ncpeer_qt6win7

Project primer

ncpeer_qt6win7 — patched Qt6 for legacy OS (review primer)

A fork of Qt6 (QtBase) carrying NinjaOne's patches to keep the NinjaRemote clients
running on legacy Windows (Win7) with a pinned Qt 6.8.x line (the exact patch version
rolls forward). Enormous repo (full Qt source per version) — the reviewable work is the
patches, not Qt itself.

Branch / maintenance model (per the repo README)

• qtbase_<ver> — the upstream QtBase archive for that Qt version (e.g. qtbase_686

= Qt 6.8.6), committed as-is. Reviewing these is reviewing upstream Qt — pointless.

• qtbase_<ver>_patched — the same base with NinjaOne's patches as commits. A new

version is created by cherry-picking the previous version's patches onto the new base and
resolving conflicts; the resulting diff is saved as a patch file consumed by ncpeer_vcpkg.

• Review scope: feature/patch PRs into the qtbase_* service branches (new or fixed

patches). Upstream-archive "drops" and big version rebases are out of scope (and are
skipped by diff size anyway).

What matters most when reviewing a patch here (durable risk areas)

• Patch correctness & minimality. A patch edits Qt internals — it must be correct, as

small as possible, and not change behaviour beyond the legacy-OS fix.

• Cross-version portability. Patches are cherry-picked across Qt versions — watch for

conflict-resolution mistakes and assumptions tied to one Qt version.

• No regression on modern platforms. A Win7-oriented change must not break Qt on current

Windows/macOS/Linux.

• Legacy-API correctness. Substitutions that avoid APIs missing on old OSes must be

correct and properly guarded by version checks.

Security-sensitive zones

Patches touching Qt networking/TLS, crypto, or process/loader behaviour — a subtle change in
a framework used everywhere has broad impact.

Compatibility surfaces (contracts that must not silently break)

• The patch set must apply cleanly onto the pinned Qt version and produce the diff

ncpeer_vcpkg expects.

• The behaviour the NinjaRemote clients rely on from patched Qt.

Conventions & gotchas

• Almost everything in a qtbase_* branch is upstream Qt — focus only on the NinjaOne patch

commits/diff, not the surrounding Qt code.

• The mirror is very large (full Qt source across versions).

_Orientation only — verify current specifics in the code; this describes the durable
maintenance model & risk areas, not a snapshot._

Ecosystem map

NinjaRemote / NinjaOne project ecosystem (relationship map)

How the monitored repos relate — so a change in one repo is reviewed with its blast
radius in mind (a change upstream of ncpeer can break ncpeer even if it looks local).
Orientation only; verify specifics in code.

NinjaRemote product

• ncpeer — the remote-desktop client/agent (streamer host + player viewer). The hub.
• ncrp — the server/relay component NinjaRemote peers connect through; ncpeer ⇄ ncrp

speak the NCRP wire protocol (protocol/format changes must stay compatible across
client and server versions).

• ncinstaller — installs the ncpeer player onto end machines.
• qclauncher — bootstraps/launches an ncpeer quick-connect session.

Cloud-side relays of the ninja-remote system (AWS-hosted, Python/Go)

• websocket-switch — generic WebSocket pairing relay: two clients join with signed

URLs, it pairs them and forwards frames verbatim. Signed join URLs are minted by the
Ninja backend — the signature scheme is a backend⇄relay contract, and the frame
semantics are a peer⇄peer contract.

• file-transfer-service — the same pairing idea over plain HTTP for file transfer:

a signed upload leg streams to a signed download leg through memory (never stored).
Two parallel implementations (Python ftsv2/ + Go fts_go/) must stay behaviorally
identical; the URL/signature scheme is shared-family with websocket-switch.
NinjaRemote file-transfer features ride on these relays when peers can't go direct.

Pulled INTO ncpeer (and sometimes nmsnj) — upstream of the products

• nccommon — shared C++ library; a submodule of BOTH ncpeer and nmsnj. An API/ABI

or behaviour change here affects both consumers.

• nr-i18n — localization resources; a submodule of ncpeer.
• nrvirtdisplay — Windows virtual-display driver used by ncpeer.
• nrvusb — virtual-USB driver used by ncpeer.
• ncpeer_vcpkg — the pinned/patched dependency set (vcpkg fork) that **ncpeer and nmsnj

build against**. A dependency bump changes what those products link (security/ABI/build).

• ncpeer_qt6win7 — patched Qt6 (QtBase) for legacy-OS support, delivered to the clients

through the ncpeer_vcpkg overlay.

Largely independent

• nmsnj — network-management delegate (talks to the Ninja Backend over WAMP/RPC);

shares nccommon and ncpeer_vcpkg with ncpeer.

• ninjaflow — packet-capture library + agent (a distinct network-telemetry product, NOT

part of the remote-desktop family). Runs as a child process of the NinjaRMM agent (the
parent owns install/upgrade/policy/launch); NinjaFlow owns the CLI contract, config schema,
credential precedence, DB schema/migrations, and exit-code meanings the parent consumes —
those are cross-process contracts. Submits telemetry to the Ninja Backend. Shares no code with
ncpeer/nmsnj; adjacent to nmsnj only in domain (network), not in implementation.

• desktop-companion — internal companion app; mostly standalone.
• spaceship — AppSec SBOM-ingestion backend (Python/Flask). A distinct security product,

not part of any product's build. It consumes the SBOMs the other products' pipelines emit
(Ninja-Remote/ncpeer, NMS/nmsnj, NinjaFlow all appear in its scope maps), scans them for CVEs
and files Jira issues — a downstream *security-scanning* relationship, not a code dependency.
Shares no code with the others; has its own DB/schema and a toolbox submodule.

• ssh-pam-ninja — SSH one-time-password PAM gatekeeper (Linux C). A standalone

authentication component: its pam_ninja.so gates SSH reverse-tunnel access into
Ninja infrastructure with a time-based OTP. Shares no code with the other repos; its
blast radius is operational (who can SSH-tunnel into hosts), not code-level. The client OTP
generators and the module must agree on the OTP scheme + shared secret.

Review implications

• Reviewing nccommon / nr-i18n / nrvirtdisplay / nrvusb / ncpeer_vcpkg / ncpeer_qt6win7:

these are *upstream* of ncpeer (and nccommon/vcpkg also of nmsnj) — weigh the consumer
side: API/ABI compatibility, build impact, and cross-platform reach.

• Reviewing ncpeer or ncrp: the NCRP wire protocol between them is a cross-version

contract.