 How did you get started in hacking/programming?
DanielBMarkham: As a gifted student, I asked our school for a computer when I was in 7th grade.They gave us a bunch of wires, a soldering iron, and instructions for making a homemade radio or some such.As a Freshman, the local Radio Shack had the TRS-80 and I spent all of my time bugging the salesmen as I played games and tried to tweak it. A friend wrote an app and made $800. Eight-hundred bucks! Then our High School got one of the first computers, a Commodore Pet. There was a guy named Roland who always signed up for it, was an arrogant jerk, and generally ticked everybody off, so I wrote a game called "Kill Roland" that became quite the local hit.Then I wrote my first contract program, a bookkeeping app on an Apple IIe. Then a program for a comic-book store, etc.After that I went into the Marines, wanting to do "real work". Several times in my young life I tried to swear off computers for other stuff I loved more. Each time, no matter what I was doing, I ended up hacking together solutions. So, for instance, after I got out of the Marines I started into management at Domino's (while taking a full load at the local college). Within a couple of months I had created a series of linked spreadsheets that handled all of the store's paperwork. I clerked at a truck-shop -- ended up writing a dBase III program that handled inventory, maintenance, driver payments, and taxes. (I also found them 100K in overpaid taxes from previous years)I tried freelance writing. I love writing. Ended up writing a bunch of articles for newspapers and magazines. Wrote some sci-fi even. Got to meet and interview famous people like Clive Barker. But within a couple of months, yet again, I was installing Macs at the local weekly newspaper, filling in for the CIO at a local company, and teaching graphics programs to guys who wrote print ads.So I finally just gave up and went into consulting. Didn't seem any point trying to fight it any more.I didn't pick hacking. It picked me.