Something else about hackers

[mdlbear]

Hackers are used to working with computers, which are fast, accurate, and extremely literal-minded. A hacker knows, deep down in his guts, that if something is wrong with the program he's writing, it's his fault. The normal human mechanisms of blame-shifting and denial don't come into play at all: the only thing to do is fix the problem and move on.

This means that if you can point out something that the hacker in your life is doing wrong, there's an excellent chance that he'll get to work on it. My father provided a good example of this: he discovered that he didn't have anything to talk about besides technology. That's fine with other techies, but not very helpful at cocktail parties. Someone else (um... \me looks in mirror and clears throat) might have stuck to his own kind, or crawled off into a corner to read.

Dad, instead, made himself an expert on wine, with a sideline in hotels and restaurants around the world. By the time I was in high school he had a notebook with not only the best places to eat and places to stay in hundreds of cities, but which rooms had the best view.

I do have to warn you that there's a downside to dealing with machines a lot of the time: it's safe to yell at a machine, because it has no feelings to hurt. There's anger there, but it's not really directed at the machine -- it's really directed at himself. How could he possibly have been so stupid? A few minutes later, of course, he'll figure out exactly how, and by the end of the day he'll be happily telling the story of his own stupidity, and his clever fix for it, to anyone who stands still long enough to listen. Just something to watch out for.

(Side note: I'm going to change focus of this series from geeks in general to hackers/computer geeks, because that's really the only subspecies I'm familiar with.)

Comments

Have you heard this one?

[markiv1111.livejournal.com]

A good friend of a lot of us, here in the Twin Cities, is one Graham Leathers. He wrote a very good song some time ago called "Don't Swear at Machinery." I have a copy somewhere of his solo album, and between that and having his and Becca's home number written down in my address book, can probably get information for you on how to get a copy. Given the virtual identity of Graham's song and the thing you were discussing, would you be interested? (And yeah, you and your wife are classic examples of people I would love to see in the Twin Cities at one of our big music circles -- but I don't really expect it any time soon.)

Nate

Re: Have you heard this one?

[mdlbear]

Absolutely interested. I think I actually *have* the album, but would have to go looking for it...

Re: Have you heard this one?

[markiv1111.livejournal.com]

Okay. If you can find your own copy, I don't need to locate one for you.

Nate

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I've been enjoying this series, by the way. Your comments about flow were particularly interesting. I'm wondering if there are ways to deliberately get myself into a flow state.

[mdlbear]

Normally one just slides into it, but it's similar enough to meditation or a light hypnotic trance that practicing one or both of those will almost certainly help.

An environment free of distractions also helps; learning to shut out distractions might work but it's probably harder for people who haven't been doing it since childhood.

[kayshapero]

Mind you, I do find myself quoting the former co-worker who said "You should never kick a computer. Use a double bladed axe." :) I know - for years it frustrated me that if someone else observed me screwing up, knew what was wrong, and knew how to deal with it they could tell me and I could DO it. But I couldn't do the same for anybody else because no matter how I phrased it they would take it as an insult.

[madfilkentist]

Insulting the machine, the underlying OS, the compiler, or whatever, is also a way of saying, "This is a worthy challenge, but I'll win."