Once you are able to exit the menu system you will be able to explore the computer.
If there are lots of computer-wise people around, or people looking over your shoulder, or people in charge running all over the place, then you'll want to get back to authorized sections of the computer ASAP so you're not discovered in the private parts and thrown out of the building.
My recommendation is to copy everything relevant to your cause onto floppies, then take them home to examine them at your leisure. This is akin to the burglar who steals the entire unopenable safe so he can work on it in his basement with noisy power tools and blow torches.
Copy the AUTOEXEC.BAT file and the menu system first of all, and any directories you find containing files with BAT, DOC or TXT extensions; miscellaneous disk utilities (especially public domain-type programs); security, maintenance, or updating programs; anything having to do with telecommunications; memory
resident programs; other explanatory text files.
Especially if the computer's on a LAN, there may be a D: drive, F: or H: or an L: drive, or some higher-lettered drive that you wouldn't ordinarily even think of looking for.
Check for hidden files and directories. Copy them, too, if you find any. Also see if any files have been deleted, and try to recover them if they appear applicable to your needs.
Depending on the situation - the computer, the place of business, other relevant factors - you may or may not find anything on the computer. Often it's worth hacking a public computer like this just for the thrill of getting by security measures. However, the computers are often so poorly pro-tected that even this thrill is a minor one.
Many times I've found public domain and shareware utilities that I'd never seen before, so it's worth doing this just to see if you can pick up any-thing new along these lines. You may even pick up some valuable programming hints or ideas - some of the batch and script files you'll find can be im-pressively complex.
Another thing that's common is to find in-house programs on the system - things like employee schedulers, databases, or other programs that are not available for public use, and are reserved for use by the managers of the business or library.
If the computer has telecommunications or networking abilities, there may be handy phone numbers or sign-in protocols you will be able to use.
If you have encountered prompts for passwords in your exploration of the computer, try to find out where the master list of passwords is stored on the disk. One time I broke out of a public menu program in a special library, and after looking around awhile, found a carefully hidden file called PASSWDS. I typed it to the screen and was surprised to find a list of about six user names, along with passwords, addresses and other
personal information for each name. Naturally I was overjoyed, but to this day I haven't figured out why they were there. I tried those names on all the systems in the area without success. I tried fingering the people ("finger" is a UNIX command that allows you to look up information about system users) on the major
computers, to no avail. The people listed in the file seemed to not exist anywhere I looked for them! Perhaps someone was just using the file as a test or demo, or on some private computer system... but then why was the file hidden away so well? Sometimes you will discover red-herring clues of this kind, trails that seem to lead nowhere. It's all part of the nature of being what you are. Hacking is frequently a matter of intense research, with the goal being to establish a hypothesis, a question that needs answering. Once you have decided on a question ("Will this password list work on the Raamses 3?" "Does the President of Moroll Corporation have a secretary with system access?"), then you can do higher level research and try to answer
it.
