Rating: 5.0
> Some strings are wider than normal...
This challenge has a binary that uses a simple `strcmp` to check the flag. When
running the program, the following output is visible:
```sh
# ./wstrings
Welcome to flag checker 1.0.
Give me a flag>
```
My first stategy was running the `strings` utility on the `wstrings` binary,
but I didn't find the flag. What was interesting to me though was that I also
couldn't find the prompt text... This immediately made me check for other
string encodings.
Running the `strings` utility with the `-eL` flag tells `strings` to look for
32-bit little-endian encoded strings, and lo and behold the flag shows up!
This is because ascii strings are less 'wide' than 32-bit strings:
```
--- ascii ---
hex -> 0x68 0x65 0x6c 0x6c 0x6f
str -> h e l l o
```
Notice how each character is represented by a single byte each (8 bits) in
ascii, as opposed to 32-bit characters in 32-bit land.
```
--- 32-bit land ---
hex -> 0x00000068 0x00000065 0x0000006c 0x0000006c 0x0000006f
str -> h e l l o
```
I think 32-bit strings also have practical use for things like non-english
texts such as hebrew, chinese or japanese. Those characters take up more space
anyways, and you would waste less space by not using unicode escape characters.
