a minute ago by mettamage
I'm reposting part of a comment I wrote.
My version on how to become a hacker.
Step 1: Go to http://www.catb.org/esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html
Step 2: Complete Binary and Malware Analysis at the Vrije Universiteit
Step 3: Complete Computer and Network Security at the Vrije Universiteit
Step 4: Complete Hardware Security at the Vrije Universiteit
Step 4b (bonus, I mean, you're there now anyway): Complete Kernel Programming at the Vrije Universiteit
Step 5: Go to https://hackthebox.eu, hack at least 1 easy, 1 medium, 1 hard and -- for good measure -- 1 insane box
Congratulations, you are now a hacker in every sense of the word:
1. You broke into computer systems.
2. You needed to be curious in order to do it.
I'm assuming you already know how to program, if you don't then get the following prerequisite knowledge.
Step 1: do CS50 in order to learn programming and learn how to learn programming languages. What I've seen in students is that the first 6 weeks are experienced as more difficult than the last 6 weeks (hint: it's because you start off with C).
Step 2: do https://www.nand2tetris.org/ to understand computer systems and get some assembly under your belt
Step 3: if you feel like this road is too rigid, do a project that you're interested in here. Create a computer graphics engine with OpenGL and Java. Yes, you could do C++ but that's complicating things for now. If you really want to though, go ahead, C++ is a fine choice if you're burning with passion.
6 minutes ago by ldeangelis
Interestingly, the initial article [0] is still alive and updated. The most recent addition was about Go. I'm always impressed by how many people do things with this language. It seems to really hit a sweet spot for small to big tools.
42 minutes ago by kebman
A lot of hacking is done simply because public and private databases and systems just aren't good enough to serve those that they were made to serve. This made me a "hacker," in that I created programs, crawlers and spiders to find and put together the information I needed for my everyday work as a teacher (all legal, of course, though highly unconventional).
I once told my boss about one such idea I had, that I thought would be beneficial to the rest of my collegues. He told me, "Go to the principal, and word your idea so it sounds like it's his idea, and I'm sure he'll give you the go-ahead for it." I told him straight up, that, "Nah, then I'll rather keep it to myself."
33 minutes ago by arexxbifs
My best advice to any budding hacker would be for them to find a job as unrelated to computers as possible, but which leaves them with enough free time to tinker with whatever currently tickles their fancy.
15 minutes ago by qzw
Iām sure this works for some people in the right context, but so many great OG hackers were career computer scientists and engineers. I mean, people like the original Xerox PARC guys, Woz, Cerf, Diffie, the RSA guys, TBL, and too many more to name. They were all working in jobs or started companies that allowed them to devote the bulk of their time and energy to hacking and building. There are only so many hours in the day. If youāre devoting a third of it to something completely unrelated to your passion, itās pretty hard to get the best out of yourself. And forget it if you want to have any other kind of ālifeā besides.
Edit: readability
18 minutes ago by markus_zhang
Pretty much what I'm doing but I do hope for a coding job...
12 minutes ago by arexxbifs
Like most things, hacking is a lot like angling in the respect that it's a fun, relaxing and rewarding pastime, but most often neither of these when depended upon for survival.
22 minutes ago by endgame
Warms my heart to see the old ways kept alive.
2 hours ago by hummel
If you need to ask How to Become a Hacker, you are not going to be one. It all depends on your personal curiosity, either you have it or you don't.
PS: Found 0day on Paypal when I was 12 in the early '00s, never got paid or recognized for it :(
an hour ago by lvice
Surely if someone is interested in the topic of "how to become a hacker", it shows the kind of curiosity that you are talking about.
PS: Congratulations? How is this relevant, gate-keeping aside?
an hour ago by viraptor
I think this is phrased wrong. I get what you mean, but this is just gate keeping. First, what do you even mean by hacker? There are many ways to describe this.
Sure, if you mean the creativity, bending the rules of what's possible, general interest in discovery... that's traits people have in the first place before being called hackers. But that's not the only way.
an hour ago by whynotminot
I find gatekeeping in the hacker world to be some of the worst in tech.
There's a strong "if you can't figure it out on your own you're too stupid to help" vibe to it, while the rest of the dev world has actually made some decent strides toward valuing inclusion and education.
43 minutes ago by vertex-four
I find that this is largely the American hacker community - European hackers, and especially Germans, tend to be incredibly supportive of people with the drive to learn. They also tend to expand their hacker mindset to things other than computers - wherever there's a complex system, they're critical of it, enjoy learning how it works, learning how to break it and bend it.
2 hours ago by elsjaako
There is a certain kind of person that will become some kind of hacker no matter what, but with advice and guidance they will get a lot further than without.
an hour ago by 5m17h
You mean you have to acquire the ability to actively collect and discriminate?
Daily Digest
Get a daily email with the the top stories from Hacker News. No spam, unsubscribe at any time.