Sean Egan is a software engineer

Software engineer

A software engineer is an engineer who applies the principles of software engineering to the design, development, testing, and evaluation of the software and systems that make computers or anything containing software, such as computer chips, work.- Overview :...

 at Google

Google

Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...

, where he worked on Google Talk

Google Talk

Google Talk is a freeware voice over Internet protocol client application offered by Google Inc. The first beta version of the program was released on August 24, 2005...

 and is currently working on Google Maps

Google Maps

Google Maps is a web mapping service application and technology provided by Google, free , that powers many map-based services, including the Google Maps website, Google Ride Finder, Google Transit, and maps embedded on third-party websites via the Google Maps API...

. He is the former project leader of Pidgin, a popular instant messaging

Instant messaging

Instant Messaging is a form of real-time direct text-based chatting communication in push mode between two or more people using personal computers or other devices, along with shared clients. The user's text is conveyed over a network, such as the Internet...

 client. He is also the author of the book "Open Source Messaging Application Development. Extending Gaim."

Biography

Born on April 5, 1982, in Long Island

Long Island

Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...

, New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

, Sean Egan graduated from Chaminade High School

Chaminade High School

Chaminade High School is a Roman Catholic college preparatory high school for young men. Located in Mineola, New York, the school was founded in 1930 by the Society of Mary , an international Roman Catholic teaching order of priests and religious Brothers. The school is named for Father William...

 in Mineola, New York

Mineola, New York

Mineola is a village in Nassau County, New York, USA. The population was 18,799 at the 2010 census. The name is derived from a Native American word meaning a "pleasant place"....

 and earned his Bachelor of Science

Bachelor of Science

A Bachelor of Science is an undergraduate academic degree awarded for completed courses that generally last three to five years .-Australia:In Australia, the BSc is a 3 year degree, offered from 1st year on...

 degree at Binghamton University

Binghamton University

Binghamton University, also formally called State University of New York at Binghamton, , is a public research university in the State of New York. The University is one of the four university centers in the State University of New York system...

 with a major in computer science

Computer science

Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...

.

He has been a major contributor to the field of open-source real-time communication software since 2000, when he started working on Pidgin

Pidgin (software)

Pidgin is an open-source multi-platform instant messaging client, based on a library named libpurple. Libpurple has support for many commonly used instant messaging protocols, allowing the user to log into various services from one application.The number of Pidgin users was estimated to be over 3...

, an open-source, multi-protocol, cross-platform instant messaging application. Sean Egan became an official part of the Pidgin team in January 2001 and was maintainer of Pidgin from early 2002 until April 2008 when he announced his retirement.

He was hired by Google, Inc. in September 2005 as a software engineer on the Google Talk

Google Talk

Google Talk is a freeware voice over Internet protocol client application offered by Google Inc. The first beta version of the program was released on August 24, 2005...

 team. As a leader of the libjingle

Jingle (protocol)

Jingle is an extension to the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol . It implements peer-to-peer session control for multimedia interactions such as in Voice over IP or videoconferencing communications. It was designed by Google and the XMPP Standards Foundation. The multimedia streams are...

 project, Sean Egan is focusing his efforts on ensuring interoperability in the voice features of XMPP

Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol

Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol is an open-standard communications protocol for message-oriented middleware based on XML . The protocol was originally named Jabber, and was developed by the Jabber open-source community in 1999 for near-real-time, extensible instant messaging , presence...

-based instant messaging clients.

Published works

• Egan, Sean M. Open Source Messaging Application Development: Building and Extending Gaim, Berkeley, CA: Apress
  Apress
  Apress, Inc. is a publisher of information technology books, based in New York City. It is a division of Springer Science+Business Media.Apress was founded by authors Gary Cornell and Dan Appleman. Its original name was Author's Press, shortened to APress, then Apress. In 2003, Apress purchased...
  
  , 2005. ISBN 1-59059-467-3.

External links

• seanegan Egan's user page at the Pidgin Instant Messaging Client website
• Speaker Profile, O'Reilly Emerging Telephony Conference

News media