Section 1: Basic Understanding

1.1: Won’t my hacker break into my computer and steal my trade secrets?

Point of clarification. There are two communities of people that call themselves ‘hackers’.

One of these groups is the one you’ve heard about–those who take pride in breaking into other people’s computers. That is all the media understands ‘hacker’ to mean, but there is another community, an older and much more interesting one, that is insulted by being mistaken for the first community. They are as insulted as an automotive engineer would be if the media said ‘automotive engineer’ when they meant ‘car thief’, and the engineer learned through bitter experience that, whenever he told people he was an automotive engineer, people thought he was only a car thief.

Your hacker is an automotive engineer, not a car thief. He is a hacker because he loves computers, and loves to do impressive things with them. He doesn’t want to steal your trade secrets, and it would be good manners of you not to confuse “automotive engineer” hackers with “car thief” hackers–whom he refers to as ‘crackers’, or the extremely pejorative ‘script kiddies’.

1.2: Was it a good idea to hire a hacker?

It depends on the job. A hacker can be dramatically more effective than a non-hacker at a job, or dramatically less effective. Jobs where hackers are particularly good are:

• Systems administration
• Programming
• Design
• Web-related development

Jobs where hackers are particularly bad are:

• Data entry
• “Computer operator”, where the “computer operator” has to use software (especially Microsoft software) that he can’t improve.

More generally, a job that requires fast and unexpected changes, significant skill, talent, and is not very repetitive will be one a hacker will excel at. Repetitive, simple jobs are a waste of a good hacker, and will make your hacker bored and frustrated. No one works well bored and frustrated.

The good news is, if you get a hacker on something he particularly likes, you will frequently see performance on the order of five to ten times what a “normal” worker would produce. This is not consistent, and you shouldn’t expect to see it all the time, but it will happen. This is most visible on particularly difficult tasks.

1.3 Wait, you just said “ten times”, didn’t you? You’re not serious, right?

Yes, I am serious; a hacker on a roll may be able to produce, in a period of a few months, something that a small development group (say, 7-8 people) would have a hard time getting together over a year. He also may not. Your mileage will vary.

IBM used to report that certain programmers might be as much as 100 times as productive as other workers, or more. This kind of thing happens.

1.4 How should I manage my hacker?

The same way you herd cats. It can be quite confusing; they’re not like most other workers. Don’t worry! Your hacker is likely to be willing to suggest answers to problems, if asked. Hackers are known for coming together and producing impressive software without any business people to tell them what to do. That’s how Perl was produced. And Linux. And quite a few other things, great and small. Most hackers are nearly self-managing.

1.5 I don’t understand this at all. This is confusing. Is there a book on this?

There are several books that explain important pieces of the puzzle, and some of them are listed in a reading. If you read from the list and ask your hacker to help you connect the dots, you’ve got a good chance at understanding your hacker much better.