Wladimir Van Der Laan is one of the great developers of Bitcoin, but also one of the least known in terms of his private life. That adding to a demure public life, where his best-known contributions are the development of a graphic driver and being the current Bitcoin Lead Developer. In short, an enigmatic person that we invite you to meet.
En the history of Bitcoin, one of the most significant, although perhaps little-known, names is, without a doubt, Wladimir Van Der Laan. This character has played a huge role in the development of Bitcoin since its inception. And it has contributed considerably to give life to this project, although it has done so in a conservative way, staying away from the public glare.
Currently, Van der laan holds the position of Bitcoin main developer, since his colleague, Gavin Andresen, will leave him in this important task in April 2014.
Although his personal life has remained a complete mystery, Wladimir J. Van Der Laan is a developer, computer expert and cypherpunk from Amsterdam, Holland. She also has a master's and a doctorate in. GPU computing and graphics.
His career as a programmer began in the late 80s. At that time, Van Der Laan began developing projects in the programming language MSXBasic. And later in the language PASCAL. Then, for the years of 1994, Van Der Laan decided to further develop and enhance his knowledge and experiences. This is how he dedicated himself to the study of programming in the C language. Later, in 1999, she chose to learn the. C ++ language. The latter, which without knowing it, would open the doors to a world of innovation and opportunities as a developer of today's most popular and important cryptocurrency, Bitcoin.
Van Der Laan's beginnings in Bitcoin
While Bitcoin was publicly released in January 2009, it wasn't until late 2011 that Van Der Laan first heard about the project. His attention was immediately captured. This, then, thought that at that time the idea of a decentralized and autonomous cryptocurrency, functioning as digital cash, was the correct one. And to this day he still maintains that point of view.
Since then, Van Der Laan got started on the Bitcoin project as a contributor and to date is a member of the Bitcoin Core developer repository.
Van Der Laan as Bitcoin Lead Developer
The moment Andresen began to distance himself from the Bitcoin Core project and try to implement decisions that did not have the approval of the majority, Van Der Laan began to take over the project. Making most of the important decisions around the development of Bitcoin.
By April 2014, Andresen submitted his resignation, publicly and definitively leaving the Bitcoin Core project in the hands of Van Der Laan. Since then, this developer has served as the director and main person in charge of Bitcoin. Together with a team of other developers, they carry out the task of reviewing the project, monitoring its development and evolution, studying alternatives that solve the present problems, testing and analyzing the software, studying new implementations or improvement proposals, among many others. .
Since coming to Bitcoin Van Der Laan he has maintained a conservative and rather reserved approach, so very little is known about him and his private life. Avoiding frequent public appearances, and even refusing to give some interviews. Similarly in the context of Bitcoin, Van Der Laan has maintained his conservative stance, although he fervently defends the decentralization and autonomy of the project. It states that any proposal or improvement that arises in a BIP for the benefit of Bitcoin must be approved by the vast majority of developers and collaborators before being implemented in the system.
Van Der Laan has a blog personal in the GitHub community where he freely and openly expresses all his opinions and thoughts.
However, his conservative stance has led Van Der Laan to win both fans and opponents. Especially from those who believe that his approach is too traditional and moderate. And more for a project of such magnitude and importance as Bitcoin.
work done
Etnaviv Project Vivante GCxxx GPU
The reverse engineering project etnaviv It is an open source user space controller that is compatible and can be implemented in the integrated GPUs of the series. Vivante GCxxx. It shows the necessary tools and informative documents on how to program the chips of these units. Although Van Der Laan makes it very clear that it is still an experimental project and is not ready to be implemented by end users. And that it is aimed at developers and programmers who wish to contribute to the development and improvement of this tool.
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