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I always thought that this article read more like "How to become Eric S. Raymond". There's a lot in here that is really pretty painful to read 14 years on; in

by jwise0 12y ago

I always thought that this article read more like "How to become Eric S. Raymond". There's a lot in here that is really pretty painful to read 14 years on; in particular, I find the argument that you have to start off by using a Unix in order to become a proficient hacker to be particularly disingenuous. The general aspect that I dislike is the idea that there is only one kind of hacker -- the kind that fits into Eric S. Raymond's "the hacker culture". For instance, he gives the monoculture that all hackers speak English; but just a few weeks ago, we saw an article on HN about the old microcomputers of the Soviet Bloc (I wish I could find the link now). And, perhaps, maybe my all-time favorite hacks were executed by demosceners who spoke little-to-no English. Are these people not hackers? I don't think you'd find anyone who could argue that, but they are not part of Eric S. Raymond's monoculture. The great essay that I have always wanted to read about How to Become a Hacker would be answering the question of how to find joy in the minutiae, and how to put all the little pieces together to make the most interesting things. But this essay is not that.

yzzxy 12y ago
Yes, the jargon file and this article are mired in specifics that are probably bad. I also don't think the weirdness the jargon file gets into near the end regarding personality archetypes is very valid, interesting or useful, and it has always felt a little creepy to me. But I would say the core principles mentioned at the top of this article are pretty valid: 1. The world is full of fascinating problems waiting to be solved. 2. No problem should ever have to be solved twice. 3. Boredom and drudgery are evil. 4. Freedom is good. 5. Attitude is no substitute for competence. That seems to capture the hacker spirit pretty well.
- adlpz 12y ago
  Even more, I would say that several of the later points are very much valid still too. I'm still one of those people that believe that hacking does in fact relate to computers and electronics (!), so I think that learning to program, knowing HTML, being fluent in Unix and the ways of contributing mentioned in the article are still perfectly relevant as of today. I do agree with jwise0, though, in that the phrasing and some details are way too specific to the author's own experience.
- tptacek 12y ago
  One problem with these 5 "core principles" is that they apply just as well to tax accounting. It's the places where ESR writes things that don't apply to contracts law or mechanical engineering where he goes off the rails, which is a telling problem with the essay.
Myk267 12y ago
> I always thought that this article read more like "How to become Eric S. Raymond". That seems like quite the coincidence given that Eric S. Raymond is the author of the article itself. Maybe there's something to that. > For instance, he gives the monoculture that all hackers speak English No. He doesn't give anything. He suggests that learning English is useful because the internet and hacker culture are dominated by it. > But this essay is not that. The scope of the document is clearly stated under the "Why This Document?" header.
ryan-allen 12y ago
Sounds like you need to write an article about joy in minutiae! I would read it! EDIT: Please write an article!
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
exDM69 12y ago
> I find the argument that you have to start off by using a Unix in order to become a proficient hacker to be particularly disingenuous. While "Unix" is perhaps not a requirement, but he does give a convincing argument why it should be an open source operating system - which significantly reduces the number of options. Sure, you can be a hacker who uses Windows, but you're locked out of half of what your computer can do. That is a restriction. Yes, you can work only on the userspace but to me, the essence of being a hacker is having a keen interest in the whole stack. While you're still locked out of your CPU internals, an avid hacker should also have an interest in hardware hacking. Feel free to disagree, but I'm on ESR's side on this one.
- ultramancool 12y ago
  > but you're locked out of half of what your computer can do. I'm a pretty big Unix guy, I run Linux desktops and FreeBSD servers, but you're going to need to clarify what you mean by that. What exactly is the restriction? Assuming you're willing to install some drivers and patch some system dlls, you can generally achieve the same things. You can very easily disable driver signature enforcement in Windows, as I have and as does anyone who writes drivers for Windows platforms or does low-level reverse engineering work on it. I think the balance of "force signing by default but allow it to be turned off" is a pretty good one, works well for Windows drivers and for Android at least.
  - exDM69 12y ago
    > What exactly is the restriction? All of the below (and the parent post) is my opinion. You can disagree with me, and I'm fine with that. You're unable to study what your computer actually does. You don't have access to the source of anything that happens in kernel space. You can take university OS courses and tinker with the educational toy operating systems, read about Windows internals but to see what you're actually running is different not only at a philosophical level but also practically. Yes, you can get into kernel space in Windows by doing a driver DLL, so you can make your computer "do" anything, but what you, as a person, will do is a lot different when dealing with a black box rather than a white box. When doing Windows kernel space driver development, you're reading the documentation (and hope that your computer does what it says), when doing that with an open source OS, you can read the source too (and know that the computer does exactly that). To me (you don't have to agree), the essence of being a computer is that you don't only use your computer to get work done or use it for entertainment. Computers are the entertainment (and perhaps the work too, like in my case in the semiconductor industry).
tingol 12y ago
"Great hackers also generally insist on using open source software. Not just because it's better, but because it gives them more control." Paul Graham said that, though I do somewhat agree about the english thing. You shouldn't take these as rules but as a guide which the title is indicative of. Sure you can become a hacker while not knowing english but the immense amount of information available on the internet (mostly in english) is just too big to avoid (not impossible as you've indicated with your examples) for beginners.

