the Manifesto behind the RTFM! creed.

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l0ngb1t
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the Manifesto behind the RTFM! creed.

Post by l0ngb1t »

i found this text on the net a year ago...

So you wanna be a HACKER huh? <Bwahahaha!> It's a state-of-MIND!
..you can induce it - but only if you are willing to drive yourself
mad enough! Go read and practice until you have mastered at least
Assembly language and Intermediate Level Electronics! Without this
foundation you'll be just another little geek, who might know the magic
words to the spell but dosent understand what he's doing! So RTFM!
..so what does that mean? Read The Fucking Manual! You will be sooo
amazed at how easy most things are if you just try to read the manual
first! The truth is: Most people cant read. Or they read poorly if
they read at all. So if you can't really read...STOP RIGHT HERE. GO
learn to read first. If you can't read at a minimum 12th Grade level
you cant be a hacker. Reading is the basic skill you must have to do
EVERYTHING BEYOND THIS POINT.
Tell your friends you cant party...you're busy. Spend at least 4
hours a day at your new-found fascination...or decide right here
and now that you cant cut it! If you CAN, get a copy of MINIX or
LINUX...start learning about OPERATING SYSTEMS. Then start your
1st real hack...try building a computer-controlled, DTMF dialer
card for your cheap PC...write the code to use it with, make it
a TSR to keep life interesting...now port it to MINIX or whatever
...better yet, port it as an IOCTL call at kernel level! You keep
reading...
Now you're ready to take on something more complex - go to the
Library, start a literature search; topic: Telephone Technologies.
RTFM! Learm about the ancient cross-bar, the Pre-ESS systems, the
fab MFTSS, the TELEX boxes and circuits...keep reading...buy up
an older, cheap (like under $50) cellular phone...by this time
you should already have a subscription to 'Nuts & Volts" as well
as a few other grassroots technology pubs....buy a copy of the
"Cellular Hacker's Bible"....start by doing something simple..
..disassemble and re-write the phone`s control ROM to allow it
to function as an 800MHZ scanner...hopefully you've assembled
a large array of tools and test gear by now. You've got a good
dual-trace scope, some pc-based PROM burner, a signal generator,
a logic probe or two, maybe even a microprocessor-emulator for
the 5051, the Z80, the 68010 or something....you may have been
dragged into some fields-afar by life - incorporate them: If
somebody drasgged you into SCUBA, build your own sonar. If you
have gotten interested in amateur radio, you can build a lot
of swell stuff...I recommend you checkout Packet's AX25A level2
protocol...very slick stuff! If your bud's are all into motors,
take a whak at doing your own Performance PROMS for GM's F.I. and
spark advance curves...or try adapting some Volkswagen/BOSCHE
Kjetronics F.I. to a Harley Davidson!..maybe you're into music
so you buy a synthesizer and learn all about electronic music,
you start hacking analog modules and build a nicer synth than you
could buy! Then you interface it to a MIDI port on a cheap 286AT
and then hack up some sequencer software, or buy some and then
disassemble it to fix all the bugs! You keep reading...
By now most of your friends are also "far into the pudding", you
have either gained 50 lbs or gone totally skinny...your skin tone
is 2 shades lighter from being indoors so long...most of the opposite
sex is either totally freaked by or with you - they either dig you,
or they dont!...you're probably knocking on the door of what will
be a $60K+/yr job as a systems analyst...and you are well-aware that
90% of the people in this world can't talk their way out of a badly
cooked steak at the local eatery, let alone install a new motherboard
in their PC! So you pick up some extra cash on doing shit like that
for the straights...you keep reading, and RTFM'ing higher and higher,
learning about networks...the VCR breaks down and your SO bitches
about having to wait till monday to have it fixed...you fix it in
about 40 minutes....the next day the clothes dryer starts to make
squeeking noises like a 50' mouse, you've never fixed one before -
but somehow it's not that difficult to open the bastard up and find
the squeek and fix it...and suddenly it dawns on you that hacking
code or hardware is pretty much the same! You keep reading...
Congrats, you are now a real hacker. Absolutly nothing but a lack of
time (or in some cases money) can stop you. You are a true Technologic
Philosopher...you can function in places a mere Engineer or Scientist
would truly FEAR TO TREAD! You can read better than Evelyn Wood, you
have a collection of tools that would make a Master Machinist and a
Prototype EE or ME cry. You can calculate series and parallel resonant
circuits in your head. You can fix any consumer appliance - if you can
get the parts. Your car has either become one of your main hacks or
you'ver deligated the job to a mechanic who you have found to be a
fellow hacker; and you work on his homebrew 68010 unix box...because
you've got a 68010 emulator and he works on your car because that's
the kind he specializes in! Maybe you trade services with people
for 50% of what ordinary people have to BUY WITH CASH!...you keep
reading...
(this is the stage where the author now finds himself...16 years
into a career at a Fortune 5 company and age 42...still reading...
your mileage may vary! <-((that's my code too! I co-wrote VEEP,
(vehicle-economy-emissions-program, a complete auto-simulator,
written in Fortran-5 for the Univac 1108 system using punch-cards!)
for the Ford Foundation and the DOT while at JPL in 1973)) )
-Avatar-> (aka: Erik K. Sorgatz) KB6LUY +----------------------------+
TTI(es@soldev.tti.com)or: sorgatz@avatar.tti.com *Government produces NOTHING!*
3100 Ocean Park Blvd. Santa Monica, CA 90405 +----------------------------+
(OPINIONS EXPRESSED DO NOT REFLECT THE VIEWS OF CITICORP OR ITS MANAGEMENT!)
Edit: text fixed.
Last edited by l0ngb1t on 17 Jan 2010, 10:56, edited 2 times in total.
There is an UNEQUAL amount of good and bad in most things, the trick is to work out the ratio and act accordingly. "The Jester"

