What delights may its practitioner expect as his
reward?
First is the sheer
joy of making things. As the child delights in his mud pie, so the adult enjoys
building things, especially things of his own design. I think this delight must
be an image of God's delight in making things, a delight shown in the distinctiveness
of each leaf and each snowflake.
Second is the
pleasure of making things that are useful to other people.Deep within, we want
others to use our work and to find it helpful. In this respect the programming
system is not essentially different from the child's first clay pencil holder
"for Daddy's office."
Third is the
fascination of fashioning complex puzzle-like objects of interlocking moving
parts and watching them work in subtle cycles, playing out the consequences of
principles built in from the beginning. The programmed computer has all the
fascination of the pinball machine or the jukebox mechanism, carried to the
ultimate.
Fourth is the joy
of always learning, which springs from the nonrepeating nature of the task. In
one way or another the problem is ever new, and its solver learns something:
sometimes practical, sometimes theoretical, and sometimes both.
Finally, there is
the delight of working in such a tractable medium. The programmer, like the
poet, works only slightly removed from pure thought-stuff. He builds his
castles in the air, from air, creating by exertion of the imagination. Few
media of creation are so flexible, so easy to polish and rework, so readily
capable of realizing grand conceptual structures. (...) Yet the program construct,
unlike the poet's words, is real in the sense that it moves and works,
producing visible outputs separately from the construct itself. It prints
results, draws pictures, produces sounds, moves arms. The magic of myth and
legend has come true in our time. One types the correct incantation on a
keyboard, and a display screen comes to life, showing things that never were
nor could be.
Programming then
is fun because it gratifies creative longings built deep within us and delights
sensibilities we have in common with all men.
opinion
I think that showing them algorithmic problems is too aggressive, unless
your target audience are students that already compete in math competitions.
For a general audience of students, I'd try first to motivate them to
learn some programming and play with it. There's a summer program in my
university for high school students where they play with visual tools to create
games (iirc). The hour of code uses a robot walk as an example. Using something visual like this helps
people seeing the results of their work and motivates them to try different
things.
After this phase, for those that enjoy programming, I'd show them the
'power' of efficient algorithms. If they don't like it, they can still try to
build other kinds of programs.
What I did once was picking a problem like sorting, demonstrate that an
algorithm works (e.g. bubble sort) for small inputs and is slow for large ones
(let the shell several seconds waiting and kill it). Then, show the speed of an
efficient algorithm. It impressed the students and got them engaged.
Programming
computers is a piece of cake. Or so the world’s digital-skills gurus would have
us believe. From the non-profit Code.org’s promise that “Anybody can learn!” to
Apple chief executive Tim Cook’s comment that writing code is “fun and
interactive,” the art and science of making software is now as accessible as
the alphabet.
Unfortunately, this rosy portrait bears no
relation to reality. For starters, the profile of a programmer’s mind is pretty
uncommon. As well as being highly analytical and creative, software developers
need almost superhuman focus to manage the complexity of their tasks. Manic
attention to detail is a must; slovenliness is verboten. Attaining this level of concentration
requires a state of mind called being “in the flow,” a quasi-symbiotic
relationship between human and machine that improves performance and
motivation.
Coding isn’t the only job that demands intense focus. But you’d never hear
someone say that brain surgery is “fun,” or that structural engineering is
“easy.” When it comes to programming, why do policymakers and technologists
pretend otherwise? For one, it helps lure people to the field at a time when
software (in the words of the venture capitalist Marc Andreessen) is “eating
the world”—and so, by expanding the labor pool, keeps industry ticking over and
wages under control. Another reason is that the very word “coding” sounds
routine and repetitive, as though there’s some sort of key that developers
apply by rote to crack any given problem. It doesn’t help that Hollywood
has cast the “coder” as a socially challenged, type-first-think-later
hacker, inevitably white and male, with the power to thwart the Nazis or penetrate
the CIA.
Insisting on the glamor and fun of coding
is the wrong way to acquaint kids with computer science. It insults their
intelligence and plants the pernicious notion in their heads that you
don’t need discipline in order to progress. As anyone with even minimal
exposure to making software knows, behind a minute of typing lies an hour of
study.
It’s better to admit that coding is
complicated, technically and ethically. Computers, at the moment, can only
execute orders, to varying degrees of sophistication. So it’s up to the
developer to be clear: the machine does what you say, not what you mean. More
and more “decisions” are being entrusted to software, including life-or-death
ones: think self-driving cars; think semi-autonomous weapons; think Facebook
and Google making inferences about your marital, psychological, or physical
status, before selling it to the highest bidder. Yet it’s rarely in the
interests of companies and governments to encourage us to probe what’s going on
beneath these processes.
