Subject: Description of Hackers-IL - Part I

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Feb 2004 15:06:16 +0200

Hi!

In response to Shachar's response I hacked together a wordy description of 
what Hackers-IL is all about. I did my best to word it accurately, and also 
run aspell on it, but still spelling errors, grammatical errors, and 
inaccuracies may be lurking here.

Please read it (it's included below) and comment on it. If you think anything 
should be modified, just let me know. Remember that it will be:

1. Sent to the beak's admins in trying to convince them to host hackers.org.il 
there.

2. Will be used and maintained more permanently as the charter of this mailing 
list. 

Note to self and everyone: I forgot to mention that discussions of 
philsophical/politcal subjects with no relation to science and technology are 
off-topic here. Well, I'll add it, but better release early and release 
often, I say.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

==================================================================

Hacker, n.:

1. A person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how 
to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn 
only the minimum necessary. RFC1392, the Internet Users' Glossary, usefully 
amplifies this as: A person who delights in having an intimate understanding 
of the internal workings of a system, computers and computer networks in 
particular.

2. One who programs enthusiastically (even obsessively) or who enjoys 
programming rather than just theorizing about programming.
 
6. An expert or enthusiast of any kind. One might be an astronomy hacker, for 
example. 

7. One who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or 
circumventing limitations. 

(from the Jargon File - http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/)

What is Hackers-IL?
-------------------

Hackers-IL are a group of computer enthusiasts who enjoy intelligently 
discussing creative programming and other branches of science and technology 
. Our discussions tend to be a bit "philosophical" in nature,
trying to reach conclusions for things that are debatable or controversial,
and trying.

Note: From now until forever: we are by no means computer intruders! While 
some
of us are knowledgeable in security, discovering security holes, writing and 
utilizing exploits, and even are capable of intruding into non-secure systems
- we do not sanction the unauthorized invasion of the networked property
of others, much less sabotaging it. 

The "Hackers" part in "Hackers-IL" means the more traditional and original 
meaning of hackers, not the media perpetuated one. 

Who are the members of Hackers-IL?
----------------------------------

It would be a good generalization to say that most of the active members
are Windows-bashing UNIX and Linux enthusiasts. Nevertheless, we do accept
Windows hackers, including those who actually like it, as long as
they do not bash UNIX irrationally for non-issues. And naturally, developers
of more exotic operating systems, are also more than welcome. We could always
use more diversity.

We are mostly educated people. Most of us have a high school education, some
of us are still college students, and others have a B.A., B.Sc., M.Sc. or 
even a Ph.D. We would accept even K-12 children, but cannot guarantee that 
our content would be "child-safe" in the pornographic sense. While, we do
not post hard-core pornography or have overt discussions about sexual matters 
(nor do we sanction them), we may actually say things that hint or mention 
them.

What are the topics of discussions?
-----------------------------------

We have a wide range of discussion topics: history of computing and 
technology;
various programming languages; software management; high education in Israel
and elsewhere; new thought-provoking articles that were published by various 
persons on the Internet; computer or science humour; the various facets of the 
open-source world; operating systems; famous or not-so-famous books; and 
the list goes on.

What we are not is a help-desk. We do not tell people how to write their 
homework, or how to X and Y in Foolang or Barware. There are many other 
specialized forums on the Net that can help you with it: we are not the 
place for it. While we do discuss design issues in existing programs, or
mention such techniques, we are not going to write your code for you.

How is Hackers-IL affiliated with Israel?
-----------------------------------------

The IL in Hackers-IL is the country code of Israel. Nevertheless, the 
discussions in Hackers-IL are entirely in English in the ASCII character
set. Sometimes we use UTF-8 or iso8859-8 if there is a good need, but it's
the exception rather than the rule. 

We are affiliated with Israel in the sense that most of us are living in 
Israel, interested in it, visited it, are Jews, etc. That does not mean 
we do not accept foreigners and/or gentiles into the mailing list. We do,
and we do not pre-discriminate against anybody. However, we hold ourselves
some "Israeli-oriented" rights like transliterating Hebrew phrases inside
the English, translating idioms from Hebrew to English without looking for
an English equivalent, linking to Israeli or Hebrew articles, discussing
current Israeli affairs (usually with a universal lesson), etc.

