Randal L. Schwartz

Infobox Person

---

birth_date=birth date and age|1961|11|22
website= [http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/ www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/]
occupation=Programmer, Author, Instructor
name=Randal L. Schwartz
nationality=American
residence=Portland, Oregon
employer=Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc.
known_for=Schwartzian transform
other_names=merlyn (internet handle)

Randal L. Schwartz (born November 22, 1961) is an American author, system administrator and programming consultant. Schwartz is the co-author of several widely used books about Perl, a programming language for computers, and has written regular columns about Perl for several computer magazines. He popularized the Just another Perl hacker signature programs. He is a founding board member of the Perl Mongers, the worldwide Perl grassroots advocacy organization. He is currently a co-host on FLOSS Weekly.

Schwartz's name is also associated with the "Schwartzian transform", an algorithm to efficiently sort a list according to a computation, without repeating the computation many times for each element of the list.

Since 1985, Schwartz has owned and operated Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc.

"State of Oregon vs. Randal Schwartz"

In July 1995, Schwartz was convicted in the case of "State of Oregon vs. Randal Schwartz". According to the prosecution, Schwartz, then working as a consultant for Intel, illegally bypassed computer security, gaining access to computers on which his accounts had been disabled, by means of other users passwords and a backdoor program called "gate", in order to gain access to a password file. According to Schwartz, he was only trying to show that management employees of Intel were selecting passwords that could be easily guessed by individuals who then could compromise computer security. Prosecutors rebutted that Schwartz failed to notify anyone at Intel of the security weaknesses, and further alleged that Schwartz had admitted that he "needed them in case they caught me doing it and they would shut me down", depriving him of access to Intel's computer resources.

Schwartz was convicted on all three felony counts, with one reduced to a misdemeanor. On September 11, 1995, he was sentenced to several years' probation, a fine of US $ 68,000, and left to pay about US $ 170,000 in personal legal bills. [ [http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/Intel_v_Schwartz/schwartz_case.intro Intel v. Randal Schwartz: Why Care?] by Jeffrey Kegler, February 4, 1996.]

On February 1, 2007, his arrest and conviction records were sealed through an expungement action, and he is legally no longer a felon. [ [http://www.lightlink.com/spacenka/fors/ State of Oregon vs. Randal Schwartz] - Case summary]

Bibliography

*"Programming Perl", ISBN 0-937175-64-1; ISBN 1-56592-149-6 "(2ed)"
*"Learning Perl", ISBN 1-56592-042-2; ISBN 1-56592-284-0 "(2ed)"; ISBN 0-596-00132-0 "(3ed)"; ISBN 0-596-10105-8 "(4ed)" [http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/learnperl4/] (2005)
*"Intermediate Perl", ISBN 0-596-10206-2 (2006)
*"Learning Perl on Win32 Systems", ISBN 1-56592-324-3
*"Learning Perl Objects, References & Modules" [http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/lrnperlorm/] (2003), ISBN 0-596-00478-8
*"Effective Perl Programming", ISBN 0-201-41975-0
*Preface for "Object Oriented Perl", ISBN 1-884777-79-1
*Collected columns in "Randal Schwartz's Perls of Wisdom", ISBN 1-59059-323-5

References

External links

* [http://www.stonehenge.com Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc.]
*Original text from his bio at one of his many [http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/columns.html columns]
* [http://www.oreillynet.com/cs/catalog/view/au/335 O'Reilly's author page with bio]
* [http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/ Randal's web page]
* [http://methodsandmessages.vox.com/ Randal's Smalltalk and Seaside blog]
* [http://www.pm.org/ Perl Mongers website]

* [http://faq.perl.org/perlfaq4.html#How_do_I_sort_an_arr perlfaq(4)] "How do I sort an array by (anything)?", the Perl FAQ entry on the Schwartzian Transform
* [http://www.perlmonks.com The Perl Monastery] where Schwartz regularly answers questions under his handle [http://www.perlmonks.com/?node=merlyn merlyn] .
* [http://www.twit.tv/floss/randall_schwartz FLOSS Weekly 9 Netcast] Interview with Randal Schwartz
* [http://www.flickr.com/photos/randal-schwartz Randal's personal photographs] Flickr Album