All of these scenarios are built on
exquisitely technical foundations. But we can’t respond to them by answering
exclusively technical questions. Programming is not a detail that can be left
to “technicians” under the false pretense that their choices will be
“scientifically neutral.” Societies are too complex: the algorithmic is
political. Automation has already dealt a blow to the job security of
low-skilled workers in factories and warehouses around the world. White-collar
workers are next in line. The digital giants of today run on a fraction of the
employees of the industrial giants of yesterday, so the irony of encouraging
more people to work as programmers is that they are slowly mobilizing
themselves out of jobs.
In an ever-more intricate and connected
world, where software plays a larger and larger role in everyday life, it’s
irresponsible to speak of coding as a lightweight activity. Software is not
simply lines of code, nor is it blandly technical. In just a few years,
understanding programming will be an indispensable part of active citizenship.
The idea that coding offers an unproblematic path to social progress and
personal enhancement works to the advantage of the growing
techno-plutocracy that’s insulating itself behind its own technology.
Topics include:
- Understanding your child's learning style
- Graphical programming on iPads and computers
- Making things move
- Learning about algorithms
- Programming animations, apps, and games
- Learning JavaScript and other core languages
- Programming virtual and real robots
- Programming hardware: Arduino and Raspberry Pi
Seeing Programming Through the Eyes of an Artist
The health benefits of creative output are well documented – a May 2012 article on CNN.com titled “A Healthy Life is a Creative Life ” acknowledges a strong link between creativity and improved mental and physical health. “Creating helps make people happier, less anxious, more resilient and better equipped to problem-solve in the face of hardship,” says author Amanda Enayati.
Many recent studies have shown that stress commonly experienced by people in jobs they dislike leads to weight gain and higher glucose levels. Those issues can morph into to bigger problems, such as upper-respiratory infections and even cardiovascular disease.
With these proven facts in mind, students or adults seeking new career paths may shun the idea of becoming a computer programmer when choosing a profession. Long hours spent hunched before a computer screen writing endless streams of code seems to be the antithesis of a creative occupation. But, when one truly understands how engaging coding can be – when they see how it can be used to create limitless programs, utilities and applications – they begin to see computer programming as an exciting, modern creative outlet.
Coding is Creating
Writing code may not be the same as producing a novel, a painting, a new design for a building, a sculpture or a beautiful piece of music, but when the coder can see him or herself as an artist whose ideas impart limitless functionality to a computer program, a new facet of creativity comes to light.
The basis of programming is to solve a problem – for example, a programmer wants to create an app that generates sales tax information on any purchase made by a given user, using location-based technology. Through the design and testing process, the programmer achieves repeated, successful results and has thus created something new and useful. Just like any other creative pursuit, the more a person practices, the better he or she will be at the craft of programming.
Before he died, Apple’s Steve Jobs said, “Everybody in the country should learn how to program a computer… because it teaches you how to think.”
Learning Method Matters
For those on the fence about whether to pursue education, then a career, in computer science or programming, the overarching advice is to learn computer languages in the correct order. Some are much more complex and more difficult to learn than others, and jumping into a difficult language first can hinder a learner’s confidence and progress.
This is where The Software Guild can have the best influence on a programming student’s education. The Software Guild is a fast-paced apprenticeship program that teaches programming and software development. It is a 12-week boot camp program in which enrollees receive staff expertise and personalized attention they may not get in traditional classrooms. This boot camp is intended to help students master the computer languages they need – in an order that makes sense – that they’ll then use to create software programs from the ground up. All of this is accomplished in a collaborative, hands-on way.
Students shouldn’t let the stereotypes of what they think computer programming and coding looks like sway them from a career in this lucrative field. With code as their medium, computer programmers can become intensely creative artists with important contributions that impact people around the world.
https://www.quora.com/Is-hacking-fun
Hacking is the most exhilarating rush you could ever get.
Have you ever broken into somewhere? What did you feel like? Were your knees trembling with fear that you might be caught?
Hacking is like that 1000x.
Hacking is the fun we almost shouldn't be allowed to have. Hacking is the intellectual and logic oriented video game that so many people crave.
It is like the ultimate hit. Or think of a level in a video game. It seemed impossible. You stuck at it for hours and hours. Tried again and again. Then you have finally won, beating the ultimate boss. That is what hacking is over and over again. But hacking requires hours of dedication that can only be sustained by someone who is truly passionate about hacking/infosec/programming.
