Daniel Stringfield
From JaxLUGWiki
Daniel Stringfield was the founding member and acting president of the Jacksonville Linux Users Group (JaxLUG) from late 1996 until late 2000.
Daniel had always had a fascination with electronics since an early age. He learned to program in BASIC on a Commodore 128D he repaired himself after his uncle tossed it out. Over the summer between grades 7 and 8 he built his first IBM compatible PC using money he earned from babysitting. In highschool he was introduced to AT&T System V Unix (SVR4) and became interested in obtaining Linux in order to further his Unix knowledge using his home computer. He was given a large stack of floppies containing a pre 1.0 release of Slackware that utilized the Linux kernel 0.97.
After much difficulty getting Slackware installed, he quickly went back to using MS-DOS because of the limited usefulness of Linux at that time. Several years later he began using Slackware again to run a multiuser BBS system. During his junior year of highschool he dropped out and became employed as a network administrator in charge of a Netware installation for a small healthcare company. A few months later he began working for a computer store building and repairing PC's. There he formulated the idea to start the Jacksonville Linux Users Group. He began talking about Linux to anyone who would listen. JaxLUG meetings were very informal and primarily consisted of showing friends how to install Slackware and roll their own kernel.
A fellow by the name of Phillip Hempel who frequented the computer store was very interested in JaxLUG and introduced Daniel to Debian GNU/Linux. JaxLUG meetings became more formalized after making friends with Eric Molitor, a coworker in the tech support department for a major online service provider. Later that year Daniel negotiated free colocation of the first jaxlug.org webserver from the Jacksonville Community Access Network (JAXCAN), a 501(c)3 organization with ties to Florida Community College at Jacksonville (FCCJ).
His involvement with JAXCAN landed him a full time job as a junior Unix admin at FCCJ. There he advocated the use of Linux and was able to introduce Debian based solutions for DNS, Student used mail services, and unix teaching platforms among other things. Around this time, JaxLUG really started to take off, with meetings and installfests taking place on FCCJ campuses. After 2 years with FCCJ, Daniel was let go and moved on to working on Unix system administration in corporate environments. In January of 2001, he was hired by a Backup and Recovery managed service provider that moved him away from Jacksonville.
That year, he became an active member of LEAP-CF in Orlando and briefly served as Treasurer. He was once again relocated, this time to New Jersey. By that time, his interests in Linux faded and never joined another LUG. Several years later he was promoted to a senior level consulting position which required him to relocate to the Boston area. He now lives in New Hampshire.
Daniel now uses MacOS X as his primary desktop platform after selling off his Linux and Windows based computers. His current interests are focused on the Libertarian party and keeping aquariums.
