What level are you?

RTM · June 23, 2004, 3:47am

Just for fun (I'm somewhere between novice and user):

Eight Circles of UNIX-fu
[Author Unknown]

Level Description and features:

beginner - insecure with the concept of a terminal

has yet to learn the basics of vi

has not figured out how to get a directory listing

still has trouble with typing
after each line of input

novice - knows that "ls" will produce a directory listing

uses the editor, but calls it "vye"

has heard of "C" but never used it

has had his first bad experience with rm

is wondering how to read his mail

is wondering why the person next to him
seems to like Unix so very much

user - uses vi and nroff, but inexpertly

has heard of regular-expr.s but never seen one

has figured out that "-" precedes options

has attempted to write a C program and has
decided to stick with pascal

is wondering how to move a directory

thinks that dbx is a brand of stereo component

knows how to read his mail and is wondering
how to read the news

knowlegable - uses nroff with no trouble, and is beginning
user to learn tbl and eqn

uses grep to search for fixed strings

has figured out that mv(1) will move directories

has learned that "help" doesn`t help

somebody has shown him how to write C programs

once used sed to do some text substitution

has seen dbx used but does not use it himself

thinks that make is only for wimps

expert - uses sed when necessary

uses macro"s in vi, uses ex when neccesary

posts news at every possible opportunity

write csh scripts occasionally

write C programs using vi and compiles with cc

has figured out what "&&" and "||" are for

thinks that human history started with "!h"

hacker - uses sed and awk with comfort

uses undocumented features of vi

write C code with "cat >" and compiles with "!cc"

uses adb because he doesn`t trust source
debuggers

can answer questions about the user environment

writes his own nroff macros to supplement standard
ones

write scripts for Bourne shell (/bin/sh)

knows how to install bug fixes

guru - uses m4 and lex with comfort

writes assembly code with "cat >"

uses adb on the kernel while system is loaded

customizes utilities by patching the source

reads device driver source with his breakfast

can answer any unix question after a
little thought

uses make for anything that requires two or more
distinct commands to achieve

has learned how to breach security but no longer
needs to try

wizard - writes device drivers with "cat >"

fixes bugs by patching the binaries

can answer any question before you ask

writes his own troff macro packages

is on first-name basis with Dennis, Bill, and Ken

izy100 · June 23, 2004, 5:29am

I am betweem knowledgeable to hacker.
But i dunno how to use
nroff, tbl, eqn and adb. Yet to write a full-blown C program in unix.
Uses more of ksh, awk, sed and sh than csh.

cbkihong · June 23, 2004, 8:11am

Knowledgeable-Hacker.

but I do write Makefiles a lot. For building LaTeX documents, and sometimes to replace shell scripts ... just virtually anything.

No, I don't use *roff either but my impression is *TeX is even more problematic than *roff.

zazzybob · June 23, 2004, 11:30am

Looks like I'm between Knowledgable and Hacker too then.

Never used *roff, but am quite nifty with LaTeX.

Starting to get to grips with my C programming too.... although I'd rather knock up a Bourne shell script to do the job if possible.

And awk is my dear friend (I've written a shell script to syntax-highlighted HTML converter using awk...)

Cheers
ZB

pressy · June 23, 2004, 6:44pm

read(0, 0xFFBFF7E7, 1)
read(0, " b", 1) = 1
write(2, " b", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " e", 1) = 1
write(2, " e", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " g", 1) = 1
write(2, " g", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " i", 1) = 1
write(2, " i", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " n", 1) = 1
write(2, " n", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " n", 1) = 1
write(2, " n", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " e", 1) = 1
write(2, " e", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, " r", 1) = 1
write(2, " r", 1) = 1
getcontext(0xFFBFF688)
read(0, 0xFFBFF7E7, 1) (sleeping...)

.....
something says me this post will be ignored *hehe*
.....

difficult to say, i think it belongs on your job.....
on my opinion there are 3 jobs in the large EDP sector

programmer&developer:
tries to write OS&Applications which should work
system engineer:
tries to integrate and implement the OS&Applications
administrators:
tries to keep the implementations running...

greetings Pre�y

kswaraj · June 23, 2004, 7:10pm

I am between User to Expert. I dont know many undocumented stuff.

