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David A. Wheeler My professional interests are in improving software development practices for higher-risk software systems (i.e., ones which must be secure, large, and/or safety-critical). My specialties include writing secure programs, vulnerability assessment, open standards, open source software / free software (OSS/FS), Internet/web standards and technologies, and POSIX. |
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Published books
Public/Published articles
Most of my written work is not publicly available.
However, if I can make it publicly available, I try to host it on
my website, or at least include
a reference to it from my website.
Here are some of my publicly-available works, some professional, and
some fun:
Interviews
The insatiably curious can see some
interviews of me here:
"Linux Security Interview with David A. Wheeler" (LinuxSecurity.com),
"Under the Brim Interview with David A. Wheeler"
("Under the Brim" August 2002),
"How useful are 'proprietary vs. open source' TCO studies?"
by NewsForge (on proprietary vs. OSS/FS TCO studies),
and
"David A. Wheeler's interview" for
FOSDEM 2002.
Mentions
I've been mentioned way too many times in various news articles and such
to even try to give a complete listing.
I've been thanked by various folks for my suggestions, such as for
my XML expertise while participating in the development of the Open Document standard, and
by Eric S. Raymond for contributing "many
perceptive criticisms and some case-study material, especially in the design"
in his book
The Art of Unix Programming.
The article Getting FUD Up? Get The Facts by
Matt McKenzie praises my article
Why Open Source Software / Free Software (OSS/FS)? Look at the Numbers!, saying it's a
"jaw-dropping essay" and is
"the best compilation of [quantitative] data I've ever seen
to support the use of open-source software."
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols' "HP Releases Multi-level Security Services
for RHEL5" (01-NOV-2007) cites me as an expert on the relationship
between open source software and security.
Bruce Schneier's article "Countering 'Trusting Trust'" describes my security
work that counters the "trusting trust" attack.
Hobbies/Personal Info
My hobbies include chess, singing (bass), and
reading (especially science fiction and fact).
I also play the piano, guitar, tuba, and baritone horn, though
never at the same time.
I live in Northern Virginia, near Washington, DC.
I'm a Christian;
more information about Christianity is available.
Other Stuff
In the mid-1980s I was the maintainer of
Scepter of Goth.
This was the first commercial multiplayer Role-Playing Game (RPG)
in the United States; it may have been the first in the world,
depending on how you date the
commercialization of Scepter and of Bartle's MUD / British Legends.
This was before Internet access was widespread; Scepter
was a franchise operation, with each franchise running in
a local area (customers would dial into a local franchise).
Scepter has influenced many later systems, including many of the
multi-million-dollar Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game
(MMORPGs) of today.
I haven't been in that business for many years, but people still remember
me for that.
Why the middle initial?
I always use my middle initial in anything written
(including information on the web), because there are a number of
other David Wheelers.
For example,
David John Wheeler (now deceased) was the creator of the
Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA) (a somewhat popular encryption algorithm
unencumbered by patents), and is credited with
co-inventing the subroutine.
David E. Wheeler is President of Kineticode,
a content management and software development consulting company
based in Portland, and is the
lead developer for Bricolage (an OSS/FS content management system);
you can contact him using the address "david" at justatheory dot com.
See my contact information if you want to contact me. Or, see my personal home page.