Raph Levien
Encyclopedia
Raphael Levien is an influential member of the free software
developer community, through his creation of the Advogato
virtual community and his work with the free software branch of Ghostscript
. He is currently employed by Google
. He holds a PhD
in Computer Science from UC Berkeley.
community that was founded by Levien in November 1999, who had two principal motivations: first, to test his ideas of attack-resistant trust metrics, and secondly to provide a development-focused forum for the free software community that was free of the kind of commercial motivations of such sites as Sourceforge
.
The site has been successful from the point of view of the first criterion, surviving many attacks aimed at subverting the attack metric, made both by developers trying out attacks, and by spam
mers. The site has needed only relatively minor changes to cope with these. The site's trust metric provides, alongside Epinions
, one of the two most important datasets used in empirical analysis of trust metrics and reputation system
s. Levien observed that Google
's PageRank
algorithm can be understood to be an attack resistant trust metric rather similar to that behind Advogato.
The site has had a more rocky road as a forum for free software developers, and currently hosts less discussion than at its peak as developers have moved from forums to weblogs. Due to this, Advogato has added a syndication feature which includes the weblogs of its current certified developer base. It remains one of the earlier networking sites, and is still a place for active discussion on development of free software.
Dr. Levien created Gill, the Gnome
Illustration Application which aimed to support the W3C SVG standard for Vector Graphics. He states it was named after Eric Gill
, the English type designer responsible for the Gill Sans
, Perpetua and Joanna
fonts. Direct development on Gill ceased around the year 2000, but a fork of its code base has evolved to Sodipodi
and through it to Inkscape
.
In 2009, Levien completed a PhD thesis entitled 'From Spiral to Spline: Optimal Techniques in Interactive Curve Design' and published an essay on the mathematical history of Elastica
as a standalone essay. He calls the Elastica "A beautiful family of curves based on beautiful mathematics and a rich and fascinating history."
Since 2010, his work with Google has largely focused on introducing high-quality, open licensed, well organized webfonts to the internet through Google's webfont API. Here, his experience with typographical technology, history and industry has helped to shape the development of this growing resource.
One of his own fonts, Inconsolata
(named in 2009 as one of the ten best programming fonts by Hivelogic, and generally known for its clean lines and elegant design) is now available within the Google library.
As a resolution to this conflict, in March 2000, Raph made a patent grant of his patent portfolio to the GPL community. This step was considered by some to have set a good example, and it has been suggested that it has set a precedent for IBM's subsequent patent grant, which followed two years later.
. At the time (1995), the code on the t-shirt would have been regarded as a munition by the United States
and other NATO governments.
Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). He currently lives with his partner, Seth, in Berkeley.
Free software
Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients can also do...
developer community, through his creation of the Advogato
Advogato
Advogato is an online community and social networking site dedicated to free software development, and was created by Raph Levien. It describes itself as "the free software developer's advocate." Advogato was an early pioneer of blogs, formerly known as "online diaries", and one of the earliest...
virtual community and his work with the free software branch of Ghostscript
Ghostscript
Ghostscript is a suite of software based on an interpreter for Adobe Systems' PostScript and Portable Document Format page description languages.- Features :...
. He is currently employed by Google
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
. He holds a PhD
PHD
PHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
in Computer Science from UC Berkeley.
Advogato
Advogato is a social website for the free softwareFree software
Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients can also do...
community that was founded by Levien in November 1999, who had two principal motivations: first, to test his ideas of attack-resistant trust metrics, and secondly to provide a development-focused forum for the free software community that was free of the kind of commercial motivations of such sites as Sourceforge
SourceForge
SourceForge Enterprise Edition is a collaborative revision control and software development management system. It provides a front-end to a range of software development lifecycle services and integrates with a number of free software / open source software applications .While originally itself...
.
The site has been successful from the point of view of the first criterion, surviving many attacks aimed at subverting the attack metric, made both by developers trying out attacks, and by spam
Spam (electronic)
Spam is the use of electronic messaging systems to send unsolicited bulk messages indiscriminately...
mers. The site has needed only relatively minor changes to cope with these. The site's trust metric provides, alongside Epinions
Epinions
Epinions.com is a general consumer review site that was established in 1999. Epinions was acquired by Shopping.com in 2003, which in turn was acquired by Ebay in 2005...
, one of the two most important datasets used in empirical analysis of trust metrics and reputation system
Reputation system
A reputation system computes and publishes reputation scores for a set of objects within a community or domain, based on a collection of opinions that other entities hold about the objects...
s. Levien observed that Google
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
's PageRank
PageRank
PageRank is a link analysis algorithm, named after Larry Page and used by the Google Internet search engine, that assigns a numerical weighting to each element of a hyperlinked set of documents, such as the World Wide Web, with the purpose of "measuring" its relative importance within the set...
algorithm can be understood to be an attack resistant trust metric rather similar to that behind Advogato.
