Terminal



A Terminal (aka Server) is used in Fallout 3 for four purposes:
 * Controlling Turrets.
 * Opening safes and doors.
 * Getting information.
 * It can also be a trap.

The operating system of a terminal is the RobCo Industries Operating System.

=Using Terminals=

To use a terminal, you simply have to activate them. Watched out for trapped terminals.

Secured Terminals
Some terminals are secured. To access them you either need
 * a password
 * enough Science skill to hack them,
 * or an encryption key.

Usually only one or two of these options are available.



Passwords
There are various ways of getting a password to a terminal. The two most common ways to get a password are that someone tells you the password or that you find an item describing the password, like a holotape.

Guessing the password or knowing the password from any other source than the game - like the wiki - does not help you; if you haven't got the password, according to the game, your only resort is to hack the terminal.

Hacking Terminals
One way to deal with secured terminals is the possibility to hack them. This works only if:
 * the terminal is hackable
 * your Science skill is high enough to hack the terminal (which can range from very easy to very hard):

You will be presented with a list of words interposed with random characters. One of the words is the correct password, and your goal is to guess it. You choose a word by clicking on it. If you didn't guess correctly, the terminal will display "x/y correct" where x is the number of correct letters, and y is the word length. It is important to realize that a letter is correct only if it is in the right spot. For example, if the password is "RELEASED" and you choose "DETECTOR" then you will be told that there are 2/8 correct because there are 'E's in the 2nd and 4th place for both. The words have other letters in common, like 'R', but it is in the first spot in one word, and the last in the other. You have four attempts to select the correct password.

This game has many similarities with Mastermind (a board game).

There are also things you can do with the characters that are not part of words. Clicking on matching brackets (i.e. [] {}  or <>, even with other characters between, but not a whole word between) can remove a dud password or even reset the number of remaining guesses to four. The brackets must be of the same type and on the same line. Take ".<*%]>)(@" as an example. Selecting the first "<" will highlight everything up to the ">". Also, two or more opening brackets can be matched to a single closing bracket ("[ [ ]" on a line gives you two chances), but the opposite is not true ("[ ] ]" only gives you one chance). Choosing a single non-letter character will simply waste an attempt.

Before you have used all four guesses, you can exit the game. You can then start the game again, and you will be given a new batch of words. This is useful if you're running low on guesses. Using all four guesses without getting the correct answer will lock the terminal and you will be unable to hack it again.


 * If you have the Computer Whiz perk, you will get another try.

Tips and Tricks
Use previous guesses to eliminate words. If you guess a word and are told that it has n correct letters, that means any word that does not have exactly n letters in common (same letter in the same position) with the first word cannot be the correct choice. For example, if you guess "CONVINCED" and are told that 3/9 are correct then you can eliminate words like "CERTAINLY" (1 letter in common) and "COMMITTEE" (4 letters in common). This often narrows your choices down a good deal - in the mini game this example was taken from, choosing "CONVINCED" eliminated all but 3 words ("FORBIDDEN", "CARDINALS", and "CLUTTERED"). So after only one guess, being able to win the mini-game was guaranteed (since there were three guesses and three words left).

Taking the above approach may require pencil and paper (or one of the programs listed below), but there are other tricks that do not. Looking at common word substructures can also be useful. For example, if any word ending in "ING" gets less than 3 letters correct, then the correct answer cannot end in "ING". Likewise, many words may start with "CON", etc.

Previous choices are displayed on the right-hand side of the terminal. You may find this easier to use for position-based character mapping than trying to do it mentally.

To get to the hacking mini-game quickly, you can click the startup screen on the terminal to skip to the next screen. Click once more to load the hack screen instantly.


 * There may be a certain word list that the game uses as "right" answers as well as a "wrong" list. I have noticed this in that whenever I have come across a terminal containing the word "WASTELAND", that has always been the proper answer. More research would need to be done.

A simple but effective approach
Choose the first word on your screen, and see how many letters are correct. Go down the list to the first word that has that many letters in common with your original word. Choose that word. Repeat the process as needed and you will generally succeed. Be sure that the next word contains the exact number of correct letters, if you get "1 letter correct of 5" on "PROUD" then "PRIDE" cannot be the correct response as both the 'p' and the 'r' is correct.

Random guess approach
A less structured, but surprisingly effective, approach is to quickly guess three times, and then exit if you did not guess the correct password. Repeat the process as necessary. Given 21 passwords to choose from, it takes seven times, on average, to get it right. This can be done very quickly. (Mind that you should either save before trying, or not guess the fourth time, or you may be locked out from the terminal permanently.)

Random guess approach with refill
When you start hacking just chose the three first passprahses, after that find all the brackets that will remove duds and replenish your tries. Most of the times you now have only 4/5/6 passphrases left. Use "A structured approach" after that.

Quasi-random approach
Guess randomly until you find either a zero match or a >50% of letters match. For instance, if your word length is 8, you want 0/8 or 5/8, 6/8, or 7/8. Given any of these, you can easily see which other words are similar, or in the case of the 0/8, entirely dissimilar. After you've found one of the aforementioned desirable matches, you can look for matching bracket pairs to restore the number of tries, if necessary. Finding brackets takes the most amount of time with this method, so don't do it unless you need to.

