John Socha - Independent Work

Independent Work

In the early days of the IBM PC, John Socha wrote a column for the now defunct magazine Softalk, where he published such programs as ScrnSave, KbdBuffer (extending the keyboard buffer), and WhereIs (finding files on a hard disk).

ScrnSave was the first screensaver ever created. John Socha also coined the term screen saver. The built-in screensaver (night sky with stars) was one of the most distinctive features of Norton Commander, along with the famous two-panel blue screen.

When Peter Norton Computing was acquired by Symantec in 1990, John Socha left to found his own company, Socha Computing Inc. The new company developed the Microsoft Plus! add-on pack for Windows 95, and also developed screensavers for Windows 98. In July 1997 Socha Computing was acquired by Asymetrix.

Since October 2003, John has devoted himself to his long-standing hobby of model railroading. He is co-founder of New Rail Models.

In December 2004, John Socha co-authored Optimize Your Pocket PC Development with the .NET Compact Framework for MSDN Magazine.

Read more about this topic:  John Socha

Famous quotes containing the words independent and/or work:

    “The real, then, is that which, sooner or later, information and reasoning would finally result in, and which is therefore independent of the vagaries of me and you. Thus, the very origin of the conception of reality shows that this conception essentially involves the notion of a COMMUNITY, without definite limits, and capable of a definite increase of knowledge.”
    —Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914)

    “Women are in bondage; their clothes are a great hindrance to their engaging in any business which will make them pecuniarily independent, and since the soul of womanhood never can be queenly and noble so long as it must beg bread for its body, is it not better, even at the expense of a vast deal of annoyance, that they whose lives deserve respect and are greater than their garments should give an example by which woman may more easily work out her own emancipation?”
    —Lucy Stone (1818–1893)