Ross Nelson

I'm the author of these pages: founder of the Amalgamated Press, lookout for the Haggis Early Warning Network, and host for WINO meetings. I was born in the midwest in 1957, but grew up in Helena, Montana. I got my Computer Science degree from Montana State University. My resume is also on-line. Intel hired me in 1979, and I've been a resident of Silicon Valley ever since. I helped create one of the first laptop computer systems at Gavilan, worked for Answer Software, got into multimedia at Kaleida Labs and followed that project to Apple Computer after the Labs were shut down by Apple and IBM. At Apple, I was managing two great projects, Cocoa (aka KidSim) and Biscotti. Apple didn't understand how neat they were and cancelled them both. I went on to co-found Stagecast Software with others from the Cocoa/KidSim project.

Apple belatedly discovered how useful some of this technology was, and subsequently restarted the Biscotti project, now shipping as Quicktime for Java. Meanwhile, our other work became the focus of a brand new company: Stagecast Software. Stagecast Creator is a programming/multimedia authoring tool that can be used by children as young as 5 years old. It's written in Java and runs on MacOS, Windows, and Linux/Unix systems.

I spent a few years at IBM's Almaden Research Center working on a web-scale data mining project called WebFountain, and developed some search quality analysis tools for their enterprise search product. Recently, overcome by a mad-scientist desire for world domination, I've joined Google.

In addition to programming, I'm also a writer. I've written two technical books: Microsoft's 80386/80486 Programming Guide and Running Visual Basic for Windows; co-authored two others: Extending DOS and The Microsoft Press Computer Dictionary; and have written for BYTE (back when they printed a magazine on real paper) and Dr. Dobb's Journal.

Since late 2001, I've been writing for theatre.  My dramatic writing is under my full name, Ross Peter Nelson, to avoid confusion with another Ross Nelson in the bay area who is also involved with the stage.

When I'm not in front of a computer, I enjoy wine tasting, cycling, and attempts to learn to play musical instruments like the piano or harmonica, and non-musical instruments like the bagpipe. None of these experiments seem to last very long. I have also been seen fencing, tap dancing, and playing the tuba, though never all at the same time, and none of those very recently. The house brew is a stout, though I've also made a few ciders that are pretty decent.

I'm also a bit of a skeptic, and a supporter of CSICOP. I'm easily recognizable on the road, with BLAMANJ license plates, though I try to commute via CalTrain when I can.

• pictures duplicating the famous Flaming PopTart experiment