The massive bug at the heart of npm

JS Party: JavaScript, CSS, Web Development

Darcy Clarke, former GitHub Staff Engineering Manager and founder of vlt, joins us to discuss a major bug in the npm ecosystem that he recently disclosed. We cover the bug’s timeline, nuances, and impact, all while setting some important context on npm packages, clients, and registries. Tune in to learn how to protect your codebase and gain a deeper understanding of this crucial part of the JavaScript ecosystem.

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Featuring:

• Darcy Clarke – Website, GitHub, LinkedIn, Mastodon, X
• Amal Hussein – GitHub, X
• Feross Aboukhadijeh – Website, GitHub, X

Show Notes:

• Darcy / vlt’s blog post on this massive npm bug
• Feross / Socket’s follow-up blog post in this issue
• Refactor Conf - Darcy & Feross will be speaking in July
• Verdaccio (not to be mistaken with Versace) - an open source npm registry proxy
• Github layoffs for engineering team in India
• Bug filled July 28th, 2022 related to binding.gyp and triaged on October 22nd, 2022
• Darcy’s original test POC from Nov 2nd, 2022
• Darcy’s POC from March 8th, 2023 which was used in the HackerOne report to Github
• Legacy docs for npm publish params
• Tool for checking packages for manifest mismatches
• Great resource for security acronyms

Something missing or broken? PRs welcome!

Chapter

1. It's party time, y'all (00:00:00)

2. Welcoming Darcy (00:00:40)

3. A massive bug (00:02:56)

4. Ecosystem overview (00:05:04)

5. But why? (00:09:30)

6. Verdaccio (00:13:58)

7. Why is this so broken (00:16:46)

8. Timeline of the bug (00:27:38)

9. Blog post feedback (00:41:40)

10. Why, GitHub, why?! (00:43:45)

11. Sponsor: Changelog News (00:45:12)

https://changelog.com/news

12. How do we dig ourselves out (00:46:44)

13. What the early days were like (00:53:14)

14. What's next for Darcy (00:55:03)

15. vlt (Volt) (00:57:25)

16. Closing time! (00:59:45)

17. Next up on the pod (01:01:57)