Robert William Scheifler | |
---|---|
Born |
Kirkwood, Missouri |
June 24, 1954
Citizenship | American |
Fields | Computer science |
Alma mater | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
Known for | X Window System, Jini |
Robert William Scheifler (born June 24, 1954, Kirkwood, Missouri) is an American computer scientist. He is most notable for leading the development of the X Window System from the project's inception in 1984 until the closure of the MIT X Consortium in 1996. He later became one of the architects of the Jini architecture at Sun Microsystems.
Bob has stated that his goal in developing the X Window System was to raise the floor in windowing systems for the entire market, and despite its early adoption primarily by commercial players with proprietary extensions, X ended up as a standard, open system. X is an important part of Linux to this day.
Scheifler holds a B.S. in Mathematics and an M.S. in computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.