RFC 968

Network Working Group V. Cerf

Request for Comments: 968 MCI December 1985

'Twas the Night Before Start-up'

STATUS OF THIS MEMO

This memo discusses problems that arise and debugging techniques used in bringing a new network into operation. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

DISCUSSION

Twas the night before start-up and all through the net,
not a packet was moving; no bit nor octet.
The engineers rattled their cards in despair,
hoping a bad chip would blow with a flare.

The salesmen were nestled all snug in their beds,
while visions of data nets danced in their heads.
And I with my datascope tracings and dumps
prepared for some pretty bad bruises and lumps.

When out in the hall there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my desk to see what was the matter.
There stood at the threshold with PC in tow,
An ARPANET hacker, all ready to go.

I could see from the creases that covered his brow,
he'd conquer the crisis confronting him now.
More rapid than eagles, he checked each alarm
and scrutinized each for its potential harm.

On LAPB, on OSI, X.25!
TCP, SNA, V.35!
His eyes were afire with the strength of his gaze;
no bug could hide long; not for hours or days.

A wink of his eye and a twitch of his head,
soon gave me to know I had little to dread.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
fixing a net that had gone plumb berserk;

And laying a finger on one suspect line,
he entered a patch and the net came up fine!
The packets flowed neatly and protocols matched;
the hosts interfaced and shift-registers latched.

He tested the system from Gateway to PAD;
not one bit was dropped; no checksum was bad.
At last he was finished and wearily sighed
and turned to explain why the system had died.

I twisted my fingers and counted to ten;
an off-by-one index had done it again..

Vint Cerf, December 1985

The Personality of a Hacker

A recent study was released on the personality of a hacker. Quoting InfoSecNews²²:

“In a study consisting of a questionnaire and longer-form answer section started at the hacker convention H2K and Def Con 8 in 2000, Bernadette Schell, dean of Business Information Technology, University of Ontario Institute of Technology and John Dodge, professor at the School of Commerce and The Department of Math and Computer Science at Laurentian University, profiled 216 hackers and their style of thinking, coping with life, and problem-solving.”

The researchers found that the respondents, whose median age was 25, have "extremely low" tendencies towards terrorist and obsessive traits and possess "relatively balanced temperaments,” according to Schell.

“Respondents also tested as particularly creative,” she said, noting that the top score for creativity was 20 and that 62 percent of those polled scored 15 or higher on the test.