by jwise0 12y ago

yzzxy 12y ago

Yes, the jargon file and this article are mired in specifics that are probably bad. I also don't think the weirdness the jargon file gets into near the end regarding personality archetypes is very valid, interesting or useful, and it has always felt a little creepy to me. But I would say the core principles mentioned at the top of this article are pretty valid: 1. The world is full of fascinating problems waiting to be solved. 2. No problem should ever have to be solved twice. 3. Boredom and drudgery are evil. 4. Freedom is good. 5. Attitude is no substitute for competence. That seems to capture the hacker spirit pretty well.

adlpz 12y ago
Even more, I would say that several of the later points are very much valid still too. I'm still one of those people that believe that hacking does in fact relate to computers and electronics (!), so I think that learning to program, knowing HTML, being fluent in Unix and the ways of contributing mentioned in the article are still perfectly relevant as of today. I do agree with jwise0, though, in that the phrasing and some details are way too specific to the author's own experience.
tptacek 12y ago
One problem with these 5 "core principles" is that they apply just as well to tax accounting. It's the places where ESR writes things that don't apply to contracts law or mechanical engineering where he goes off the rails, which is a telling problem with the essay.

Myk267 12y ago

> I always thought that this article read more like "How to become Eric S. Raymond". That seems like quite the coincidence given that Eric S. Raymond is the author of the article itself. Maybe there's something to that. > For instance, he gives the monoculture that all hackers speak English No. He doesn't give anything. He suggests that learning English is useful because the internet and hacker culture are dominated by it. > But this essay is not that. The scope of the document is clearly stated under the "Why This Document?" header.

ryan-allen 12y ago

Sounds like you need to write an article about joy in minutiae! I would read it! EDIT: Please write an article!

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

exDM69 12y ago

> I find the argument that you have to start off by using a Unix in order to become a proficient hacker to be particularly disingenuous. While "Unix" is perhaps not a requirement, but he does give a convincing argument why it should be an open source operating system - which significantly reduces the number of options. Sure, you can be a hacker who uses Windows, but you're locked out of half of what your computer can do. That is a restriction. Yes, you can work only on the userspace but to me, the essence of being a hacker is having a keen interest in the whole stack. While you're still locked out of your CPU internals, an avid hacker should also have an interest in hardware hacking. Feel free to disagree, but I'm on ESR's side on this one.

ultramancool 12y ago
> but you're locked out of half of what your computer can do. I'm a pretty big Unix guy, I run Linux desktops and FreeBSD servers, but you're going to need to clarify what you mean by that. What exactly is the restriction? Assuming you're willing to install some drivers and patch some system dlls, you can generally achieve the same things. You can very easily disable driver signature enforcement in Windows, as I have and as does anyone who writes drivers for Windows platforms or does low-level reverse engineering work on it. I think the balance of "force signing by default but allow it to be turned off" is a pretty good one, works well for Windows drivers and for Android at least.
- exDM69 12y ago
  > What exactly is the restriction? All of the below (and the parent post) is my opinion. You can disagree with me, and I'm fine with that. You're unable to study what your computer actually does. You don't have access to the source of anything that happens in kernel space. You can take university OS courses and tinker with the educational toy operating systems, read about Windows internals but to see what you're actually running is different not only at a philosophical level but also practically. Yes, you can get into kernel space in Windows by doing a driver DLL, so you can make your computer "do" anything, but what you, as a person, will do is a lot different when dealing with a black box rather than a white box. When doing Windows kernel space driver development, you're reading the documentation (and hope that your computer does what it says), when doing that with an open source OS, you can read the source too (and know that the computer does exactly that). To me (you don't have to agree), the essence of being a computer is that you don't only use your computer to get work done or use it for entertainment. Computers are the entertainment (and perhaps the work too, like in my case in the semiconductor industry).

tingol 12y ago

"Great hackers also generally insist on using open source software. Not just because it's better, but because it gives them more control." Paul Graham said that, though I do somewhat agree about the english thing. You shouldn't take these as rules but as a guide which the title is indicative of. Sure you can become a hacker while not knowing english but the immense amount of information available on the internet (mostly in english) is just too big to avoid (not impossible as you've indicated with your examples) for beginners.