Most of are discussions are entirely universal, though. If you still don't 
like it, feel free to start Hackers-Foovile or Hackers-Llewelynland. We will
gladly link to you.

What are the technical resources of Hackers-IL?
-----------------------------------------------

At the moment, most of the action takes place in a mailing list, hosted on
Yahoo Groups. Yahoo Groups (and previously eGroups) offer a very good service.
However, its commercialism and the fact that Yahoo is trying to save money
on it on expense of its users, leaves us with three choices of accepting the
Status Quo, paying them to relieve the limitations, or moving the mailing list
to our own domain. 

While we have nothing against paying Yahoo Groups to get premium service (such 
good services can cost money an rightfully so), we wish to move the mailing 
list to our own domain (hackers.org.il) where we will have more opportunities 
for growing the community and more fun taking it into the next phase of 
advancement. We are hackers after all, and as such have resources at our 
disposal to accommodate for our Internet services, and wish to host it 
ourselves.

After the domain is set up, we plan to establish a web-site with some 
information about us, links and a world-editable Wiki. Hopefully, the web-site
will be active as well, publicize our list, and span a culture of its own.

We also have several ideas for other mailing lists to complement hackers-il. 
Some ideas are mailing lists for code snippets, mailing lists for 
collaborating on contributions to open source code, an actual help desk for 
general computer 
help, etc.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Shlomi Fish      [email-masked]
Homepage:        http://t2.technion.ac.il/~shlomif/

I don't believe in fairies. Oops! A fairy died.
I don't believe in fairies. Oops! Another fairy died.

---

From: Arik Baratz <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 07 Feb 2004 02:52:28 +0200

Hi Shlomi

I think you are too verbose, and you are going into places you better 
stay out of (jews vs. gentiles? come on). I'd take each of your 
paragraphs (sans the Hacker jargon definition) and derive a single 
sentence from it. I suggest the following charter:

Hackers-IL is a mailing list for computer enthusiasts who enjoy 
intelligently discussing creative programming and other branches of 
science and technology. We do not sanction nor encourage illegal 
activity. The group comprises mostly of educated persons, but is not 
limited to such.

There is no limit on the language used, but the members have a good 
sense of internet etiquette and foul language is only heard in extreme 
cases. We do not eforce correct latin pluralii.

The topics of discussion include and revolve around computers, 
technology, the internet, OS/FS, books. Offtopic discussions include 
helpdesk questions, help in obtaining illegal access to computer systems 
and getting even with your ex-something by sending them viruses.

Hackers-IL relates to Israel in the sense that most members bear some 
relationship to Israel. While the formal language of the mailing list is 
English, there will be instances where we will write parts of a message 
in Hebrew, if it can contribute to the discussion. We will link to 
Israel-related and Hebrew articles, and discuss topics which are of 
special interest to Israelis.

We accept members regardless of their nationality, religion, sex, etc. 
The list admins maintain the right to kick out a subscriber that posts 
offending and defamatory messages to the list. Only list members may 
post to the list.

Messages to the list should be text-only and should use the UTF-8 or 
us-ascii encoding.

This was the charter. Besides that, you can say that the list has been 
active for xx time (chen?) and has yy members (chen?), and we seek 
hosting by beak because Yahoo! groups terms are annoying. A word or two 
about an imminent web-site wiki may also be in order.

You owe me 10 agorot.

-- Arik

Shlomi Fish wrote:

> (from the Jargon File - http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/ 
> <http://www.catb.org/%7Eesr/jargon/>)
> What is Hackers-IL?
> -------------------
> <http://t2.technion.ac.il/%7Eshlomif/>
> Yahoo! Groups Links

---

From: Ori Idan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 07 Feb 2004 04:25:16 +0200

Reading both descriptions, I think both of them are good but I tend to 
like Shlomi's description, Shlomi's description is rather long but 
explains everthing in great details I like especially that part that 
descriminates hackers from crackers which are busy with illegal 
activity. I think it is very important as today many people just hearing 
the word hacker immidiatly think about someone who entertain illegal 
computer activity.
I had some discussions even with sytem administrator and computer 
instructors about this term thus we should explain it as detailed as 
possible, just like Shlomi did, I could not do it better.

--
Ori Idan

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Feb 2004 07:02:00 +0200

> sentence from it. I suggest the following charter:

Hi Arik, your charter looks very nice, but I'll comment below. In any case, I 
think my wordy description would still be more suitable for the web-site. 
(with a few corrections, some of which were already be made).