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Gogeta70
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Post by Gogeta70 »

I could barely read past this part: "better yet, port it as an IOCTL call at kernel level! You keep reading... "

Honestly, just reading the first bit my first thoughts are that this is a kid, who can't spell or punctuate past a 9th grade level (much less a 12th grade level), with a bloated head, a little knowledge and a lot of fucking arrogance.


The way this kid starts out really annoys me too. He tells you hacking is a state of mind - he tries to define hacking for the reader, instead of driving the reader to find their own definition. I don't believe hacking is a state of mind, or at least not entirely. I believe it's also a personality, a perspective - seeing things that are invisible to others, understanding everyday things in a different way - AND a state of mind, as well as other things.

Another thing he says: "mastered at least assembly language and intermediate level electronics." I find it an interesting word that he chose, "master." To master, meaning to have full understanding and knowledge of a subject and that you can learn nothing more about it. Isn't part of being a hacker to never stop learning, never stop searching for more knowledge?

I could go on all day tearing this thing up, but i don't want to hijack your thread, so i'll stop here.

Please realize that i'm not saying any of this about you, i'm just telling you to carefully consider what this person is actually saying - i don't find it inspiring, i find it disappointing.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It works on my machine...

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l0ngb1t
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Post by l0ngb1t »

nooo you can tear it up as much as you want
i just posted a thread, just for reading...
it's just many peoples ask what is RTFM! so here it is lol
and your criticism well be very helpful :D and useful as well to rectify some faulse meaning

btw when u master ASM you can go and learn something else.. it's not a big deal :P:P:P:P
Last edited by l0ngb1t on 17 Jan 2010, 10:55, edited 1 time in total.
There is an UNEQUAL amount of good and bad in most things, the trick is to work out the ratio and act accordingly. "The Jester"

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Post by IceDane »

That is possibly the stupidest piece of regurgitated shit I have ever come across, and I may just make it my crusade to find this individual so I can beat him to a bloody pulp.

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Post by ph0bYx »

Seems like a "hackers manifests" week to be going on here. Don't want to make a new thread so I'll just post the one that read like 5 minutes after the Mentor's one:
I went up to a college this summer to look around, see if it was where I wanted to go and what not. The guide asked me about my interests, and when I said computers, he started asking me about what systems I had, etc. And when all that was done, the first thing he asked me was "Are you a hacker?"

