Jonathan Oxer
Encyclopedia
Programmer
A programmer, computer programmer or coder is someone who writes computer software. The term computer programmer can refer to a specialist in one area of computer programming or to a generalist who writes code for many kinds of software. One who practices or professes a formal approach to...
, Debian
Debian
Debian is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential...
developer, author, entrepreneur, and Free Software activist. He lives in Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
, Victoria
Victoria (Australia)
Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
with his wife and their two children.
Early life and education
Jonathan Oxer was born at St Mary Abbott's Hospital in London, England to Australian parents who were working in London at the time. In late 1970 his parents returned to Melbourne, Australia.Oxer's primary education was at Blackwood Community School, a small alternative school created in the mid-1970s by a group of parents. The school was known for having an unstructured learning program that mixed students across all year levels and did not use scheduled class times.
Oxer's secondary education was at St Michael's Grammar School
St Michael's Grammar School
St Michael's Grammar School is a co-educational independent day school located in St Kilda, Victoria, Australia.The school was founded in 1895 by the Community of the Sisters of the Church and is associated with the Anglican Church of Australia. St Michael's is located on a single campus, its...
where he completed his HSC in 1989. In 1987 Oxer was one of a group of students from the school who conducted an extra-curricular project to use information published by researchers at IBM Zurich, the University of Alabama
University of Alabama
The University of Alabama is a public coeducational university located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States....
, and the University of Houston
University of Houston
The University of Houston is a state research university, and is the flagship institution of the University of Houston System. Founded in 1927, it is Texas's third-largest university with nearly 40,000 students. Its campus spans 667 acres in southeast Houston, and was known as University of...
to create a sample of yttrium-barium-copper-oxide (YBCO) superconductor capable of exhibiting superconducting properties at the temperature of liquid nitrogen, which at the time was the highest-temperature superconductor yet created Oxer's contributions to the project included writing software to plot the optimum cooling curve of the material to maximise crystal alignment during the annealing process.
Career
In 1994 Oxer founded Mission Internet, one of the first companies in the world to specialise in connecting database content to the Internet. In 2000 Mission Internet's operations became part of Internet Vision Technologies, a company formed in partnership with Andrew Minett. Oxer is currently Technical Director of Internet Vision Technologies.Debian Project
Oxer was admitted to the Debian Project in August 2002. He subsequently convened the Debian Miniconf in a different city every year in conjunction with Linux.conf.au: Perth in 2003, Adelaide in 2004, Canberra in 2005, Dunedin (New Zealand) in 2006, Sydney in 2007, and Melbourne in 2008.Linux Australia Inc
Oxer was elected President of Linux AustraliaLinux Australia
Linux Australia is the national, Australian Linux organisation. It was founded in 1997 and formally incorporated in New South Wales as a non-profit organisation in 1999. Linux Australia aims to represent the Australian Linux community and to support and collaborate with the Linux User Groups in...
on 25 January 2005, serving three consecutive terms. He was also nominated for the 2008 election but did not accept the nomination.
Early in his first term Oxer was the focus of controversy surrounding the application for a trademark in Australia for the term "Linux". In many countries the trademark "Linux" is registered by or on behalf of the Linux Mark Institute
Linux Mark Institute
The Linux Mark Institute is an organization which administers the "Linux" trademark on behalf of Linus Torvalds for computer software which includes the Linux kernel, computer hardware utilizing Linux-based software, and for services associated with the implementation and documentation of...
, an organisation which administers the trademark on behalf of Linus Torvalds
Linus Torvalds
Linus Benedict Torvalds is a Finnish software engineer and hacker, best known for having initiated the development of the open source Linux kernel. He later became the chief architect of the Linux kernel, and now acts as the project's coordinator...
. Following an attempt by an unassociated commercial entity known as Linux Australia Pty Ltd to register the trademark within Australia, Linux Australia agreed to act as an agent of Linux Mark Institute to contest the pending trademark application by Linux Australia Pty Ltd and submit a counterclaim for the trademark. Subsequent action taken by Linux Australia included presentation of a request for support for the trademark application to a number of FOSS-related businesses in Australia by a lawyer acting on behalf of the organisation. As a result of the way the letter was worded some recipients misinterpreted it as a demand for payment for use of the trademark, causing a negative backlash within the FOSS community. Jon Hall (programmer), President of Linux Mark Institute, subsequently defended the actions of Linux Australia Inc and confirmed that the application was submitted on behalf of the organisation. The trademark applications by both Linux Australia Pty Ltd and Linux Australia Inc were ultimately denied.
During his incumbency Oxer was a vocal opponent of changes to Australian intellectual property law mandated by the Australia-United States Free Trade Agreement
Australia-United States Free Trade Agreement
The Australia – United States Free Trade Agreement is a preferential trade agreement between Australia and the United States modelled on the North American Free Trade Agreement . The free trade agreement was signed on 18 May 2004, ratified by the U.S. House of Representatives on 14 July 2004 by a...
, and in particular the broader definition of technological protection measures.
Cryptography
Oxer has coordinated the large PGP/GPG keysigning parties at every Linux.conf.au from 2004 onward, and to assist with key collection and management for large groups created the keysigning.org website. He also administers keys.keysigning.org, the only keyserver in the subkeys.pgp.net network geographically located in Australasia.RFID Implant
In March 2006 Oxer used a veterinary RFID tag implantation tool to implant an RFID tag under the skin of his left arm, and subsequently modified his house to allow the implanted tag to control items such as the door locks. He was subsequently labelled "Australia's geekiest geek" in The Age and Sydney Morning Herald.Author
Oxer is author of several books relating to computers and e-business:- How To Build A Website And Stay Sane (Oft Press, 2005)
- Ubuntu Hacks (O'Reilly, 2006)
- How To Build A Website And Stay Sane, Second Edition (Lulu, 2007)
- Quickstart Guide to Google AdWords (Lulu, 2008)
- Practical Arduino (Apress, 2009)