Program Sources To The Whole Hacker Culture example essay topic

... u get into serious programming, you will have to learn C, the core language of Unix (though it's not the one to try learning first thing). Other languages of particular importance to hackers include Perl and LISP. Perl is worth learning for practical reasons; it's very widely used for active web pages and system administration, so that even if you never write Perl you should learn to read it. LISP is worth learning for the profound enlightenment experience you will have when you finally get it; that experience will make you a better programmer for the rest of your days, even if you never actually use LISP itself a lot. It's best, actually, to learn all four of these (Python, C, Perl, and LISP). Besides being the most important hacking languages, they represent very different approaches to programming, and each will educate you in valuable ways.

I can't give complete instructions on how to learn to program here -- it's a complex skill. But I can tell you that books and courses won't do it (many, maybe most of the best hackers are self-taught). What will do it is (a) reading code and (b) writing code. Learning to program is like learning to write good natural language. The best way to do it is to read some stuff written by masters of the form, write some things yourself, read a lot more, write a little more, read a lot more, write some more... and repeat until your writing begins to develop the kind of strength and economy you see in your models.

Finding good code to read used to be hard, because there were few large programs available in source for fledge ling hackers to read and tinker with. This has changed dramatically; open-source software, programming tools, and operating systems (all built by hackers) are now widely available. Which brings me neatly to our next topic... 2. Get one of the open-source Unixes and learn to use and run it. I'm assuming you have a personal computer or can get access to one (these kids today have it so easy: -) ).

The single most important step any newbie can take towards acquiring hacker skills is to get a copy of Linux or one of the BSD-Unixes, install it on a personal machine, and run it. (I don't really recommend installing Linux as a solo project if you " re a newbie. Find a local Linux user's group and ask for help; or contact the Linux Internet Support Co-Operative. LISP maintains IRC channels where you can get help.) Yes, there are other operating systems in the world besides Unix.

But they " re distributed in binary -- you can't read the code, and you can't modify it. Trying to learn to hack on a DOS or Windows machine or under MacOS is like trying to learn to dance while wearing a body cast. Besides, Unix is the operating system of the Internet. While you can learn to use the Internet without knowing Unix, you can't be an Internet hacker without understanding it.

For this reason, the hacker culture today is pretty strongly Unix-centered. (This wasn't always true, and some old-time hackers aren't happy about it, but the symbiosis between Unix and the Internet has become strong enough that even Microsoft's muscle doesn't seem able to seriously dent it.) So, bring up a Unix -- I like Linux myself but there are other ways (and yes, you can run both Linux and DOS / Windows on the same machine). Learn it. Run it. Tinker with it. Talk to the Internet with it.

Read the code. Modify the code. You " ll get better programming tools (including C, Lisp, Python, and Perl) than any Microsoft operating system can dream of, you " ll have fun, and you " ll soak up more knowledge than you realize you " re learning until you look back on it as a master hacker. For more about learning Unix, see The Login ataka. To get your hands on a Linux, see the Where can I get Linux. 3.

Learn how to use the World Wide Web and write HTML. Most of the things the hacker culture has built do their work out of sight, helping run factories and offices and universities without any obvious impact on how non-hackers live. The Web is the one big exception, the huge shiny hacker toy that even politicians admit is changing the world. For this reason alone (and a lot of other good ones as well) you need to learn how to work the Web. This doesn't just mean learning how to drive a browser (anyone can do that), but learning how to write HTML, the Web's markup language. If you don't know how to program, writing HTML will teach you some mental habits that will help you learn.

So build a home page. But just having a home page isn't anywhere near good enough to make you a hacker. The Web is full of home pages. Most of them are pointless, zero-content sludge -- very snazzy-looking sludge, mind you, but sludge all the same (for more on this see The HTML Hell Page).

To be worthwhile, your page must have content -- it must be interesting and / or useful to other hackers. And that brings us to the next topic... Status in the Hacker Culture Like most cultures without a money economy, hacker dom runs on reputation. You " re trying to solve interesting problems, but how interesting they are, and whether your solutions are really good, is something that only your technical peers or superiors are normally equipped to judge. Accordingly, when you play the hacker game, you learn to keep score primarily by what other hackers think of your skill (this is why you aren't really a hacker until other hackers consistently call you one).

This fact is obscured by the image of hacking as solitary work; also by a hacker-cultural taboo (now gradually decaying but still potent) against admitting that ego or external validation are involved in one's motivation at all. Specifically, hacker dom is what anthropologists call a gift culture. You gain status and reputation in it not by dominating other people, nor by being beautiful, nor by having things other people want, but rather by giving things away. Specifically, by giving away your time, your creativity, and the results of your skill.

There are basically five kinds of things you can do to be respected by hackers: 1. Write open-source software. The first (the most central and most traditional) is to write programs that other hackers think are fun or useful, and give the program sources to the whole hacker culture to use. (We used to call these works 'free software', but this confused too many people who weren't sure exactly what 'free' was supposed to mean. Many of us now prefer the term 'open-source's oftware). Hackerdom's most revered demigods are people who have written large, capable programs that met a widespread need and given them away, so that now everyone uses them.

2. Help test and debug open-source software They also serve who stand and debug open-source software. In this imperfect world, we will inevitably spend most of our software development time in the debugging phase. That's why any open-source author who's thinking will tell you that good beta-testers (who know how to describe symptoms clearly, localize problems well, can tolerate bugs in a quickie release, and are willing to apply a few simple diagnostic routines) are worth their weight in rubies.

Even one of these can make the difference between a debugging phase that's a protracted, exhausting nightmare and one that's merely a salutary nuisance. If you " re a newbie, try to find a program under development that you " re interested in and be a good beta-tester. There's a natural progression from helping test programs to helping debug them to helping modify them. You " ll learn a lot this way, and generate good karma with people who will help you later on. 3. Publish useful information.

Another good thing is to collect and filter useful and interesting information into Web pages or documents like FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions lists), and make those generally available. Maintainers of major technical FAQs get almost as much respect as open-source authors. 4. Help keep the infrastructure working. The hacker culture (and the engineering development of the Internet, for that matter) is run by volunteers. There's a lot of necessary but unglamorous work that needs done to keep it going -- administering mailing lists, moderating newsgroups, maintaining large software archive sites, developing RFCs and other technical standards.

People who do this sort of thing well get a lot of respect, because everybody knows these jobs are huge time sinks and not as much fun as playing with code. Doing them shows dedication. 5. Serve the hacker culture itself.

Finally, you can serve and propagate the culture itself (by, for example, writing an accurate primer on how to become a hacker: -) ). This is not something you " ll be positioned to do until you " ve been around for while and become well-known for one of the first four things. The hacker culture doesn't have leaders, exactly, but it does have culture heroes and tribal elders and historians and spokespeople. When you " ve been in the trenches long enough, you may grow into one of these.

Beware: hackers distrust blatant ego in their tribal elders, so visibly reaching for this kind of fame is dangerous. Rather than striving for it, you have to sort of position yourself so it drops in your lap, and then be modest and gracious about your status. The Hacker / Nerd Connection Contrary to popular myth, you don't have to be a nerd to be a hacker. It does help, however, and many hackers are in fact nerds.

Being a social outcast helps you stay concentrated on the really important things, like thinking and hacking. For this reason, many hackers have adopted the label 'nerd' and even use the harsher term 'geek' as a badge of pride -- it's a way of declaring their independence from normal social expectations. See The Geek Page for extensive discussion. If you can manage to concentrate enough on hacking to be good at it and still have a life, that's fine.