Tom Limoncelli
Encyclopedia
Tom Limoncelli is a noted system administrator, author
, speaker
and bisexual activist.
A system administrator and network engineer since 1987, he speaks at conferences around the world on topics ranging from firewall security to time management
. He is the author of Time Management for System Administrators from O'Reilly
; along with Christine Hogan, co-author of the book The Practice of System and Network Administration from Addison-Wesley
and most recently with Peter H. Salus
he has published a compilation of the best April Fools jokes created by the IETF entitled The Complete April Fools' Day RFCs.
He has also published papers at conferences such as the Usenix
LISA (conference)
on a wide variety of topics including innovative firewall techniques, coordinating massive network changes, models for improving customer support, and the security issues related to firing your system administrator.
but has lived in New Jersey
since the age of four. He holds a Bachelor of Arts
in Computer Science
from Drew University
in Madison
, New Jersey
.
He is currently a Systems Administrator in the New York City
office of Google
. He has previously been Director, IT
Services for Cibernet Corporation, Director of Operations at Lumeta and also worked at Bell Labs
/ Lucent Technologies
where he ran the internet gateway and networks used by the scientists as well as consulted internally to various business units. In early 2000 he took a leave from his job at Lumeta to volunteer for the presidential campaign of Howard Dean
.
, where he was active in (and for 2 years co-President of) the student LGB
organization. He facilitated a men's support group that was part of the Gay Activists Alliance in Morris County
in 1989-1990.
In 1991-2 he worked on New Jersey's successful effort to amend the New Jersey's Law Against Discrimination, to add "sexual or affectional orientation" for protection in housing, hiring, banking, and public accommodations.
He served as outreach co-chair and logistics coordinator. He co-created BiNet/NJ (now known as BiZone) in 1991. He was vice-president then president of the New Jersey Lesbian and Gay Coalition 1994-1996, which included such accomplishments as the creation of a community center, spinning off the NJ Pride Parade as a separate organization, modifying the by-laws to be fully bisexual and transgender
inclusive, participation in the 1993 March on Washington
and Stonewall 25, and other projects.
He has worked with BiNet USA
since 1992 including 4 years spent as the Regional Organizer from the Tri-State area
region. He has edited the New Jersey
section of the Bisexual Resource Guide
for much of the 1990s.
Limoncelli spends much of his time with the Tri-State Bisexual Conferences which he created/co-chaired in 1996 (NYC, NY), was advisor to in 1997 (Hartford, CT), co-chair in 1999 (New Brunswick NJ), and on the planning committee of the highly successful 2000 (NYU Campus, NY) conference.
Throughout all of this, Limoncelli has been active in Internet activism
. Since 1987 he has used the Internet as an organizing tool. He maintained information about the 1993 March on Washington and Stonewall 25 events on the internet, and was one of a handful of people that since 1992 organized to keep the idea alive that there should be a Stonewall 25 celebration in NYC in 1994.
AT&T's LEAGUE (Lesbian and Gay United Employees) organization awarded him their 1995 LEAGUE Community Involvement Award (Political), and in 1997 the New Jersey Lesbian and Gay Coalition awarded him their "Honor" life-time achievement award for his activism.
He has written two books, contributed to the anthology “Getting Bi: Voices of Bisexuals Around the World” and is the creator of BiSquish an on-line journal reporting news and events for the bisexual community
until September 7, 2006.
In 2006 he received the Brenda Howard Award
http://www.pflag-queens.org/brendahoward.html from the Queens
branch of PFLAG.
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, speaker
Public speaking
Public speaking is the process of speaking to a group of people in a structured, deliberate manner intended to inform, influence, or entertain the listeners...
and bisexual activist.
A system administrator and network engineer since 1987, he speaks at conferences around the world on topics ranging from firewall security to time management
Time management
Time management is the act or process of exercising conscious control over the amount of time spent on specific activities, especially to increase efficiency or productivity. Time management may be aided by a range of skills, tools, and techniques used to manage time when accomplishing specific...
. He is the author of Time Management for System Administrators from O'Reilly
O'Reilly
O'Reilly is the Anglicised form of the Gaelic Ó Raghallaigh. It is also the patronymic form of the Irish name Reilly . It is commonly found throughout Ireland, with the greatest concentration of the surname found in County Cavan followed by Longford, Meath, Westmeath, Fermanagh and Monaghan, and...
