Damien Sandras is known in the

free software community The free software movement is a social movement with the goal of obtaining and guaranteeing certain freedoms for software users, namely the freedoms to run, study, modify, and share copies of software. Software which meets these requirements, ...

due to his work on

GNOME A gnome () is a mythological creature and diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, introduced by Paracelsus in the 16th century and widely adopted by authors, including those of modern fantasy literature. They are typically depict ...

, more specifically on

Ekiga Ekiga (formerly called GnomeMeeting) was a VoIP and video conferencing application for GNOME and Microsoft Windows. It was distributed as free software under the terms of the GNU GPL-2.0-or-later. It was the default VoIP client in Ubuntu until Oc ...

, the leading

open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

softphone A softphone is a software program for making telephone calls over the Internet using a general purpose computer rather than dedicated hardware. The softphone can be installed on a piece of equipment such as a desktop, mobile device, or other compu ...

for the Linux desktop. He is one of the founders of

FOSDEM Free and Open source Software Developers' European Meeting (FOSDEM) is an annual software engineering conference. It is non-commercial and volunteer-organized with a focus on free and open-source software. Initiated in 2000, it is usually held d ...

, an event dedicated to

free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...

developers in Europe.

was initially created by Raphaël Bauduin under the name OSDEM. Sandras joined Bauduin and helped him setting up the event. Sandras was one of the driving forces behind the organization during 7 years.

was supported by the

Free Software Foundation The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985. The organisation supports the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed ...

and more specifically by

Richard Stallman Richard Matthew Stallman ( ; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner that its users have the freedom to ...

as an alternative to the proprietary

Skype Skype () was a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for IP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also had instant messaging, file transfer, ...

. Stallman's e-mail signature contained a mention to the softphone during a few years: Sandras is a graduate of the University of Louvain (UCLouvain). He is mentioned on the university portal in the ''University Success Stories''. He is now leading Be IP, a startup dealing with enterprise open-source

VoIP Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also known as IP telephony, is a set of technologies used primarily for voice communication sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. VoIP enables voice calls to be transmitted as ...

software.

Sources

* http://www.journaldunet.com/solutions/itws/050317_it_gnomemeeting.shtml * http://www.linuxdevcenter.com/pub/a/linux/2005/03/17/gnomemeeting.html * http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2002-01-11-005-20-IN-GN * https://web.archive.org/web/20070629120232/http://ghj.sunsite.dk/index.php?1=articles%2F1%2Finterview_gnomemeeting.html&article=1

References

External links

Home page

Ekiga.org

Be IP
Belgian computer programmers GNOME developers Free software programmers Living people Year of birth missing (living people) {{compu-bio-stub