When did the hackers come, and when did the earliest hackers come ~ ~

The era of hacking began in 196 1 when the first computer DECPD- 1 appeared at MIT. After the power and signal team of the Technology Model Railway Club (TMRC) of Massachusetts Institute of Technology bought this machine, it was regarded as the most fashionable technology toy, and various programming tools and computer terms began to appear. The whole environment and culture have developed to this day. This is described in detail in the first paragraph of Steven Levy's The Hacker (published by Anchor/Doubleday Company, 1984, ISBN 0-385-19195-2).

Interactive computing does not mean windows, GUI, what you see is what you get. ※. At that time, interactive computing was only considered when the terminal and the shell issued instructions. The first word to use Hacker should be MIT. The authority of artificial intelligence in the early academic circles from 65438 to 0980: MIT artificial intelligence laboratory, whose core figures are all from TMRC. From 1969, it happened to be the first year when ARPANET was built. This group of people made great breakthroughs and contributions in computer science.

ARPANET is the first high-speed network in America. An experimental digital communication network funded by the US Department of Defense has gradually developed into a large-scale network connecting universities, defense contractors and research institutions. Researchers from all over the world can exchange information with unprecedented speed and flexibility, and the super-efficient cooperation mode leads to the rapid development of science and technology.

Another advantage of ARPANET is that the information superhighway brings hackers from all over the world together instead of forming a short-lived culture in isolation, and the network brings them together into a powerful force. Some people began to feel the existence of hacker culture, began to sort out terms and put them on the internet, published satirical literature on the internet, and discussed the ethics that hackers should have. (The first edition of jargon file appeared in 1973, which is a good example). Hacking culture has developed rapidly in universities connected with ARPANET, especially (but not all) in information-related departments.

At first, the development of hacker culture was centered on the AI lab of MIT, but the artificial intelligence labs of Stanford University (SAIL) and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) are rising rapidly. These three are large-scale information science research centers and artificial intelligence authorities, which have gathered elites from all over the world and made great contributions to hacker culture both technically and spiritually.

In order to understand the following story, we must first look at the changes in the computer itself; With the development of science and technology, the protagonist MIT AI Lab also faded from the smash hit to the final stage.

Starting from MIT PDP- 1, Hacker's main programming platform is digital equipment company's PDP microcomputer sequence. DEC pioneered the development of interactive computing and time-sharing operating systems, mainly for commercial purposes. At that time, many universities bought DEC machines because they were flexible, fast and cheap (compared with faster mainframes). Cheap time-sharing system is one of the factors for the rapid growth of hacker culture. In the era when PDP was popular, ARPANET was mainly based on DEC, and the most important one was PDP- 10, which has been favored by hackers for fifteen years. TOPS- 10(DEC's operating system) and MACRO- 10 (its assembler) still frequently appear in many nostalgic words and hacker legends.

MIT uses PDP- 10 like everyone else, but they despise DEC's operating system. They insisted on writing their own: the legendary ITS.

Its full name is' incompatible time-sharing system', and this strange name really conforms to MIT's eccentric style-it is to be different. They stink, but they have the ability to write their own operating system. It is always unstable, with strange design and many bugs, but it still has many original ideas, which seems to be the record holder of the longest boot time of the time-sharing system.

It is written in assembly language itself, and other parts are written in LISP. LISP was a powerful and flexible programming language at that time. In fact, after 25 years, its design is still better than most programming languages at present. LISP allows its hackers to give full play to their imagination and funny ability. LISP is the biggest contributor to the success of MIT AI Lab, and it is still one of Hacker's favorites.

Many of its products still exist today; EMACS is probably the most famous one, and its unofficial history is still talked about by hackers, just like what you read in the jargon file. Sail and CMU were not idle when MIT was red and purple. Teamin Between of SAIL later became an important role in PC industry or graphical user interface research and development. Hacker of CMU developed the first practical large-scale expert system and industrial robot.

Another hacker city is the Palo Alto Research Center of Xerox PARC. From the early 1970 to the middle 1980, PARC has made amazing breakthroughs and inventions, regardless of quality or quantity, software or hardware. Such as mouse interface of current window, laser printer and local area network; Its D series machine gave birth to a powerful personal computer, which can compete with mini computers. Unfortunately, these prophets are not appreciated by the company's top management; PARC is a company that specializes in providing good ideas to help others make money. It has become a well-known joke. Even so, PARC has made an indelible contribution to hacker culture. 1970s and PDP- 10 cultures grew rapidly and flourished. The emergence of mailing lists enables people all over the world to form many special interest groups, not only in the computer field, but also in the social and entertainment fields. DARPA turns a blind eye to these improper activities, because these activities will attract more smart boys to join the computer field.

The famous ARPANET mailing list related to non-computer technology was the first to promote science fiction fans. Today, ARPANET has become the Internet, and more and more readers are participating in the discussion. Mailing lists have gradually become the media of public discussion, which has led to the establishment of many commercial Internet services, such as CompuServe, Genie and Prodigy.