> science and technology. 

> We do not sanction nor encourage illegal 

These two sentences are a bit out of place. What kind of illegal activity 
don't we sanction? And what kind of legal? If an American publishes the DeCSS 
source code on his site, despite the DMCA, shouldn't we sanction it? And this 
is without getting into philosophical discussions of "absolute" Law vs. 
Country Law.

So I think we can omit this sentence because you already mention that we do 
not encourage breaking into other people's computers later on.

As for the "educated" - it doesn't sound too right. How about:

"The group comprises mostly of people who are knowledgeable or very 
knowledgeable about computers or science, many times with a proven education. 
However, we are open for everybody who is eager for knowledge and mind 
exercise.

> cases. We do not eforce correct latin pluralii.

What is correct Latin pluralii? (pardon my ignorance)

> and getting even with your ex-something by sending them viruses.

Right. Nice.

> special interest to Israelis.

Nice.

> offending and defamatory messages to the list. Only list members may

OK.

> Messages to the list should be text-only and should use the UTF-8 or

I would add (preferablly US-ASCII only)

> about an imminent web-site wiki may also be in order.

I will thanks.

> You owe me 10 agorot.

I'll give you 20, because I highly appreciate your contribution.

Like I said, I'm still going to use my old charter on the upcoming web-site 
unless someone has anything to say. (I'll put the corrected version online 
and send a link, so as to not increase the volume of this list too much)

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

--

---

From: "Nadav Har'El" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Feb 2004 12:04:05 +0200

On Fri, Feb 06, 2004, Shlomi Fish wrote about "[hackers-il] Description of Hackers-IL - Part I":
>..

You might want to stick the word "cracker" somewhere here.

> (nor do we sanction them), we may actually say things that hint or mention 

Excuse me? I don't recall any pornographic discussions on this list, hard-core
or not. Like any unmoderated mailing-list some idiot can subscribe and post
some pornographic text, but this would certainly be considered off-topic and
frowned upon. So why even mention this? 

> mention such techniques, we are not going to write your code for you.

You can sum this up by saying that we tend to dabble in the obscure - this
list has rarely been interested in "down-to-earth" computer issues like
how to configure you Linux machine or how to do this-and-that in C.
Any discussion with an immediate application would be frowned upon ;)

> current Israeli affairs (usually with a universal lesson), etc.

I'd drop the words "Jew", "Gentile", etc., from this discussion, it is
completely irrelevent.
You might say that this mailing list was started by a few Israeli friends,
and naturally grew to include mostly Israelis. The Israeli members of
this group, living in a confined geographical area, also find it easier to
meet each other in person, strengthening their sense of community.

> like it, feel free to start Hackers-Foovile or Hackers-Llewelynland. We will

Link to it? I thought that hackers-il was a mailing list, not a web site :)

> We also have several ideas for other mailing lists to complement hackers-il. 

I think this is a bad idea. Hackers-il is very low volume as is, and creating
splinter groups would not do it any good.

> collaborating on contributions to open source code, an actual help desk for 

Most of these have nothing to do with hackers-il... You'll find most of
these happening in linux-il, which *is* a mailing list that could use
some splitting up :)

-- 
Nadav Har'El                        |     Saturday, Feb 7 2004, 15 Shevat 5764
[email-masked]             |-----------------------------------------
Phone: +972-53-790466, ICQ 13349191 |Creativity consists of coming up with
http://nadav.harel.org.il           |many ideas, not just that one great idea.

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Feb 2004 13:53:32 +0200

On Saturday 07 February 2004 12:04, Nadav Har'El wrote:
> > Note: From now until forever: we are by no means computer intruders!
> > While ..
> > The "Hackers" part in "Hackers-IL" means the more traditional and
> > original meaning of hackers, not the media perpetuated one.
>

I'm a bit hazy about "cracker". For me cracker means someone who is trying to 
sabotage a system. Some computer intruders simply want to prove to themselves 
that they can hack into a system, and do not wish to do anything with it. I 
knew a computer intruder who was three years my junior, and was very 
knowledgable in UNIX, TCP/IP, security, C, etc. He was a very nice and 
pleasant person, and he acted as our company's network administrator. I also 
saw a Linux Kernel fix he did once. Such people transcend above the casual 
"script kiddie" level, and I have a hard time calling them "crackers".