A structured approach
Read all the words, and you will notice that many look alike. Choose the word that seems to have the most in common with the other words. Then: Again, note the number of correct letters. You have two more guesses left. Go through the words and find which ones have not been eliminated. There will likely be only one or two word that fit the bill - try them.
 * If only one or two letters are incorrect, choose a word that differs by only one or two letters.
 * Otherwise, choose a word that is very different from your previous choice.

Pencil and Paper approach
Write down all the words on a piece of paper. Choose a word that seems to have a lot in common with many of the other words. Use the feedback from the computer (x/y correct) to eliminate all words that do not have that x letter in common with the word you chose. Repeat as needed.

"Quad ruled" or squared graph paper can be useful for this job. Writing one letter in each square makes it easy to compare words letter by letter. If you have a printer, you can print your own graph paper by downloading a PDF from here or by printing a blank spreadsheet with narrow columns and borders on all cells.

Match Brackets
No matter the strategy, matching brackets can prove to be very useful. Although it may take longer, it just about guarantees a success. The most effective method is to make 3 guesses, then find matching brackets until the attempts refill. This can be repeated, potentially giving more than 7 guesses. That, plus the duds removed, will leave the screen with so few plausible passwords that the correct one will be difficult to miss.

Use a program
Several programs exist that will make suggestions and do the book keeping for you. The algorithms behind most of the programs are not known. Some appear to suggest words that have the most in common with other words (although what exactly that means varies with the algorithm). The algorithm behind the Vault-Tec 1337 Hax0ring Tool uses the laws of probability to choose the word that will, on average, eliminate the most other words. The Terminal Hacking Tool for Fallout 3 (THTF3) works pretty much the same way. It ensures fail-safe results for all the terminals up to Very Hard level. The difference between THTF3 and other online tools is that it is implemented wizard-style, suggesting which word should be selected at each step.

Online:
 * Fallout 3 Terminal Hacking Tool
 * Terminal Hacking Tool for Fallout 3
 * HACK-BOY
 * Terminal Hacking Assistant
 * Fallout 3 Terminal Cracker

Offline:
 * Vault-Tec 1337 Hax0ring Tool
 * HackBoy for iPhone and iPod Touch
 * Offline Fallout 3 Terminal Hacker - includes VB.Net source / requires .NET 3.5

Encrypted Terminals
Sometimes terminals has options that can't be used until you have the correct encryption key, and will be presented as gibberish.

An example of this are the terminals used by Chinese spies in the Capital Wasteland - but the terminal encryption key is usually nearby.


 * See: Mama Dolce's Encryption Key
 * See: Signal Sierra Romeo



Trapped terminal
A terminal can also look like a normal, working terminal at first glance, but in reality it's a trap.

If triggered by activating the keyboard, the terminal will first give a small electical shock, and then the rigged Frag Grenade will detonate.

How to recognize
A trapped terminal has a broken rear, and a little "windmill"-shaped antenna; see picture to the right.

Disarming
Disarming a trapped terminal demands 45 Explosives skill. It is disarmed by activating the rear of the terminal rather than the front.

A Frag Grenade was used to create the trap, and you will get the one used to rig the terminal when you disarm it.

A Word Of Caution
Hacking privately-owned terminals -- which display their "Hack" options in red instead of in green (such as Moira Brown's research computer in Craterside Supply) -- is always a risky choice. Ignoring the likelihood of karma loss, owners who see you tampering with their private property are very likely to become hostile to you and retaliate. Usually, your followers will attack and kill them immediately when they become hostile. This can lead to serious consequences, particularly if the owner of the terminal is necessary for obtaining or completing a quest. Be warned.

=Purpose of Terminals=

Turret Control
Terminals can be used to turn turrets off. Terminals can also be used to disable the turrent's targeting causing it to shoot at everyone no matter who they are.

Opening doors and safes
Terminals are quite commonly used to open safes, giving an alternative to lockpicking the safe. For purposes of the Data Miner achievement, it is suggested that players always favor the use of the terminal when possible. Hackable terminals -- while common enough to allow ample opportunities to receive the achievement -- are still much less common than locked safes, doors, gates, or ammo boxes, making Keys are for Cowards much easier to obtain.

Terminals are also sometimes used to unlock or open doors; an example is the terminal used in the Tenpenny Tower quest to let Ghouls in from the Metro.

Riddles & Mini-games

 * In Museum of Technology, Prime has reprogrammed a few terminals so that Jiggs can track his whereabouts, if he manages to get the answers right. See: Jiggs' Loot.
 * In Hubris Comics, one still working terminal has a beta test of a computer game, Reign of Grelok (beta).
 * In The National Archives, a terminal controls a mulitple choice quiz that dispenses a reward ticket on successful completion. This ticket (and others found elsewhere in the museum) can be cashed in at a nearby terminal for some otherwise unique mentats.

=Appendix=

List of hackable terminals
For the Data Miner achievement, you need to find 50 terminals to hack. For this purpose this page will contain a list of those terminals. If there are any others please add to the list.