Swaraj

dkaplowitz · June 23, 2004, 10:58pm

I didn't like the options, so I modified it myself. Nothing fancy, but closer to my experience. Here goes:

[edit]I posted it online: http://www.dkap.info/8-circles.html
[/edit]

beginner

was given a login and password by someone else

was shown how to log in and list directories, but wonders what is next (might also know "cat" because it's a real word)

has yet to learn how to exit vi without rebooting

still asks questions like "how do I become a hacker"

still titles his questions in useless ways like "Question" or "Problem"

novice

can save and exit vi, but calls it "vye"

has heard of "C" but doesn't really know A or B yet (and wonders why no one mentions them as much)

has had his first bad experience with rm, but doesn't know it

is wondering how to read his mail

is wondering how to move a directory

is unaware of hidden files

is wondering why the person next to him seems to like Unix so very much

user

uses vi and nroff, but inexpertly

insecure with the concept of a terminal

has had his second bad experience with rm and knows it

has heard of regexps but has never seen one

has figured out that "-" precedes options

has attempted to write a C program and has decided to stick with pascal

thinks that dbx is a brand of stereo component

knows how to read his mail and is wondering how to read the news

still asks questions that have obvious answers, but thinks twice about it

has heard of man pages

knowledgable

uses nroff with no trouble, and is beginning user to learn tbl and eqn

uses grep to search for fixed strings

has changed his command prompt about 330,000 times

has figured out that mv(1) will move directories

uses tar, but has a lot of tarballs with no hidden files

is aware that hidden files exist

has learned that "help" doesn't help

still uses color in his terminals

somebody has shown him how to modify existing C programs

once used sed to do some text substitution

has seen dbx used but does not use it himself

thinks that make is only for wimps

has actually seen a man page, but finds them about as useful as a third testacle

starting to get the idea about searching for the answer to questions before asking them

might be able to successfully install Redhat Linux

expert

uses sed when necessary

uses macro's in vi, uses ex when neccesary

has a high post count on some UNIX forum somewhere

write sh scripts occasionally

write C programs using vi and compiles with cc

has figured out what "&&" and "||" are for

thinks that human history started with "!h"

uses Google as if it were "The Oracle" in The Matrix

has configured a firewall using an open source OS

makes use of man pages more frequently than ever before...starting to actually like them

has actually answered a question or two on an open forum

Is thinking of doing a stage-1 install of Gentoo Linux

hacker

uses sed and awk with comfort

uses undocumented features of vi

write C code with "cat >" and compiles with "!cc"

uses adb because he doesn`t trust source debuggers

can answer questions about the user environment

writes his own nroff macros to supplement standard ones

write scripts for Bourne shell (/bin/sh)

knows how to install bug fixes

has transcended Gentoo and is on to LFS or OpenBSD -CURRENT

guru

uses m4 and lex with comfort

writes assembly code with "cat >"

uses adb on the kernel while system is loaded

customizes utilities by patching the source

reads device driver source with his breakfast

can answer any unix question after a little thought

uses make for anything that requires two or more distinct commands to achieve

has learned how to breach security but no longer needs to try

created his own liveCD and is working on an embedded OS

wizard

writes device drivers with "cat >"

fixes bugs by patching the binaries

can answer any question before you ask

writes his own troff macro packages

can revisit a 2-page Perl script he wrote 2 years ago and still understand what it does

is on first-name basis with Dennis, Bill, and Ken

P.S. I haven't even made the list yet, so I am pre-beginner.

norsk_hedensk · June 23, 2004, 11:46pm

has had his first bad experience with rm

eh dont think that is a fair one.

what if you just have ALWAYS been careful from the beginning?

dkaplowitz · June 24, 2004, 12:06am

Well I tend to agree with you, but for a couple of other reasons:

a) it's seriously old school. For instance, I've never once used nroff or groff and have never had a reason to. This list, however insists that nroff is an essential part of one's progress along the path to becoming a UNIX wizard...almost some sort of rite of passage. Pheh! Unless I'm missing something really rudimentary (always a possibility with me), it's not that common anymore.

b) networking of any kind really isn't even mentioned in this list, and a modern UNIX pro has to know tons and tons of networking (at least according to 9 out of 10 UNIX jobs I see posted every day)

c) it's a C programmer's list more than anything else (i mean, c'mon, csh?)... knowledge of which was probably more valid >5 years ago, but isn't such a sine qua non anymore...

That's just my opinion though. I guess that b/c I came from GNU/Linux originally it's easy for me to see it this way. It could be b/c I'm also a newbie myself. (proven by the fact that I don't use nroff ).

Tux · June 26, 2004, 12:26pm

Knowledgeable, it seems.