Linus Torvalds
Linus Torvalds
Linus Benedict Torvalds; born December 28, 1969) is a Finnish-American software engineer who is the creator and, for a long time, principal developer, of the Linux kernel, which became the kernel for operating systemssuch as GNU and years later Android and Chrome OS. He also created the distributed revision control system git and the diving logging and planning software Subsurface. He was honored, along with Shinya Yamanaka, with the 2012 Millennium Technology Prize by the Technology Academy Finland "in recognition...
NationalityFinnish
ProfessionEngineer
Date of Birth28 December 1969
CityHelsinki, Finland
CountryFinland
On a purely technical side, I'm really very happy with how Linux gets used in a very wide set of different areas. It's important for development.
In many cases, the user interface to a program is the most important part for a commercial company: whether the programs works correctly or not seems to be secondary.
The thing with Linux is that the developers themselves are actually customers too: that has always been an important part of Linux.
Programmers are in the enviable position of not only getting to do what they want to, but because the end result is so important they get paid to do it. There are other professions like that, but not that many.
I don't expect the desktop to come quickly. It will take time,
I was going to start with a lawyer joke, but I'm told it was already done yesterday,
Software patents are a huge potential threat to the ability of people to work together on open source. Making it easier for companies and communities that have patents to make those patents available in a common pool for people to use is one way to try to help developers deal with the threat.
The primary issue is just to make people comfortable with Linux.
I started Linux as a desktop operating system. And it's the only area where Linux hasn't completely taken over. That just annoys the hell out of me.
People who are doing things for fun do things the right way by themselves.
I think a lot of people may find that the GPLv3 'anti-DRM' measures aren't all that wonderful after all. Digital signatures and cryptography aren't just 'bad DRM.' They very much are 'good security' too.
I don't use GNOME, because in striving to be simple, it has long since reached the point where it simply doesn't do what I need it to do. I personally just encourage people to switch to KDE.
I lose sleep if I end up feeling bad about something I've said. Usually that happens when I send something out without having read it over a few times, or when I call somebody names.
I don't see myself as a visionary at all.