Well, that question has been bugging me ever since. Just what exactly is a hacker? A REAL hacker?

For those who don't know better, the news media (and even comic strips) have blown it way out of proportion... A hacker, by wrong-definition, can be anything from a computer-user to someone who destroys everything they can get their evil terminals into.

And the idiotic schmucks of the world who get a Commodore Vic-20 and a 300 baud modem (heh, and a tape drive!) for Christmas haven't helped hackers' reputations a damn bit. They somehow get access to a really cool system and find some files on hacking... Or maybe a friendly but not-too-cautious hacker helps the loser out, gives him a few numbers, etc. The schmuck gets onto a system somewhere, lucks up and gets into some really cool information or programs, and deletes them. Or some of the more greedy ones capture it, delete it, and try to sell it to Libya or something. Who gets the blame?

The true hackers...that's who. So what is a true hacker?

Firstly, some people may not think I am entirely qualified to say, mainly because I don't consider myself a hacker yet. I'm still learning the ropes about it, but I think I have a pretty damn good idea of what a true hacker is. If I'm wrong, let one correct me...

True hackers are intelligent, they have to be. Either they do really great in school because they have nothing better to do, or they don't do so good because school is terribly boring. And the ones who are bored aren't that way because they don't give a shit about learning anything. A true hacker wants to know everything. They're bored because schools teach the same dull things over and over and over, nothing new, nothing challenging.

True hackers are curious and patient. If you aren't, how can you work so very hard hacking away at a single system for even one small PEEK at what may be on it?

A true hacker DOESN'T get into the system to kill everything or to sell what he gets to someone else. True hackers want to learn, or want to satisfy their curiosity, that's why they get into the system. To search around inside of a place they've never been, to explore all the little nooks and crannies of a world so unlike the boring cess-pool we live in. Why destroy something and take away the pleasure you had from someone else? Why bring down the whole world on the few true hackers who aren't cruising the phone lines with malicious intent?

True hackers are disgusted at the way things are in this world. All the wonderful technology of the world costs three arms and four legs to get these days. It costs a fortune to call up a board in an adjoining state! So why pay for it? To borrow something from a file I will name later, why pay for what could be "dirt cheap if it wasn't run by profiteering gluttons"?

Why be forced, due to lack of the hellacious cash flow it would require to call all the great places, to stay around a bunch of schmuck losers in your home town? Calling out and entering a system you've never seen before are two of the most exhilarating experiences known to man, but it is a pleasure that could not be enjoyed were it not for the ability to phreak...

True hackers are quiet. I don't mean they talk at about .5 dB, I mean they keep their mouths shut and don't brag. The number one killer of those the media would have us call hackers is bragging. You tell a friend, or you run your mouth on a board, and sooner or later people in power will find out what you did, who you are, and you're gone...

I honestly don't know what purpose this file will serve, maybe someone somewhere will read it, and know the truth about hackers. Not the lies that the ignorant spread. To the true hackers out there, I hope I am portraying what you are in this file... If I am not, then I at least am saying what I think a true hacker should be. And to those wanna-be's out there who like the label of "HACKER" being tacked onto them, grow up, would ya?

Oh yeah, the file I quoted from... It has been done (at least) two times. "The Hacker's Manifesto" or "Conscience of a Hacker" are the two names I've seen it given. (A file by itself, and part of an issue of Phrack) Either way, it was written by The Mentor, and it is absolutely the best thing ever written on the subject of hackers. Read it, it could change your life.

Spread it around, but don't change anything please. . .

Back then when I read this the first time the label hacker was an aim for me. It was so cool and prestige back then but because I just started to explore the world of the computers. Now, after a year and a half of hearing so many people bragging around being hackers, after reading millions of definitions of that label, visiting various forums that carry that label, I'm honestly sick of it!
Now when it comes to labeling someone I much rather use the labels coder, defacer, hardware technician, criminal, web developer etc. than that heavily overused label.
I guess I just realized that that is just a word, nothing else. You can all call me uber master hacker but that won't make me any smarter than I am.

And now, if you would excuse me I, a normal average guy how's interested in computers, have to study for an exam.

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