[Haskell-cafe] What is a hacker? [was: Mozart versus Beethoven]

Kirsten Chevalier wrote:

On 12/12/06, Patrick Mulder wrote:

...

PS I like the idea of a book "Hakell for Hackers"

Maybe "Haskell for People Who Want to Be Hackers"?

I would never buy a book with such a title, even if I didn't have the slightest clue about programming. However "Haskell for Hackers" is cool.

(Since, of course, one should never apply the term "hacker" to oneself.)

Who told you that? Calling oneself 'hacker' is a sign of healthy self-respect; to the contrary, I don't know anyone who would call themselves wannabe-hacker.

I'm not sure whether it's best to aim at people who might be already hackers who want to learn Haskell, or people who are already programmers who want to be Haskell hackers, in particular. I suppose that the first group of people is probably larger.

Being a hacker is a matter of attitude and self-definition more than knowledge and experience. A hacker, even if young and lacking experience, reads books for hackers (if at all) not 'how do I become a hacker' books. The attitude is 'gimme the knowledge so i can go ahead and start doing real stuff', not 'oh, there is so much to learn, maybe after 10 years of study and hard work people will finally call me a hacker'. Cheers Ben