Danese Cooper
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3f/Danese_Cooper.jpg/250px-Danese_Cooper.jpg)
Danese Cooper (born January 19, 1959) is a programmer, computer scientist, and advocate of open source software. She has been hired as the Chief Technical Officer of the Wikimedia Foundation and will begin working there on February 4, 2010.[1]
Known as the "Open Source Diva" after stints as an open source community builder at Sun Microsystems, Intel, and REvolution Computing,[2] she is currently Treasurer on the board of the Open Source Initiative, which she joined in December 2001.[3] She came to public attention for her work at Sun Microsystems on promoting open source.
Her father named her after his Alfa Romeo.[4] After earning a B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles, Cooper was in the Peace Corps and involved in management of the Renaissance Faire in California. She worked on the Options Trading Floor at the Pacific Exchange, leaving to work in a prominent law firm. She then moved to Apple Computer, the first of several jobs in engineering. She worked for six months at Microsoft.
Her job before Sun was at Symantec, working on version 5 of the ACT! personal information manager (ACT! 2000). This was her first practical experience of internally open development methods and Extreme Programming and convinced her of the benefits of open source and open development.
At Sun, Cooper created and managed the Open Source Programs Office at Sun from March 1999 until March 2005. She chose the Sun Public License for NetBeans software, helped draft the CDDL for OpenSolaris and worked on the creation of the Sun Industry Standards Source License for TI-RPC, the Joint Copyright Assignment for OpenOffice.org and that program's dual-licensing with the LGPL. She jointly received a Chairman's Award at Sun as part of the team creating the Sun blogspaces at blogs.sun.com[5] and Java.Net[6].
She ended her employment at Sun in March 2005 and moved to Intel,[7] where she worked as Sr. Director of Open Source Strategy for Channel Software Operations.[8] She left Intel early in 2009 and moved to R language startup REvolution Computing based in New Haven, Connecticut, which she left suddenly in October 2009.[9]
References
- Darryl K. Taft (24 March 2009). "Danese Cooper Starts at REvolution as 'Open Source Diva'". EWeek.
- Stephen Shankland (18 March 2005). "Sun open-source diva departs for Intel". ZDNet.
- Christian Einfeldt. "Danese Cooper: Reflections of an open source diva". Mad Penguin. Retrieved 21 March 2005. — detailed history of Cooper's time at Sun
- ^ Danese Cooper joins Wikimedia as CTO
- ^ eWeek.Com - Danese Cooper Starts at REvolution as 'Open Source Diva'
- ^ OSI Board listing, retrieved October 22, 2009
- ^ Flickr photos of the Nardi-Danese Alfa
- ^ Award announcement by Will Snow, retrieved January 28, 2010
- ^ Bio referencing Java.Net on IT Conversations, retrieved January 28, 2010
- ^ ZDNet - Sun open-source diva departs for Intel
- ^ Java.net - Danese Cooper's Blog
- ^ Danese Cooper - Start the REvolution without me...
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- New DivaBlog (Danese Cooper's blog)
- Danese Cooper's Blog (java.net) — Cooper's Java-related blog
- Danese Cooper, Open Source Initiative and Intel Corporation: "Why Whinging Doesn't Work" (Video)