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From: lreeves@crl.com (Les Reeves)
Newsgroups: alt.cd-rom.reviews
Subject: Re: Review of "Hacker Chronicles" wanted
Date: 16 Apr 1994 12:01:07 -0700
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James L. Waletzky (umwaletz@cc.umanitoba.ca) wrote:
: In <2ojidc$a9m@crl2.crl.com> lreeves@crl.com (Les Reeves) writes:

: >Has this disk been reviewed?  I saw it in a large computer store here 
: >recently.  How does it compare to the many books on the subject?


: The Hacker Chronicles has some good and bad points in my opinion. First
: the bad. A good 85% of the CD is text files.... that's right, TEXT
: files. And let me tell you, that is A HELL OF A LOT of reading!!!!!
: I was hoping for some graphics and animations, but was disappointed by
: the absense of "multimedia". The only graphics to speak of are the
: title screen, and there is only one tune which plays through the
: SoundBlaster while you read the text. There's also some shareware
: programs on the disk which seem to be tailored to electronics (such as
: circuit diagram tools) but I haven't checked them out as yet. Seems
: to be nothing there that you can't get at wuarchive.

: Now the good. The material that they have included is excellent. You'll
: learn LOTS about anarchy, unix hacking, phreaking, lock picking, etc.
: Most of the files seem to have been taken directly from pirate boards.
: A great bonus which I found is that the disk contains many back issues
: of Phrack magazine. A lot of interesting reading here.

That sounds like a good first attempt.  I would much rather have 
tons of interesting text instead of a snazzy multimedia interface.

: The menu system for the various text files contains the filename, the
: directory it is located in, the size, and a short one line description
: of the file. That's about it. Searching is pretty crude as it is limited
: to what is on the screen. It would have been nice to have some sort
: of grep utility to search files for particular content. In addition,
: the shareware files are all in zip format and must be unzipped to the
: hard disk. I wouldn't think the CD is full... it would have been much
: nicer to have the programs in uncompressed form in directories.

Sounds like they put this together using the same "publishing" strategy
that is used for most shareware CDs.  I have been told that it costs
about $1.00 per disk to add the search engine "Folio" to a CD-ROM.
Lesko's "Info USA" CD uses Folio, and it is really impressive.

: All in all, I consider this CD a really good buy. I've learned a lot
: of useful information by reading the text files. There's also the
: odd program contained in some of the text files which you can compile
: and run. Unfortunately some of the material is a bit dated, but that
: is to be expected since technology changes so fast.           

: One word of "caution" though: the box for the CD is deceiving - all it
: contains is the CD => NO MANUAL or other interesting brochures.

I have come to expect this. It doesn't really matter to me.  If the
disk is any good you will not need a manual or other printed stuff.

: Hope this review
: helps you. (This is my first crack at a "review" so please excuse its
: "lousiness" ;^)

Thanks.  Your review is very helpful.  I would have been afraid to plunk 
down $25.00 for this disk without some idea of what it contains.  I will
probably purchase the CD soon.


_>  Les      lreeves@crl.com       Atlanta,GA