The site has had a more rocky road as a forum for free software developers, and currently hosts less discussion than at its peak as developers have moved from forums to weblogs. Due to this, Advogato has added a syndication feature which includes the weblogs of its current certified developer base. It remains one of the earlier networking sites, and is still a place for active discussion on development of free software.
Imaging and typography
Raph Levien's main research interest is in the theory of imaging, that is, rendering pictures and fonts so that they can be displayed electronically. He has written several papers on his research in halftoning technology, which have been implemented in the Gimp-Print free software package, as well as by several commercial implementations.Dr. Levien created Gill, the Gnome
GNOME
GNOME is a desktop environment and graphical user interface that runs on top of a computer operating system. It is composed entirely of free and open source software...
Illustration Application which aimed to support the W3C SVG standard for Vector Graphics. He states it was named after Eric Gill
Eric Gill
Arthur Eric Rowton Gill was a British sculptor, typeface designer, stonecutter and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement...
, the English type designer responsible for the Gill Sans
Gill Sans
Gill Sans is a sans-serif typeface designed by Eric Gill.The original design appeared in 1926 when Douglas Cleverdon opened a bookshop in his home town of Bristol, where Eric Gill painted the fascia over the window in sans-serif capitals that would later be known as Gill Sans...
, Perpetua and Joanna
Joanna
Joanna is a feminine given name deriving from Koine Greek Iōanna from Hebrew יוֹחָנָה meaning "God is gracious". Variants in English include Joan, Joann, Joanne, and Johanna...
fonts. Direct development on Gill ceased around the year 2000, but a fork of its code base has evolved to Sodipodi
Sodipodi
Sodipodi is an open source vector graphics editor, discontinued in 2004, which is the predecessor to Inkscape.-Development:Sodipodi started as a fork of Gill, a vector-graphics program written by Raph Levien. The main author is Lauris Kaplinski, and several other people have contributed to the...
and through it to Inkscape
Inkscape
Inkscape is a free software vector graphics editor, licensed under the GNU General Public License. Its goal is to implement full support for the Scalable Vector Graphics 1.1 standard....
.
In 2009, Levien completed a PhD thesis entitled 'From Spiral to Spline: Optimal Techniques in Interactive Curve Design' and published an essay on the mathematical history of Elastica
Elastica theory
The elastica theory is a theory of mechanics of solid materials developed by Leonhard Euler that allows for very large scale elastic deflections of structures. Euler and Jakob Bernoulli developed the theory for elastic lines and studied buckling. Certain situations can be solved exactly by...
as a standalone essay. He calls the Elastica "A beautiful family of curves based on beautiful mathematics and a rich and fascinating history."
Since 2010, his work with Google has largely focused on introducing high-quality, open licensed, well organized webfonts to the internet through Google's webfont API. Here, his experience with typographical technology, history and industry has helped to shape the development of this growing resource.
One of his own fonts, Inconsolata
Inconsolata
Inconsolata is an open source font created by Raph Levien and released under the SIL Open Font License. It is a monospaced font designed for source code listing, terminal emulators, and similar uses. Its design was largely inspired by humanist designs...
(named in 2009 as one of the ten best programming fonts by Hivelogic, and generally known for its clean lines and elegant design) is now available within the Google library.
Patent grant to GPL-licensed software
ZD-Net's Interactive week summarised the issue that patents pose to the free software community:- Levien recognizes the paradox: On one hand, he made money from forcing everyone who used his patented ideas to give him royalties. On the other, he shared the source code of several programs and recognized how the cooperation helped him and others. The two models were in conflict.
As a resolution to this conflict, in March 2000, Raph made a patent grant of his patent portfolio to the GPL community. This step was considered by some to have set a good example, and it has been suggested that it has set a precedent for IBM's subsequent patent grant, which followed two years later.
Activism against encryption export regulations
Raph played a small part in precipitating the relaxation of the US crypto export legislation, by filing for a Commodities Jurisdiction Request for a t-shirt containing an implementation of the RSA encryption algorithm, in four lines of PerlPerl
Perl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Perl was originally developed by Larry Wall in 1987 as a general-purpose Unix scripting language to make report processing easier. Since then, it has undergone many changes and revisions and become widely popular...
. At the time (1995), the code on the t-shirt would have been regarded as a munition by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and other NATO governments.
Personal life
He is divorced, with two sons: Alan and Max. He is a member of the BerkeleyBerkeley, California
Berkeley is a city on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California, United States. Its neighbors to the south are the cities of Oakland and Emeryville. To the north is the city of Albany and the unincorporated community of Kensington...
Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). He currently lives with his partner, Seth, in Berkeley.
External links
- Profile raph at AdvogatoAdvogatoAdvogato is an online community and social networking site dedicated to free software development, and was created by Raph Levien. It describes itself as "the free software developer's advocate." Advogato was an early pioneer of blogs, formerly known as "online diaries", and one of the earliest...
- Text of Levien's patent grant