What is a Hacker?

From dictionary.com,
3. Computer Slang.
a. a computer enthusiast.
b. a microcomputer user who attempts to gain unauthorized access to proprietary computer systems.

Most people only use the second definition, believing hackers to be criminals who break into computers for profit. In reality, a hacker is anyone who isn’t constrained by the original design of systems, but looks at the underlying engineering and sees how the system can be used in new and unique ways.

Chapter One Released

Several years ago I deployed to Saudi Arabia, and found that absent the distractions of spouse, children, friends, beer, and perhaps most importantly, Internet, one finds a lot of free time they didn’t have before. I wrote a book, Waiting for War, which may not have hit the NYT Bestseller’s List, was still a lot of fun to write and sold far more copies than I had predicted. I promised myself I would write another book next time I spent a significant amount of time deployed….

Well, as you probably know, my Big Deployment to the Persian Gulf was cut short by the rude arrival of my medical condition, and now I’m back in the States, with a new job, new bionic heart, and new uncertainties about my future. Such is life. In the meantime, I’d only gotten a small start on the book I promised myself I would write, and which I’ve basically forgotten over the last two months. However, I was talking on the phone to an old dear friend, and he asked if I would weave the heart condition into my book. I think it could work — my last book was based on real people, and this book was starting out to be pseudo-autobiographical, in that it was inspired by my life, but with a giant heaping LSD spoonful of creative license.

So, in a vain attempt to pressure myself to actually write the dang book, I’m releasing Chapter One for free download (Copyright 2008 James Brokaw, license to distribute freely as long as attribution remains). If you like this, by all means leave a comment or send me a message to pressure me to find the time to continue it. If you REALLY like it and haven’t yet read Waiting for War, go ahead and read that, too.

Clinically Dead at Thirty

It’s been about a month and a half since I was told I would need a pacemaker, and a week since it was installed. I’m thirty years old, and at my age you generally aren’t thinking about pacemakers. In fact, you’re generally thinking about the same things you were thinking about at twenty, with the occaisionally nagging guilt about not thinking enough about the future. When you spend the night in intensive care, you tend to think about some other things.

Google Data Leak

Yes, there’s an easy fix — don’t tell Google your real name. But if you use GMail for sending mail to and from your family and friends, that’s not always the best option. You may ask why you, as a law-abiding ordinary citizen, might worry about someone finding out your real name. Well, it turns out that spammers have already started using this bug to not only validate GMail addresses, but harvest the names of people using the accounts, allowing for those annoying “personalized” spam with your name in the subject line. Then there’s the basic “least privledge” principle of security — Google’s well known for finding ways to make good use of shared data, but you shouldn’t be sharing data with people you don’t want to share with.

In other news, New York and California are forcing ISPs to stop providing access to the alt.* newsgroups because there’s a possibility that mixed in with hundreds of millions of messages sent via USENET, there may be some kiddie porn. This thinking will of course eventually lead to blocking the Internet entirely, because there’s porn on it…

What’s the best solution? Cyberdiversity. Stop relying on a few large companies to provide the services you need, and start providing those services yourself. Nobody’s going to put effort into harvesting e-mail addresses off a mail server that has exactly one person using it. Why would you want to use your ISPs USENET server, anyway? Start your own. GMail? Run your own mail server. Tired of crappy DNS performance? Guess what… Run your own. Linux makes these tasks amazingly easy, and modern distros are so easy to install and configure some of them make Windows look painfully complicated. Think about it, and stop relying on others.

The Bionic Hedgehog is Back

I’m back from the hospital, pacemaker installed, everything working okay. That is all.

Tomorrow's the Day

Tomorrow (Monday) I’m going in for surgery. If all goes well, late Tuesday or late Wednesday I’ll post that I’m OK.

Yesterday I Climbed Heliotrope Ridge

Yesterday I climbed up Heliotrope Ridge. Oddly enough, I saw about a dozen climbers, but we were the only ones skiing. The trail was in bad shape, but the snow was the best spring snow I’ve ever seen. Truly a pleasure to behold. I’ve put the best photos here and a trip repot for Turns-All-Year is here.

Here’s my victory shot, with Mt Baker in the background. Higher-res version is in the photo set. I would have to say yesterday was one of the best days of my life. W00t!

Talked to the Doc today...

For those who care to follow me in my personal trials and tribulations, I met with my surgeon today. I’ll be having my surgery on Monday, hopefully to be released from the hospital on Tuesday morning. The Doc gave me a booklet that states that any activity that could cause an injury or impact to the collarbone should be avoided, and specifically mentioned skiing among the activities to avoid. Both my cardiologist and surgeon have assured me that I can ski freely with the pacemaker in, and the Pacemaker Club is full of people who ski and mountain climb with the pacemakers installed. I’m of the belief that it may not be the best idea to learn to ski with a pacemaker installed, but once you reach the point where you hardly fall at all, there’s no real reason to stop. It is debatable if I ought to give up the halfpipe, however…

On the way back, we stopped by the Engine House No 9. It’s an old fire station converted into a brewpub in Tacoma. Very affordable, kid-friendly, and nice food and drink. Eric decided to stick with the popcorn at 25c per bowl rather than test the kid’s menu, and I can’t complain. Fifty cents for lunch is always a good thing…

Hedgie.com gets a revamp!

After keeping the same static HTML homepage with only minor edits for close to eight years, I decided it was well past time for a major revamp of hedgie.com. You can expect to see random thoughts, musings, updates, etc., posted here. Feel free to comment if you want, although it’s by no means required. On the right you’ll find “quickies,” or things that don’t justify large posts but are interesting, so come back frequently to see what I’m doing these days.