…
[1] https://github.com/theonion/fartscroll.js/
raptrex · 2009-12-14
use chromium and follow this:http://grack.com/blog/2009/12/08/re-enable-install-button-for-mac-chro…
dgrunwald · 2026-08-20
The malicious code could use life-before-main hacks to gain code execution if it's linked at all, even if uncalled.
https://grack.com/blog/2026/06/11/life-before-main/
alwillis · 2026-03-11
It's not hidden or undocumented; it's in the man page.
Here's 15-year old HN link about it: http://grack.com/blog/2011/02/23/ssh-escape-sequences-or-dont-kill-9-t…
Jaruzel · 2022-03-23
You can re-live your childhood online:
https://grack.com/demos/adventure/
It's the 1984 variant version[1] but close enough. It's also retro styled as well!
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[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossal_Cave_Adventure#Later_versions
mbreese · 2016-10-22
Apparently iTerm2 can be used to setup lrzsz coupling [1]. I haven't tried it yet myself, but I'm going to! I really hope this works. It's such a pain to setup scp back to my workstation that if I need to do any real back and forth, I've been known to setup a reverse SSH tunnel just for getting scp to work. But even then, it's a pain. Zmodem would be so much easier (and make me a little nostalgic inside every time I used it).
[1] https://grack.com/blog/2011/10/26/automatic-file-transfer-in-iterm2-vi…
hawleyal · 2015-03-04
(Ab)using css3's :nth-child selector to invent new ones
https://grack.com/blog/2015/01/09/abusing-css3-selectors/
detaro · 2015-01-12
Earlier post from the same blog, showing usage for building image grids:
http://grack.com/blog/2015/01/09/abusing-css3-selectors/
vdm · 2014-08-31
Some terminal emulators support in-band file transfers using zmodem. SecureCRT does this.
iTerm: http://grack.com/blog/2011/10/26/automatic-file-transfer-in-iterm2-via…
fady · 2011-03-08
similar to this via twitter: by @paulrouget
http://grack.com/blog/
AmberShah · 2010-09-14
Actually worked with would be http://benrady.com/, http://grack.com/blog/, and a few other people who don't have online presences.
Seen in person but not worked with would be http://twitter.com/venkat_s and http://www.nealford.com/.