Doornbos: What's Your Hack?

BYTE -- What things really interest you? Do you have something you're passionate about that you would work on, even if you weren't paid for it?

About two years ago I met Alexandru Csete of Denmark on the Twitters, of all places. (@Csete) He caught my eye because we share a personal interest in space exploration. Ten years ago he wrote the first version of the open source real-time satellite tracking program, GNOME Predict. Today he continues to develop it. It's the best satellite tracking program in the Open Source world.

As an amateur radio operator, he also builds his own handheld communication systems and antennae dishes to perform experiments on satellites in orbit and the International Space Station.

On the other hand, Ted Winklebottom of Salisbury, MD spends his Saturday afternoons scratching his navel and fishing through tv channels. He does tech for a living, but spends his free time watching Dancing With The Stars and picking all the M&M's out of his wife's trail mix.

Alex Csete is a hero. Ted Winklebottom is dead weight.

Which one are you? If you're like Alex, I want to hear what you're doing.

Michael Doornbos is a senior contributor at BYTE. Email him at [email protected].