Task Unmanager

Task Unmanager is process roulette for a VM or a computer you do not care about. It spins through live PIDs and purchased catastrophe wedges, lands on one, and tries to terminate or trigger it.

This is intentionally dangerous. Killing the wrong process can crash the desktop, terminate your terminal, force a logout, reboot the machine, kernel panic Linux, or blue-screen Windows. Run it only inside a disposable VM, test box, or throwaway install.

What it does

• Targets every visible process except Task Unmanager itself.
• Tags high-risk process names as [SYS] and purchased action targets as [WEDGE].
• Pays extra for [SYS], infected [!], and catastrophe wedge hits.
• Persists coins and upgrades in:
  • Windows: %APPDATA%\TaskUnmanager\save.txt
  • Linux: $HOME/TaskUnmanager/save.txt when APPDATA is unset

Windows behavior

• Launches elevated through the embedded requireAdministrator manifest.
• If needed, relaunches through ShellExecuteW("runas").
• Best-effort enables the most relevant token privileges Windows will grant: SeDebugPrivilege, ownership/backup/restore/shutdown/load-driver related privileges, quota/token privileges, and SeTcbPrivilege when assigned.
• Process kills try escalating access masks first, then: TerminateProcess, taskkill /PID <pid> /T /F, and sysinfo fallback.
• BSOD wedge attempts to terminate critical Windows processes.
• Soft-brick wedge kills shell/session processes and sends a forced reboot.
• Blackout wedge attempts to terminate every visible process except itself.

Linux behavior

• Non-root runs try to relaunch through sudo unless --no-elevate is used.
• Process kills try kill -9 first, then sysinfo fallback.
• Kernel-panic wedge writes c to /proc/sysrq-trigger when root and kernel sysrq policy allow it.
• Soft-brick wedge tries systemctl reboot --force --force, then reboot -f.
• Blackout wedge sends SIGKILL to visible processes except itself.

Build and run

cargo run --release

For non-elevated development only:

cargo run -- --no-elevate

Controls

Main menu:

Up/Down     move selection
Enter       choose
P/S/R/Q     play, shop, reset, quit
Esc         quit/back

In game:

Space/Enter spin and fire
S           open shop
Q/Esc       back to menu

Shop:

Up/Down     move selection
Enter       buy selected upgrade
Esc/Q       back

Catastrophe wedges

The shop can add these action targets directly to the roulette wheel:

• Add BSOD Wedge: Windows critical-process crash attempt, or Linux kernel panic attempt.
• Add Soft-Brick Wedge: shell/session shredding plus forced reboot. It does not wipe disks or delete system files.
• Add Blackout Wedge: best-effort kill sweep over visible processes.

Notes

Protected Process Light, kernel policy, PID namespaces, capabilities, and access-denied responses can still make targets survive. That is the OS winning the coin toss, not a bug in the game loop.