User:Artur

My name is Artur Hefczyc and I live in... well it changes all the time.

I am applying to retain my XSF membership.

If you need to contact me send either an XMPP or an e-mail message to address: artur.hefczyc AT tigase.net.

History
I am old school software engineer. I come from Poland. Apart from my professional job I used to participate to a few open source projects: GeoTools, GenerGuide, WTTools and the last one, Jabber/XMPP related: Tigase. Most of my professional work was around implementation of network servers and network protocols.

In addition to software development work I also wrote a few articles about working with Emacs, Java and XML: "Emacs and JDEE", "Tools and methods for XML" and "Editing XML files".

Software development is not just a way to earn money for me. I like doing it, I enjoy creating something new and I have a big fun when I can see as other people use my software.

Ages ago I found information about new IM protocol - Jabber. As that was (and still is?) the first fully open protocol and the idea about distributed IM network seemed very interesting I started to use it. After some time, using Jabber client was not enough for me. I decided I want to have my own server installed.

Soon after that I started to think about own implementation of Jabber/XMPP server. That was start of Tigase project.

At the moment Tigase project includes not just Jabber/XMPP server but also dedicated XML parser and test suite with built-in scripting language for testing network servers.

Jabber/XMPP Projects
There is a number of open source XMPP projects I am involved in:
 * Jabber/XMPP project: Tigase and some other server related subsprojects
 * BeagleIM - MacOS Client
 * SiskinIM - iOS Client
 * StorkIM - Android Client
 * Libraries for above platforms and other languages

Code

 * Jabber/XMPP server implementation for Tigase project. The new version of the server is available every few months.


 * Dedicated XML parser for streamed XML data like XMPP streams. The first version is available on Tigase project. And the new version is ready. It is more generic (XMPP specific code has been removed and XML parser code has been separated from the server code). New release will be available together with the new release of the server.


 * Test suite to test network servers. It has been, of course, designed and implemented to test and compare Jabber/XMPP servers but the implementation is generic enough to make it easy to extend it for testing other network servers. Part of the suite is scripting language designed to build different test scenarios like functional tests, performance tests, stability tests or other kind. The release of this suite will be available at the same time as a new version of the server.

Plans for the future
In short term my main goal always is to make release of the new version of Tigase components (server, XML parser and test suite).

Long term plans are: first to continue development of Tigase project add lacking functionality, make it more robust, stable - just make it fully functional and useful application. Another plans are to actively participate in Jabber/XMPP evolution. And also provide a full suite of the client side applications for people to use.

Jabber - Why I like it
Modern world is in most cases about effective communication. People live in distant areas and they often work together so they have to communicate. Before IM there was phone and e-mail. And IM takes the best of them and offers this as a very effective way of communication. Jabber/XMPP as open technology brings it even on to next level. Thanks to Jabber/XMPP we are not dependent on a particular company.

Everybody can have own server installed and use it for private needs being even disconnected from the Internet.

But Jabber/XMPP is not only about effective communication its flexibility allows easy implementation of many different services where instant reaction is required.

Why I'm reapplying
I want to continue my contribution.

Once I was working on my Jabber/XMPP project alone for a long time which is not good, now there are a few of us, the Tigase Team. I would like to share my ideas with the community and receive feedback from other people working on similar goals. I dedicated much of my time to Tigase project development and I would like to also actively participate in developing ideas around that technology.

I think this is the right time to attract more people to Jabber community as now we have excellent client applications which are far ahead of commercial alternatives.