Russell Nelson (born March 21, 1958) is an American
computer programmer
A programmer, computer programmer or coder is an author of computer source code someone with skill in computer programming.
The professional titles ''software developer'' and ''software engineer'' are used for jobs that require a progr ...
. He was a founding board member of the
Open Source Initiative
The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is a California public benefit corporation "actively involved in Open Source community-building, education, and public advocacy to promote awareness and the importance of non-proprietary software".
Governance
The ...
and briefly served as its president in 2005.
Career
In 1983, Nelson and
Patrick Naughton wrote Painter's Apprentice, a
MacPaint clone. Nelson was the author of
Freemacs (a variant of
Emacs
Emacs (), originally named EMACS (an acronym for "Editor Macros"), is a family of text editors that are characterized by their extensibility. The manual for the most widely used variant, GNU Emacs, describes it as "the extensible, customizable, s ...
used by
FreeDOS
FreeDOS (formerly PD-DOS) is a free software operating system for IBM PC compatible computers. It intends to provide a complete MS-DOS-compatible environment for running Legacy system, legacy software and supporting embedded systems. FreeDOS ca ...
).
While attending university, Nelson began developing the collection of
drivers later commercially released as the "Crynwr Collection". In 1991, Nelson founded Crynwr Software, a company located in
Potsdam
Potsdam () is the capital and largest city of the Germany, German States of Germany, state of Brandenburg. It is part of the Berlin/Brandenburg Metropolitan Region. Potsdam sits on the Havel, River Havel, a tributary of the Elbe, downstream of B ...
,
New York, supporting deployment of
large-scale e-mail systems, development of packet drivers, Linux
kernel drivers, and
reverse engineering
Reverse engineering (also known as backwards engineering or back engineering) is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how a previously made device, process, system, or piece of software accompl ...
of
embedded system
An embedded system is a specialized computer system—a combination of a computer processor, computer memory, and input/output peripheral devices—that has a dedicated function within a larger mechanical or electronic system. It is e ...
s.
In July 2010, Nelson was working on
water quality sensors.
Open Source Initiative
In 1998, Nelson became one of the six first members of the
board of directors
A board of directors is a governing body that supervises the activities of a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government agency.
The powers, duties, and responsibilities of a board of directors are determined by government regulatio ...
of the Open Source Initiative.
On February 1, 2005, he was named as the new president of the Open Source Initiative, replacing
Eric S. Raymond
Eric Steven Raymond (born December 4, 1957), often referred to as ESR, is an American software developer, open-source software advocate, and author of the 1997 essay and 1999 book ''The Cathedral and the Bazaar''. He wrote a guidebook for the R ...
.
On February 7, Nelson published a post to his personal
blog
A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...
titled "Blacks are lazy", which generated controversy.
Nelson apologized to those who perceived the post (which he withdrew because it "was not well written") as racist.
Nelson resigned as president in early March (the resignation was backdated to February 23), and stated he did not believe himself to be politically savvy enough for the role of president.
Nelson remained on the board of directors of the Open Source Initiative for another six years.
Personal
Nelson is the son of Russell Edward Nelson and Gladys Jacobsen Nelson. Formerly a
Quaker
Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...
,
for political reasons he no longer identifies as one, as of 2014.
Nelson is a
pacifist
Pacifism is the opposition to war or violence. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campaigner Émile Arnaud and adopted by other peace activists at the tenth Universal Peace Congress in Glasgow in 1901. A related term is ''a ...
, and a member of the
Libertarian Party of the United States.
Nelson created the first Quaker website in the world
quaker.org in early 1995.
He transferred the website to
Friends Publishing Corporation, a Quaker nonprofit, in March 2018.
External links
Russ Nelson's Home PageCrynwr Software
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nelson, Russ
1958 births
Living people
American bloggers
American computer programmers
American libertarians
American male bloggers
American male writers
American political writers
Nelson, Russell
Former Quakers
Free software programmers
Members of the Open Source Initiative board of directors
21st-century American non-fiction writers