; along with Christine Hogan, co-author of the book The Practice of System and Network Administration from Addison-Wesley
Addison-Wesley
Addison-Wesley was a book publisher in Boston, Massachusetts, best known for its textbooks and computer literature. As well as publishing books, Addison-Wesley also distributed its technical titles through the Safari Books Online e-reference service...
and most recently with Peter H. Salus
Peter H. Salus
Peter H. Salus is a linguist, computer scientist, historian of technology, author in many fields, and an editor of books and journals. He has conducted research in germanistics, language acquisition, and computer languages...
he has published a compilation of the best April Fools jokes created by the IETF entitled The Complete April Fools' Day RFCs.
He has also published papers at conferences such as the Usenix
USENIX
-External links:* *...
LISA (conference)
LISA (conference)
LISA is the Large Installation System Administration Conference, co-sponsored by the computing professional organizations USENIX and SAGE.The word "large" was dropped from the title of the 6th conference in 1992 . The full acronym was restored in the title of the 2003 conference and remains in use...
on a wide variety of topics including innovative firewall techniques, coordinating massive network changes, models for improving customer support, and the security issues related to firing your system administrator.
Biography
Limoncelli is the youngest of five children in a large, close-knit Italian-American family. He was born in New Haven, ConnecticutNew Haven, Connecticut
New Haven is the second-largest city in Connecticut and the sixth-largest in New England. According to the 2010 Census, New Haven's population increased by 5.0% between 2000 and 2010, a rate higher than that of the State of Connecticut, and higher than that of the state's five largest cities, and...
but has lived in New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
since the age of four. He holds a Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
in Computer Science
Computer science
Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...
from Drew University
Drew University
Drew University is a private university located in Madison, New Jersey.Originally established as the Drew Theological Seminary in 1867, the university later expanded to include an undergraduate liberal arts college in 1928 and commenced a program of graduate studies in 1955...
in Madison
Madison, New Jersey
Madison is a borough in Morris County, New Jersey, in the United States. As of the 2000 United States Census, the population was 16,530. It also is known as "The Rose City".-Geography:Madison is located at ....
, New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
.
He is currently a Systems Administrator in the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
office of 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 has previously been Director, IT
Information technology
Information technology is the acquisition, processing, storage and dissemination of vocal, pictorial, textual and numerical information by a microelectronics-based combination of computing and telecommunications...
Services for Cibernet Corporation, Director of Operations at Lumeta and also worked at Bell Labs
Bell Labs
Bell Laboratories is the research and development subsidiary of the French-owned Alcatel-Lucent and previously of the American Telephone & Telegraph Company , half-owned through its Western Electric manufacturing subsidiary.Bell Laboratories operates its...
/ Lucent Technologies
Lucent Technologies
Alcatel-Lucent USA, Inc., originally Lucent Technologies, Inc. is a French-owned technology company composed of what was formerly AT&T Technologies, which included Western Electric and Bell Labs...
where he ran the internet gateway and networks used by the scientists as well as consulted internally to various business units. In early 2000 he took a leave from his job at Lumeta to volunteer for the presidential campaign of Howard Dean
Howard Dean
Howard Brush Dean III is an American politician and physician from Vermont. He served six terms as the 79th Governor of Vermont and ran unsuccessfully for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination. He was chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 2005 to 2009. Although his U.S...
.
Work for bisexual rights
Limoncelli started his activism when he was a student at Drew UniversityDrew University
Drew University is a private university located in Madison, New Jersey.Originally established as the Drew Theological Seminary in 1867, the university later expanded to include an undergraduate liberal arts college in 1928 and commenced a program of graduate studies in 1955...
, where he was active in (and for 2 years co-President of) the student LGB
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
organization. He facilitated a men's support group that was part of the Gay Activists Alliance in Morris County
Morris County, New Jersey
Morris County is a county located in the U.S. state of New Jersey, about west of New York City. According to the United States 2010 Census, the population was 492,276. It is part of the New York Metropolitan Area. Its county seat is Morristown....
in 1989-1990.
In 1991-2 he worked on New Jersey's successful effort to amend the New Jersey's Law Against Discrimination, to add "sexual or affectional orientation" for protection in housing, hiring, banking, and public accommodations.
He served as outreach co-chair and logistics coordinator. He co-created BiNet/NJ (now known as BiZone) in 1991. He was vice-president then president of the New Jersey Lesbian and Gay Coalition 1994-1996, which included such accomplishments as the creation of a community center, spinning off the NJ Pride Parade as a separate organization, modifying the by-laws to be fully bisexual and transgender
Transgender
Transgender is a general term applied to a variety of individuals, behaviors, and groups involving tendencies to vary from culturally conventional gender roles....
inclusive, participation in the 1993 March on Washington
March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation
The March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation was a large political rally that took place in Washington, D.C. on April 25, 1993...
and Stonewall 25, and other projects.
