*** interview with one members on KMail developer team***

Hi

KMail is a very nice Email Manager software for Linux users. This is one of KDE productions (See: www.KDE.org)

Last year, I interviewed with one of team members of KDE developer team, Mr Ingo Klöcker and I published it in my Persian blog. Now I republish it in English:

On Wednesday 10 March 2010:

1.Please introduce yourself.
I'm Ingo Klöcker and I'm 38 years old. I studied Mathematics and did a Ph.D. in Number Theory. Now I'm working as Development Manager in a software company doing medical imaging. I was born in Aachen (Germany) and I'm currently living in Bremen (Germany).


2.When You began Programming? How did You Learn Programming?
At the age of 12 (or 13?) I was first introduced to programming by a neighbor who had an Apple IIe. At this time I wrote my first, very basic programs in BASIC. At the age of 16 I took a course in university for learning Pascal. Then I had three years of Computer Science at high school, but to be honest I didn't really learn that much in high school. I mostly learned programming by simply doing it, i.e. by writing programs in my spare time.


3.Why You Choose Linux OS ?
I was introduced to Linux during my vocational training. Shortly afterwards I bought my first Linux distribution. It was love on first sight. Since then Linux has been my main OS and I did only boot into Windows for playing games. Now I use Linux exclusively at home.


And if Softwares of Linux are Free , How Programmers Earn Money in Linux?!
It's not Linux software that's free, but Free Software that's free. Of course, a lot of software written for Linux is Free Software, but there is also a lot of proprietary software written for Linux.

Many programmers who do earn money with Linux do so by selling services or by working for companies that develop software for Linux.


4.When Kmail Project Started ?
The KMail project was started shortly after the start of the KDE project. I don't know the exact date. The first date mentioned in the CHANGES file is 1997-05-09, but there have been three "releases" before this date (0.0.1, 0.0.2, and 0.0.3).


5.How About the Last Version of Kmail ?
The latest version of KMail is the one that is part of KDE SC 4.4. We are currently working on porting KMail to our new backend Akonadi. At the same time we are working on making KMail more modular, so that its main components can be used independently of each other by other
applications with similar needs.


And How About Kmail Security?
KMail supports signing and encryption with OpenPGP since a very long time. Actually, my first contributions to KMail were related to KMail's OpenPGP support. Since KDE SC 3.1 (released in January 2003) KMail supports PGP/MIME and S/MIME, i.e. the two most important standards for signing and encryption of email messages. This development was done in close collaboration with the developers of GnuPG.
Of course, KMail also supports the necessary protocols for secure connections with mail servers, i.e. SSL and TLS together with the corresponding authentication methods (e.g. CRAM-MD5, DIGEST-MD5, NTLM, and GSSAPI).

KMail has always had a focus on security. For example, any active content in email messages (e.g. JavaScript) is ignored. Moreover, by default external links in HTML messages are not resolved to protect the privacy of the user. (External links in HTML messages are often used for
tracking whether a recipient has read a messages.)


6.Were You Wrote A Program For Mobile too?
The Kolab Konsortium which added the support for PGP/MIME and S/MIME I mentioned above is currently working on bringing Kontact to Windows Mobile 6.5 devices and to the N900.


7.On which Project You Are working NOW ? Can You tell me ?
I'm still working on KMail, but I'm not doing actual development work
anymore. Instead, nowadays I'm active in user support.


8.What's difficulties Of Programming in Your Country And in the World? Can You render A solution ?

I'm not sure what you mean. So I cannot answer this question. Maybe you can rephrase it.


9.With Which programming language You are Working ?

C++ and a bit of Python.


10. I Write Some Words , Please Write Your view And credo About Which Word :

Computer : Computers are ubiquitous (at least in the Western world). I'm not sure
whether that's good or bad.
Programming: I love programming. :-)

Internet: Free access to information (via the Internet) is one of the core requirements for a free world.

Linux: Linux rocks.

Success: Every man (and woman) is the architect of his (or her) own fortune.

چو تو خود كنی اختر خویش را بد/ مدار از فلك چشم نیك اختری را
(I hope this is correct. I copied it from a web page.)
(editor: this is from a Persian poem that means: when you destroy your chance, so don’t expect fortune from sky…)

Cigarette: I loathe smoking.
Civilization: Civilization is a great game.


11.What's Your Recommendations To Programmers And Companies?

Write Free Software!

*** thanks a lot from Mr Ingo Klöcker for participate in this interview***

If you interviewed with a programmer or technology master, please let’s know by leaving a comment…

(Source: http://theFastPerfectionist.Blogspot.com)