I am a senior in high school and for the longest time I had no idea what I wanted to major in in college (university for you non US-ers).

I have recently been considering getting into computer science of some sort. I have always liked using computers and I had 2 Visual BASIC classes in school a few years back that I liked and have made some simple programs on TI calculators using TI-BASIC.

I really like the concept of hacking (not cracking, i mean only for legal purposes). I got a copy of the magazine "2600" and found it really interesting. I guess I like the whole concept of analyzing the situation and trying to exploit weaknesses, its like a logic puzzle.

I just have a few questions that maybe some of you highly skilled computer experts can answer.

What kind of advice do you have for someone like me interested in having a career with computers?

I am thinking about getting a cheap computer to run just linux on so I can learn to program and better understand computers. Any advice on getting started with linux? I read that Slackware is very intensive on using programming. Would it be good to use something like that or to get started with a more user friendly version of linux?

What languages would be useful to learn? I have recently looked into some html and java. I have heard a lot about python too. Even if I don't make a career out of this I am still interested in learning about it all.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.