Matthew Garrett

Last updated

Matthew Garrett
Matthew Garrett "You're not even a wiki" (cropped).jpg
Born
Galway, Ireland
Other namesmjg59
EducationComputational Genetics
Alma mater University of Cambridge
Occupation Software developer
EmployerAurora
Known for Free software development and advocacy
Awards Free Software Award
Website mjg59.dreamwidth.org

Matthew Garrett is an Irish technologist, programmer, and free software activist who is a major contributor to a series of free software projects including Linux, GNOME, Debian, Ubuntu, and Red Hat. [1] He has received the Free Software Award from the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for his work on Secure Boot, UEFI, and the Linux kernel. [2]

Contents

Life and career

Garrett was born in Galway, Ireland, [3] and has a PhD in genetics from the University of Cambridge. [4] He is the author of several articles on Drosophila melanogaster (i.e., fruit fly) genetics. [5] [6] [7]

Garrett has been a contributor to the GNOME [8] [9] and the Debian Linux projects, was an early contributor to Ubuntu, was an initial member of the Ubuntu Technical Board, worked as a contractor at Canonical Ltd., and worked at Red Hat. [1]

At Canonical Ltd. and Red Hat, Garrett worked on power management in Linux. [10] While at Red Hat, Garrett also worked on issues relating to Secure Boot and UEFI and the Linux kernel to preserve users' ability to run the operating system of their choosing on hardware supporting Secure Boot. [11] This work eventually led to his being awarded the 2013 FSF Free Software Award. [2]

Garrett worked at the cloud computing platform company CoreOS and is cited in the press as an expert in cloud computing issues. [12] From 2017 until 2021, he worked for Google [13] and is currently employed at Aurora. [14]

On January 9, 2023, Garrett was appointed to the Debian Technical Committee. [15]

He has received the Free Software Award from the Free Software Foundation for his work on Secure Boot, UEFI, and the Linux kernel. [2]

Advocacy

Garrett has been a strong advocate for software freedom and compliance with the GNU General Public License (GPL) in the Linux kernel. For example, Garrett filed a complaint with US Customs against Fusion Garage due to violations of the GPL. [16] [17]

In March 2021, Garrett, who had served on the Free Software Foundation's board of directors, signed an open letter to the FSF calling for the removal of its entire board and for Richard Stallman to be removed from all leadership positions. [18] [19]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Free software</span> Software licensed to be freely used, modified and distributed

Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, not price; all users are legally free to do what they want with their copies of a free software regardless of how much is paid to obtain the program. Computer programs are deemed "free" if they give end-users ultimate control over the software and, subsequently, over their devices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GNU</span> Free software collection

GNU is an extensive collection of free software, which can be used as an operating system or can be used in parts with other operating systems. The use of the completed GNU tools led to the family of operating systems popularly known as Linux. Most of GNU is licensed under the GNU Project's own General Public License (GPL).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Linux distribution</span> Operating system based on the Linux kernel

A Linux distribution is an operating system that includes the Linux kernel for its kernel functionality. Although the name does not imply product distribution per se, a distro, if distributed on its own, is often obtained via a website intended specifically for the purpose. Distros have been designed for a wide variety of systems ranging from personal computers to servers and from embedded devices to supercomputers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GNU Project</span> Free software project

The GNU Project is a free software, mass collaboration project announced by Richard Stallman on September 27, 1983. Its goal is to give computer users freedom and control in their use of their computers and computing devices by collaboratively developing and publishing software that gives everyone the rights to freely run the software, copy and distribute it, study it, and modify it. GNU software grants these rights in its license.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GNU/Linux naming controversy</span> Issues of what to call a system with the GNU toolchain and the Linux kernel

The GNU/Linux naming controversy is a controversy regarding whether computer operating systems that use GNU software and the Linux kernel should be referred to as "GNU/Linux" or "Linux" systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FSF Free Software Awards</span>

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) grants two annual awards. Since 1998, FSF has granted the award for Advancement of Free Software and since 2005, also the Free Software Award for Projects of Social Benefit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MemTest86</span> Computer memory diagnostics software

MemTest86 and Memtest86+ are memory test software programs designed to test and stress test an x86 architecture computer's random-access memory (RAM) for errors, by writing test patterns to most memory addresses, reading back the data, and comparing for errors. Each tries to verify that the RAM will accept and correctly retain arbitrary patterns of data written to it, that there are no errors where different bits of memory interact, and that there are no conflicts between memory addresses.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">UEFI</span> Technical specification for firmware architecture

Unified Extensible Firmware Interface is a specification for the firmware architecture of a computing platform. When a computer is powered on, the UEFI-implementation is typically the first that runs, before starting the operating system. Examples include AMI Aptio, Phoenix SecureCore, TianoCore EDK II, InsydeH2O.

The Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL) is a free and open-source software license, produced by Sun Microsystems, based on the Mozilla Public License (MPL). Files licensed under the CDDL can be combined with files licensed under other licenses, whether open source or proprietary. In 2005 the Open Source Initiative approved the license. The Free Software Foundation (FSF) considers it a free software license, but one which is incompatible with the GNU General Public License (GPL).

Alternative terms for free software, such as open source, FOSS, and FLOSS, have been a recurring issue among free and open-source software users from the late 1990s onwards. These terms share almost identical licence criteria and development practices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Stallman</span> American free software activist and GNU Project founder (born 1953)

Richard Matthew Stallman, also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner that its users have the freedom to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software which ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF) in October 1985, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote all versions of the GNU General Public License.

Tivoization is the practice of designing hardware that incorporates software under the terms of a copyleft software license like the GNU General Public License, but uses hardware restrictions or digital rights management (DRM) to prevent users from running modified versions of the software on that hardware. Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) coined the term in reference to TiVo's use of GNU GPL licensed software on the TiVo brand digital video recorders (DVR), which actively block modified software by design. Stallman believes this practice denies users some of the freedom that the GNU GPL was designed to protect. The FSF refers to tivoized hardware as "proprietary tyrants".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Linux</span> Family of Unix-like operating systems

Linux is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution (distro), which includes the kernel and supporting system software and libraries—most of which are provided by third parties—to create a complete operating system, designed as a clone of Unix and released under the copyleft GPL license.

gNewSense Linux distribution

gNewSense was a Linux distribution, active from 2006 to 2016. It was based on Debian, and developed with sponsorship from the Free Software Foundation. Its goal was user-friendliness, but with all proprietary and non-free software removed. The Free Software Foundation considered gNewSense to be composed entirely of free software.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of free and open-source software</span>

The history of free and open-source software begins at the advent of computer software in the early half of the 20th century. In the 1950s and 1960s, computer operating software and compilers were delivered as a part of hardware purchases without separate fees. At the time, source code—the human-readable form of software—was generally distributed with the software, providing the ability to fix bugs or add new functions. Universities were early adopters of computing technology. Many of the modifications developed by universities were openly shared, in keeping with the academic principles of sharing knowledge, and organizations sprung up to facilitate sharing.

License compatibility is a legal framework that allows for pieces of software with different software licenses to be distributed together. The need for such a framework arises because the different licenses can contain contradictory requirements, rendering it impossible to legally combine source code from separately-licensed software in order to create and publish a new program. Proprietary licenses are generally program-specific and incompatible; authors must negotiate to combine code. Copyleft licenses are commonly deliberately incompatible with proprietary licenses, in order to prevent copyleft software from being re-licensed under a proprietary license, turning it into proprietary software. Many copyleft licenses explicitly allow relicensing under some other copyleft licenses. Permissive licenses are compatible with everything, including proprietary licenses; there is thus no guarantee that all derived works will remain under a permissive license.

Linux began in 1991 as a personal project by Finnish student Linus Torvalds to create a new free operating system kernel. The resulting Linux kernel has been marked by constant growth throughout its history. Since the initial release of its source code in 1991, it has grown from a small number of C files under a license prohibiting commercial distribution to the 4.15 version in 2018 with more than 23.3 million lines of source code, not counting comments, under the GNU General Public License v2 with a syscall exception meaning anything that uses the kernel via system calls are not subject to the GNU GPL.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GNU General Public License</span> Series of free software licenses

The GNU General Public Licenses are a series of widely used free software licenses, or copyleft licenses, that guarantee end users the freedoms to run, study, share, or modify the software. The GPL was the first copyleft license available for general use. It was originally written by Richard Stallman, the founder of the Free Software Foundation (FSF), for the GNU Project. The license grants the recipients of a computer program the rights of the Free Software Definition. The licenses in the GPL series are all copyleft licenses, which means that any derivative work must be distributed under the same or equivalent license terms. It is more restrictive than the Lesser General Public License, and even further distinct from the more widely-used permissive software licenses such as BSD, MIT, and Apache.