He has worked with BiNet USA
BiNet USA
BiNet USA is a national bisexual/pansexual civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States. It was founded to formalize communication between U.S...
since 1992 including 4 years spent as the Regional Organizer from the Tri-State area
Metropolitan area
The term metropolitan area refers to a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories, sharing industry, infrastructure, and housing. A metropolitan area usually encompasses multiple jurisdictions and municipalities: neighborhoods, townships,...
region. He has edited the New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
section of the Bisexual Resource Guide
Bisexual Resource Center
Bisexual Resource Center is a 501 non-profit educational organization that has served the bisexual community since 1985. Originally known as the East Coast Bisexual Network, the BRC is headquartered in Boston MA and provides education about bisexual and progressive issues and support for bisexual...
for much of the 1990s.
Limoncelli spends much of his time with the Tri-State Bisexual Conferences which he created/co-chaired in 1996 (NYC, NY), was advisor to in 1997 (Hartford, CT), co-chair in 1999 (New Brunswick NJ), and on the planning committee of the highly successful 2000 (NYU Campus, NY) conference.
Throughout all of this, Limoncelli has been active in Internet activism
Internet activism
Internet activism is the use of electronic communication technologies such as e-mail, the World Wide Web, and podcasts for various forms of activism to enable faster communications by citizen movements and the delivery of local information to a large audience...
. Since 1987 he has used the Internet as an organizing tool. He maintained information about the 1993 March on Washington and Stonewall 25 events on the internet, and was one of a handful of people that since 1992 organized to keep the idea alive that there should be a Stonewall 25 celebration in NYC in 1994.
AT&T's LEAGUE (Lesbian and Gay United Employees) organization awarded him their 1995 LEAGUE Community Involvement Award (Political), and in 1997 the New Jersey Lesbian and Gay Coalition awarded him their "Honor" life-time achievement award for his activism.
He has written two books, contributed to the anthology “Getting Bi: Voices of Bisexuals Around the World” and is the creator of BiSquish an on-line journal reporting news and events for the bisexual community
Bisexual community
Bisexual community is a term used to describe members of the LGBT community who identify as bisexual, pansexual, "fluid", and queer-identified, as well as their allies...
until September 7, 2006.
In 2006 he received the Brenda Howard Award
Brenda Howard Award
The Brenda Howard Memorial Award was created in 2005 by the Queens Chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays .This award to be given annually, recognizes an individual or organization whose work on behalf of the Bisexual Community and greater LGBT Community best exemplifies the...
http://www.pflag-queens.org/brendahoward.html from the Queens
Queens
Queens is the easternmost of the five boroughs of New York City. The largest borough in area and the second-largest in population, it is coextensive with Queens County, an administrative division of New York state, in the United States....
branch of PFLAG.
Partial bibliography
- The Practice of System and Network Administration (Addison-WesleyAddison-WesleyAddison-Wesley was a book publisher in Boston, Massachusetts, best known for its textbooks and computer literature. As well as publishing books, Addison-Wesley also distributed its technical titles through the Safari Books Online e-reference service...
), 2001, by Thomas A. Limoncelli and Christine Hogan ISBN 0-201-70271-1 - Time Management for System Administrators by Thomas A. Limoncelli (O'ReillyO'Reilly MediaO'Reilly Media is an American media company established by Tim O'Reilly that publishes books and Web sites and produces conferences on computer technology topics...
), 2005 ISBN 0-596-00783-3 - The Practice of System and Network Administration (2nd Edition) (Addison-WesleyAddison-WesleyAddison-Wesley was a book publisher in Boston, Massachusetts, best known for its textbooks and computer literature. As well as publishing books, Addison-Wesley also distributed its technical titles through the Safari Books Online e-reference service...
), 2007, by Thomas A. Limoncelli, Christine Hogan, and Strata R. Chalup ISBN 0-321-49266-8 - The Complete April Fools' Day RFCs (Peer-to-Peer Communications Inc.) by Thomas A. Limoncelli and Peter H. SalusPeter H. SalusPeter H. Salus is a linguist, computer scientist, historian of technology, author in many fields, and an editor of books and journals. He has conducted research in germanistics, language acquisition, and computer languages...
, 2007 ISBN 1-573-98042-0