David A. Thomas (software developer)
Encyclopedia
David A. Thomas is a well-known figure in modern software development and object technology. Thomas took undergraduate (1969) and graduate (1976) degrees at the Carleton University
, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
, and held a number of software development positions in the ensuing years. Thomas is perhaps best known as the founder and past CEO of Object Technology International
, Inc., now IBM OTI Labs. OTI was responsible for initial development of the Eclipse open source
IDE
and the Visual Age Java
development environment.
Thomas is a frequent speaker at development conferences on topics dealing with technology and technology management. As an author and through publication of a number of papers in peer-reviewed journals, Thomas has demonstrated substantial contributions to both the commercial and academic aspects of software development. In 2006 he was recognized as a Distinguished Engineer by the Association for Computing Machinery
.
Carleton University
Carleton University is a comprehensive university located in the capital of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. The enabling legislation is The Carleton University Act, 1952, S.O. 1952. Founded as a small college in 1942, Carleton now offers over 65 programs in a diverse range of disciplines. Carleton has...
, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, and held a number of software development positions in the ensuing years. Thomas is perhaps best known as the founder and past CEO of Object Technology International
Object Technology International
Object Technology International was founded in Ottawa, Ontario in 1988 and acquired by IBM in 1996. OTI was the company behind the VisualAge line Smalltalk and Java development tools that eventually culminated in the open source Eclipse tool platform and integrated development environment .OTI...
, Inc., now IBM OTI Labs. OTI was responsible for initial development of the Eclipse open source
Open source
The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...
IDE
Integrated development environment
An integrated development environment is a software application that provides comprehensive facilities to computer programmers for software development...
and the Visual Age Java
VisualAge
VisualAge was the name of a family of computer integrated development environments from IBM, which included support for multiple programming languages. VisualAge was first released in the 1980s and is still available in 2011...
development environment.
Thomas is a frequent speaker at development conferences on topics dealing with technology and technology management. As an author and through publication of a number of papers in peer-reviewed journals, Thomas has demonstrated substantial contributions to both the commercial and academic aspects of software development. In 2006 he was recognized as a Distinguished Engineer by the Association for Computing Machinery
Association for Computing Machinery
The Association for Computing Machinery is a learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 as the world's first scientific and educational computing society. Its membership is more than 92,000 as of 2009...
.
External links
- Curriculum vitae
- Bedarra Research Labs
- Podcast Interview with Dave Thomas on Software Engineering Radio
- Dave Thomas
- Interview on Conferences & Technology Futures on Coding By Numbers podcast.