Sarah Allen (born Sarah Lindsley)
is an American software developer and entrepreneur. Allen attended
Brown University
Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...
in
Rhode Island
Rhode Island ( ) is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Connecticut to its west; Massachusetts to its north and east; and the Atlantic Ocean to its south via Rhode Island Sound and Block Is ...
, where she majored in computer science and visual arts. Early in her career, she led the development of
Adobe Shockwave
Adobe Shockwave (formerly Macromedia Shockwave and MacroMind Shockwave) is a discontinued multimedia platform for building interactive multimedia applications and video games. Developers originate content using Adobe Director and publish it o ...
Multiuser Server,
Flash Media Server, and
Flash video, and co-founded the company that created
Adobe After Effects
Adobe After Effects is a digital visual effects, motion graphics, and compositing application developed by Adobe Inc.; it is used for animation and in the post-production process of film making, video games and television production. Amo ...
.
In 2013, Allen was selected for the
Presidential Innovation Fellows
The Presidential Innovation Fellows program is a competitive fellowship program that pairs top innovators from the private sector, non-profits, and academia with top innovators in government to collaborate on solutions that aim to deliver signifi ...
program working with the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums, Education center, education and Research institute, research centers, created by the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government "for the increase a ...
.
Companies
In 2010, Allen co-founded and serves as the chief technology officer of mobile startup Mightyverse. In parallel she is the founder of San Francisco-based
Ruby on Rails
Ruby on Rails (simplified as Rails) is a server-side web application framework written in Ruby under the MIT License. Rails is a model–view–controller (MVC) framework, providing default structures for a database, a web service, and web pa ...
consultancy Blazing Cloud, a product-centric mobile application consulting firm. In 2010, she co-authored the book ''Pro Smartphone Cross-Platform Development''.
Representation of women
In the Silicon Valley community, Allen contributes her time to improving the representation of women in technology as the president of RailsBridge, which aims to "bridge the gap from aspiring developer to contributing open source community member through mentoring, teaching and writing".
Recognition
In 1998, Allen was named one of the Top 25 Women of the Web by
San Francisco Women on the Web. Allen was honored on
Ada Lovelace
Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace (''née'' Byron; 10 December 1815 – 27 November 1852), also known as Ada Lovelace, was an English mathematician and writer chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's proposed mechanical general-pur ...
Day by the Bay Area
Girl Geek Dinners in 2010 and participated in the mobile-themed Google Tech Talk at the company's headquarters in
Mountain View. In 2013, Allen was chosen as a Presidential Innovation Fellow and worked for six months with the Smithsonian Institution.
Publications
"The Future of the Web is not the Past of Windows"W3C Position Paper: Workshop on Web Applications and Compound Documents. June 2004.
"Pro Smartphone Cross-Platform Development iPhone, Blackberry, Windows Mobile and Android Development and Distribution"Sept 2010, Apress.
References