🚀 go-pugleaf

nra...@nmt.edu (Daniel Briggs) writes:

>In article <1990Oct4.0...@specialix.co.uk> jo...@specialix.co.uk
> (Jon Brawn) writes:
>>>In article <47...@lure.latrobe.edu.au> CC...@lure.latrobe.edu.au (Mark
>>>Kosten - Computer Centre, La Trobe Uni.) re-entered the classic saga
>>>of Mel, the virtuoso hacker.
>>                     ^^^^^^^^
>>How dare you call my hero a hacker!

>Methinks we have a small communications problem here.  Your hero was
>being complimented.  C'mon, if we can't use the word 'hacker' *here*,
>in its original pre media distorted sense, where *can* we use it?
>This is probably the largest single body of people around who used the
>word back when there was still a difference between hacker &
>muncher/cracker/crasher/(your local slang here).  Heck, I *still* call
>myself a hacker quite proudly, although it does earn me some odd looks
>from the relative newbies to the computer field.
>-- 
>This is a shared guest account, please send replies to
>dbr...@nrao.edu (Internet)
>Dan Briggs / NRAO / P.O. Box O / Socorro, NM / 87801  (U.S. Snail)
Nope. Even the hacker of code, rather than the criminally prosecutable
security fouler, is unfair dues to the man. He was not, in any sense,
a hacker. He was a coder of the greatest ability. The code was tight,
efficient, and well thought through. A hack is a quick tacky little
number, usually implemented to get you immediate superior of your back
because something doesn't work. Mel's not like that. Mel was and artist.

Jon?
-- 
Here I speak neither for Specialix, nor myself. What you see is all you get.
Jon Brawn, jo...@specialix.co.uk  (or for you bangers: ..!mcsun!ukc!slxsys!jonb)
  ``Once upon a time, not so very long ago, on a network not so very far away''