I do not sanction intruding to other people's computers, without their 
permissions, but I think the real problem is software that is written 
sloppily, and systems that are not kept updated. (and general lack of 
consciousness about it). The U.S. media likes to perpetuate computer 
intruders and viruses writers as the problem, but they are a necessary 
symptom rather than the real problem.

So I'd rather just say that we are hackers, in the MIT/Berkeley sense, and not 
computer intruders, instead of trying to draw the line between "hacker" and 
"cracker". Note that I sometimes use the term "he hacked into our server" to 
mean that he logged in there, without permission. Thus, it makes such people 
"hackers". Of course, the problem is that the verb to hack has a very general 
meaning.

> > even a Ph.D. We would accept even K-12 children, but cannot guarantee
> > that our content would be "child-safe" in the pornographic sense. While,
> > we do not post hard-core pornography or have overt discussions about
> > sexual matters (nor do we sanction them), we may actually say things that
> > hint or mention them.
>
> Excuse me? I don't recall any pornographic discussions on this list,
> hard-core or not. Like any unmoderated mailing-list some idiot can
> subscribe and post some pornographic text, but this would certainly be
> considered off-topic and frowned upon. So why even mention this?
>

There was the Playboy hiatus, followed by the thing about bras... This may be 
considered inappropriate to children. I suppose I can try to paraphrase it a 
bit. In any case, I just want to make sure parents don't become angry that 
their 7-years old child joined Hackers-IL and then heard something that 
hinted or mentioned sex. 

Can you suggest a better paragraph? I'm a bit hazy on it.

> > various programming languages; software management; high education in
> > Israel and elsewhere; new thought-provoking articles that were published
> > by various persons on the Internet; computer or science humour; the
> > various facets of the open-source world; operating systems; famous or
> > not-so-famous books; and the list goes on.
> >

I'm not sure this is the case. Sometimes people can consult us with design 
decisions that they are later going to implement. This is fully legitimate. 
I'd rather be verbose in this WWW charter than err on being obscure.

> > and we do not pre-discriminate against anybody. However, we hold
> > ourselves some "Israeli-oriented" rights like transliterating Hebrew
> > phrases inside the English, translating idioms from Hebrew to English
> > without looking for an English equivalent, linking to Israeli or Hebrew
> > articles, discussing current Israeli affairs (usually with a universal
> > lesson), etc.
>

Right. As Arik noted, I'll change it in my copy and upload it again.

> meet each other in person, strengthening their sense of community.

Cool, I will.

> > Most of are discussions are entirely universal, though. If you still
> > don't like it, feel free to start Hackers-Foovile or
> > Hackers-Llewelynland. We will gladly link to you.
>

Well, we are planning to set up a web-site and a Wiki once we move to the new 
domain. We can link from there. Alternatively, someone can address us in 
person, and we'll post a link to the site. For instance, if anyone of us 
lived for sometime abroad in one place, he may wish to join its local 
Hackers-Foovile group.

> I think this is a bad idea. Hackers-il is very low volume as is, and
> creating splinter groups would not do it any good.
>

See below.

> > collaborating on contributions to open source code, an actual help desk
> > for general computer
> > help, etc.
>

Hmmm.... well, personally, I wanted to create a mailing list to send 
interesting little stuff I wrote. People believed my tendency to do that 
lowered the SNR of Hackers-IL, but I (and many others) actually found it 
desirable to send them and discuss them. (this is a common theme in the Perl 
Monks web-site, BTW).

Sending a funky makefile that I wrote for Linux-IL just to show off is 
off-topic there. So, if we have something like that in Hackers-IL, where we 
move discussions from there to the core mailing list if it gets interesting, 
we can really benefit from it. And we have our own domain, so what do we 
care.

"May the boys play in front of us."

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

--

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Feb 2004 14:26:34 +0200

Hi all!

Well, I took Arik's mini-charter, and modified it somewhat according to my
and his input. If all is well with everybody, I will send it to the 
beak.hamakor.org.il's admins.

Please review and comment.

Here goes:

-----------------------------------------------------

Hackers-IL is a mailing list for computer enthusiasts who enjoy 
intelligently discussing creative programming and other branches of 
science and technology. We do not discuss computer intrusion (the
media-perpetuated meaning of "hacking") and do not sanction such activities. 
The group comprises mostly of people who are knowledgeable or very 
knowledgeable about computers or science, many times with a proven education. 
However, we are open for everybody who is eager for knowledge and mind 
exercise.