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985. The organisation supports the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed under copyleft terms, such as with its own GNU General Public License. The FSF was incorporated in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, where it is also based.

References

  1. 1 2 Gareth Greenaway (27 January 2013). "INTERVIEW: Matthew Garrett". SCALE. Retrieved 8 October 2014.
  2. 1 2 3 "Matthew Garrett, GNOME Foundation's Outreach Program for Women are Free Software Award winners". Free Software Foundation. 21 March 2014. Retrieved 23 March 2014.
  3. ↑ Garrett, Matthew (11 August 2014). "birthplace". mjg59's journal.
  4. ↑ Garrett, Matthew James (2010). Comparative genomic analysis as a tool for locating novel functional elements in D. melanogaster (Thesis). Cambridge, UK: University of Cambridge.
  5. ↑ Garrett, Matthew; Fullaondo, Ane; Troxler, Larent; Micklem, Gos; Gubb, David (22 October 2009). "Identification and analysis of serpin-family genes by homology and synteny across the 12 sequenced Drosophilid genomes". BMC Genomics. 10 (1): 489. doi: 10.1186/1471-2164-10-489 . ISSN   1471-2164. PMC   2770083 . PMID   19849829.
  6. ↑ Hudson, Stephanie G.; Garrett, Matthew J.; Carlson, Joseph W.; Micklem, Gos; Celniker, Susan E.; Goldstein, Elliott S.; Newfeld, Stuart J. (1 November 2007). "Phylogenetic and Genomewide Analyses Suggest a Functional Relationship Between kayak, the Drosophila Fos Homolog, and fig, a Predicted Protein Phosphatase 2C Nested Within a kayak Intron". Genetics. 177 (3): 1349–1361. doi:10.1534/genetics.107.071670. ISSN   0016-6731. PMC   2147949 . PMID   18039871 . Retrieved 23 March 2014.
  7. ↑ Guo, Jiannan; Garrett, Matthew; Micklem, Gos; Brogna, Saverio (15 February 2011). "Poly(A) Signals Located near the 5′ End of Genes Are Silenced by a General Mechanism That Prevents Premature 3′-End Processing". Molecular and Cellular Biology. 31 (4): 639–651. doi:10.1128/MCB.00919-10. ISSN   0270-7306. PMC   3028650 . PMID   21135120.
  8. ↑ Garrett, Matthew (27 July 2004). "Application from Matthew Garrett". membership-committee (Mailing list).
  9. ↑ Garrett, Matthew (5 May 2014). "Application from Matthew Garrett". membership-committee (Mailing list).
  10. ↑ Larabel, Michael (5 July 2013). "Intel Rapid Start Being Toyed With For Linux". www.phoronix.com. Retrieved 5 October 2024.
  11. ↑ "Microsoft, Red Hat spar over secure boot-loading tech". Computer News Middle East. 25 September 2011.
  12. ↑ Magnanti, Dr Brooke. "Could the UK really block internet porn?". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 23 March 2014.
  13. ↑ "Matthew Garrett / Linux Plumbers Conference: Developing the Kernel, Libraries and Utilities".
  14. ↑ "Matthew Garrett". LinkedIn . Retrieved 13 November 2024.
  15. ↑ Carter, Jonathan. "New appointment for the Debian Technical Committee: mjg59". debian-devel-announce (Mailing list). Archived from the original on 19 January 2023. Retrieved 29 February 2024.
  16. ↑ Matthew Garrett files case with US Customs against Fusion Garage LWN.net, 2010.
  17. ↑ Meeker, Heather J. (2012). "Open Source and the Age of Enforcement". Hastings Science & Technology Law Journal. 4 (267).
  18. ↑ Brodkin, Jon (23 March 2021). "Free software advocates seek removal of Richard Stallman and entire FSF board". Ars Technica . Retrieved 26 April 2021.
  19. ↑ "An open letter to remove Richard M. Stallman from all leadership positions" . Retrieved 25 March 2021.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.