Conclusion: Yes, Hacking is so f*cking fun.
most people here havent got a clue about hacking..
so they spout on about how hacking is investigating, washing machines, watches and lots more bullshit.
proper hacking is all about hacking computers…so just ignore all the lengthy explanation on what hacking means to an old grey or someone who hasnt got a clue what you are talking about clearly…ignore that balloney.
hacking is not really that much fun…it takes lots of study, investigation, coding and low level programing and understanding. hackers are born. to them it is fun of the highest order…they get a better buzz from sussing out and circumventing systems and enhancing their knowledge on computers, than a 14 year old kid gets from jerking off and playing x box all night. Hacking is the big boys computer game….but you have to be elite with computers in order to play competently…
this is the main problem, most are not prepared to put in the endless hours of toiling through books and programs in total confusion and frustration.you need to be a proper jack of all trades…you need to know about networking, firewalls, databases, machine code, linux dumps, encryption, scanning , coding, metadata, and analysing files and files of data, competent with scripting and programming, and anonimity.
once you get competent at certain skills and with certain tools it can be quite interesting, or you can just get some silly kiddy scripts and plant them into an email or attachment of some sort..
conclusion
hacking is really very very very difficult, takes a hell of a lot of expertese to do properly, (finding zero day exploits - that nobody else on earth knows about ) extreme competence with computers and programming and various computer technology, is very time consuming….
if you are not a total geek, dont even bother . geek is not good enough …total geek may suffice.
if you are just starting out and have a basic understanding of computing then possibly in 10 years time of hard study you will be able to do some simple hacks.
a great start will be to get linux fast. then get nmap port scanner and read up on a few scans and start scanning target ips,…try not to just scan a block of ips, scan something of your own choosing, and you will find you get very little inofrmation back, look into how the ohter sysadmins know they are being scanned, get a couple pcs , scan each other and go deeper into scans, you can then look inot metasploit and nessus …once you know what is running on a system you can find existing exploits for that version of software, then you can use metasploit to dump a payload to the machine ..try and get a back door on your other pc..once you do that see if you can see any trace ..use snort and monitor all your files…create access lists to block stuff and alarms etc…keep delving around and open more doors and study more
i have been hacking for several years…and still havent managed more than becoming competent with linux, competent with anonimity, a little programming, decent networking and understanding of switches routers firewalls and routing protocols….but i still havent managed to break into a friends windows machine….i mean i could send an email with a payload ..but that would be cheating.
good luck.
We all have different motivators and reasons for doing things. You’re the only one who can tell whether your husband is behaving strangely.Generally speaking though, here are a few common telltale signs. Disclaimer: one person’s odd behavior doesn’t necessarily translate into universal truth, so YMMV. Always—ALWAYS—talk about things and find out the facts before you fly off the handle and do something rash that you might (probably will…) regret later.Note: These are based on things my father taught me. He was a detective for almost 20 years, so many of these things are based on lying or suspicious behaviors—not necessarily “cheater” behaviors. But since most cheating features lying concomitantly, I think it’s safe to say you can try these out and see what you come up with.1) A person you know well is doing, or starts doing, something uncharacteristic of their usual behavior. For instance: your husband gets home late from work. In fact he despises staying past 5. Suddenly he starts finding things to do after work—going out for a beer “with the guys”, working late, or doing something else that keeps him away from home. This is especially true if it’s one or two specific days a week, since many cheaters are plying their nefarious trade with another person who’s also cheating. So for instance, they agree to meet on Thursdays at 5:30 pm at the 7 Dwarfs Motor Lodge…a time that isn’t necessarily suspicious to their spouses.2) Someone gets defensive when questioned about recent activities. My dad used to say (he had lots of little cop homilies): “Liars shout; the innocent talk it out.” For example, let’s say your spouse claims he’s meeting The Guys For A Beer after work each Friday. After a week or two, you say “Dear, is there anything you aren’t telling me about what you’re doing on Fridays?”Liar’s answer: “How dare you question me!! I thought you trusted me!! I’m not even going to justify that with a response! I’m going out, and you better just think about what you just said to me, because I refuse to be treated this way!”Innocent’s answer: “Nope, I’m just meeting The Guys For A Beer. You want to call Tom right now and ask him? You want to come with me next week For A Beer so you can see it’s all good?”In other words, liars try to hide their deceit with anger, rage, and evasiveness…very common defensive techniques which are actually fear-based responses. He’s scared of getting caught, so he tries to reverse that and scare you into laying off your questioning.People labor under the delusion that this behavior works…and maybe for some weak-willed people, it does. But not for most people. For most people, this behavior actually supports their suspicions.Innocent people are too happy to provide you with any piece of evidence necessary to clear their names. You want to look at his phone? He’ll say ok, cool, go right ahead. You want to call Tom’s wife and ask whether he’s been meeting your husband For A Beer With The Guys? He says go right ahead—I’ll even dial the number for you. He’ll even ask you to meet him every Friday afternoon just to prove he’s innocent, if that’s what it takes to convince you.Bottom line: he wants you to believe him…no…NEEDS you to believe him, because he has nothing to hide