There is no limit on the language used, but the members have a good 
sense of Internet etiquette and foul language is only heard in extreme 
cases. 

The topics of discussion include and revolve around computers, 
technology, the Internet, Open Source/Free Software and books. 
Off-topic discussions include help-desk questions, help in obtaining 
illegal access to computer systems and getting even with your ex-something 
by sending them viruses.

Hackers-IL relates to Israel in the sense that most members bear some 
relationship to Israel. While the formal language of the mailing list is 
English, there will be instances where we will write parts of a message 
in Hebrew, if it can contribute to the discussion. Furthermore, 
we may link to Israel-related and Hebrew articles, and discuss topics 
which are of special interest to Israelis.

We accept members regardless of their nationality, religion, gender, etc. 
The list admins maintain the right to kick out a subscriber that posts 
offending and defamatory messages to the list. Only list members may 
post to the list.

Messages to the list should be text-only and should use the US-ASCII 
encoding (preferably) or UTF-8 when there's a good need.

The group has been active as a Yahoo Groups mailing list since May 2000.
We now wish to move to our domain (hackers.org.il) and to a mail service
hosted on beak, so we will be self-maintaining, avoid the various limits
Yahoo Groups imposes on its free service, and give us a chance for our
culture to grow beyond just a mailing list.

----------------------------------------------

It's a bazaar model of development, isn't it?

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Feb 2004 14:08:32 +0200

> the word hacker immidiatly think about someone who entertain illegal

I think Arik's description should do for sending it to the beak's admins. Mine 
will more suitable in the About page of the future web-site.

> possible, just like Shlomi did, I could not do it better.

Interesting. But even I became aware of the more broad meaning of the term 
hacker quite lately in my career. I also was working on UNIX for quite some 
time (used GNU programs, compiled gcc and X-Windows, and turned a SunOS 
system into GNU/SunOS) and I still believed hacking was mostly computer 
intruding.

What I do recall was an incident that happened to me when I worked in a 
relatively Microsoftish company that produced a cross-platform database 
middleware. I talked with the CTO, who was an ex-Micrososftie who had headed 
the development of the Microsoft Jet Database. I asked him if Bill Gates was 
a good programmer, and he answered: "Yes. He used to be a real hacker." By 
that time, I knew he did not mean a computer intruder.

He went on to tell me that he wrote something in Basic for his school, and 
that he was completely clueless in certain areas such as databases.

Of course, I don't think Gates can be considered a good hacker in today's 
standards. Heck, even my Basic/C/Pascal DOS/Win3.x knowledge I had when I was 
18 (which is well above what the general populace know about hacking), is now 
hugely superceded by the knowledge of any half-decent 16-years-old Linux 
guru.

You can't say that there isn't progress in due time, and the generation is not 
diminishing, but quite the opposite.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

---

From: Arik Baratz <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 08 Feb 2004 00:57:21 +0200

> However, we are open for everybody who is eager for knowledge and mind
s/proven/formal/g

> culture to grow beyond just a mailing list.
Yup.

-- Arik

---

From: Arik Baratz <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 08 Feb 2004 01:04:52 +0200

> What is correct Latin pluralii? (pardon my ignorance)
That's a taunt on behalf of The Wielder of the SCSI Cable, Maintainer of 
the Linux-IL list and Linux-IL Non-Cabal Non-Leader.

> and send a link, so as to not increase the volume of this list too much)
If you're using your charter I strngly suggest you review it and take 
the edge off some things in there.

-- Arik

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 8 Feb 2004 12:01:13 +0200

> > However, we are open for everybody who is eager for knowledge and mind

Sure, I'll correct that.

> > It's a bazaar model of development, isn't it?

:-)

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 8 Feb 2004 12:03:30 +0200

> the Linux-IL list and Linux-IL Non-Cabal Non-Leader.

Oh, I see. Well, I think I'll just omit it. Not many people will understand 
it.

> the edge off some things in there.

OK, I will. I'm going to revise it a bit and post it on the web for review. 
Then, you can comment on it, before we place it on the site. Note that I wish 
it to be dynamic instead of static, so there's not going to be a "final" 
version.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish