using R seems a bit strange to me -- i have nothing against R (use it regularly), but not exactly a "hacker" language. this seems like an ideal book for python, but R?
I had the same feeling when I saw this. R is a great tool for statistics, very useful when you need to do in-depth statistical analysis (analysis of variance, etc.). It doesn't strike me as a good choice for a hacker's book - which makes me think about their reasons to use this word, hacker. Maybe they are just trying to benefit from the buzz that it generates these days?
indeed, this was my first reaction as well...seems like a bit of marketing gimmick to toss the word "hacker" into the title.
Why are hackers allowed to use Python but not R? R is a quite powerful Scheme-like language with an incredible math library. Python is a "teaching language", officially.
Python or a jvm language should be a better choice