Rating: 
Summary: Don't judge a book by its cover
Review: Anyone who wants to judge a book should read it first and not just whine and complain, not only can other people use it but buisness men can secure there computers using it, normal people can learn more about the computer, and everyone else can expand their knowledgeREAD IT FIRST PEOPLE
Rating: 
Summary: Works better than Kitty Litter!
Review: Couldn't rate any lower! Don't waste your time! After reading this I think I now suffer from "Post Traumatic Stupidity Disorder". I can not find any words to describe how juvenile, and incredibly lame this book is. If you take this book and "Secrets of A Super Hacker" wrap them in duct tape, connect to a stick... you would have an excellent fly swatter.
Rating: 
Summary: Good for the new person, forget it if you're experienced
Review: I will admit the book was full of gramatical errors, but that is common on the net. So you get over that. And the beginning of the book was completely worthless. Learn to change windoze background. Wow..thats amazing...although, I would definitly consider it worthwhile if you want to learn the BASICS of hacking and get general ideas. And if you're experienced, definitly go somewhere else. This book will bore you.
Rating:
Summary: Neither Happy, Nor Hacking.
Review: Somewhere in this collection of Windows 95 tricks and re-digesting of commonly available information regarding certain Internet protocols, there's a good hacker book waiting to come out. The problem is, between all the mis-information and grammatical errors (of which there's plenty), you get the feeling that "The Happy Hacker" isn't so much a guide to becoming a white hat hacker as it is somebody's way of making a quick buck off the hacker hysteria. Do yourself a favor: spend the money on any one of the books published by "O'Reilly and Associates" on things like security, running and using Linux, or various protocols and programs that make up the Internet. Or, spend the money renting WarGames. At least then you'll know how 70's hackers got free local phone calls from payphones.
Rating: 
Summary: More entertainment than serious work.
Review: Not the greatest (as some would have you believe), but not the worst, either. The deliberately poor spelling is sometimes an annoyance. Otherwise, easy to read. I'd probably think it was great if this was my first exposure to the subject and I was thirteen. Definite juvenile tone. Not too bad if all you want is basic techniques, but nothing that can't be found elsewhere.
Rating:
Summary: A complete waste of money
Review: This book is a complete waste of money. You won't learn anything new from it. It's very poor, technically incorrect, bad writen and absolutely boring. I can't believe it made it into print.
Rating:
Summary: Hacking??
Review: If you are interested in learning how to hack in any shape or form, I suggest that you steer clear of this book. The information that is supplied is nothing more than playing with your logo.sys on windows, and learning very little about UNIX, which she claims is essential to hacking yet she gives you little info the OS. The book can also get annoying while reading her repetitive grammatical errors and very annoying laughs! If you do want to get this book, you should check out the website, almost every bit of information in the book is on the website, even though she claims that her book is all new information. Half of what she writes doesn't work, and if it does it's useless and/or boring. If you want to learn what's in this book, just mess around with control panels in windows for awhile and open telnet and telnet to port 25 of any host and type "Help". You will get just about all that I got by doing those two things. I was very disappointed in this book! , and I am still trying to figure out why she is so proud of it! Again, this book is definetly not worth the money!!
Rating:
Summary: Who says garbage is cheap?
Review: This book proves that anyone can get a book published if they either have the money themselves or sleep with someone who does. I can't honestly review the entire book as I could not force myself to read the entire thing. After a few chapters I did not know wether to cry over having wasted a hour of my life on something so worthless, or to laugh that someone might actually think this book is informative. The contents are both inaccurate and useless. A "hacker" does not need help changing his windows95 background I assure you. Skip this by all means....
Rating:
Summary: A make money fast scheme gone wrong.
Review: After reading through this book, I can't believe it made it into print. Looking past the glaring errors in grammar and spelling, the reader must deal with the constant technical errors, contradictions, and overall lacking 'style' the author uses. The book is made up of material that has already been published on the web (also technically incorrect), and brings no new insight to the subject she claims to teach. As far as teaching 'hacking', I couldn't find a single quality reference or section that dealt with hacking. Considering the questionable past of the author, the book furthers thoughts that she has no experience as a hacker, security consultant, or anything related to computers at all. For those interested in learning hacking, stick to more positive sources. Check out some other security books or online resources. Hacking is not something that can be taught from a book, it is more a state of mind and desire to learn. ps: Her comment of people not reading before reviewing are wrong. Despite her not sending some of us advanced copies as promised, we still got our hands on copies before it hits the shelf. Don't believe me? Page 67: "I make my living asking dumb questions." Quoted material is straight from the author's mouth, and seems to be dead on with the technical level of the book.
Rating: 
Summary: An entertaining beginner's guide, but far from comprehensive
Review: I purchased this book, along with several others, to get a better understanding of the 'code kiddiez' I have to deal with at my job with an online gaming company. Meinel's book is the one I return to time-and-again for a humorous, entertaining introduction to a subject, and after I've exhausted what she has to say, I crack open the dry texts on systems security to learn more. If you know how to play with e-mail, read headers, run a shell account, edit a Windows 95 registry, and use basic Unix commands, then don't bother with this book. If you're new to these subjects, however, Meinel will give you a good head start, and on the basis that the book does what it attempts to do well, I give it four stars.
| 
