Geoff Perlman (born January 6, 1964) is an American entrepreneur and author whose vision for cross-platform development tools has growing impact for developing applications on different operating systems.[citation needed] His interest in cross-platform compatibility surfaced at an early age during exposure to technology at the local university. Carrying this passion with him throughout his life he has founded companies to allow ordinary people to create extraordinary things with computer software. Perlman has worked for a number of technology companies in his career, including AT&T and 4D, and he founded development tools company, Real Software,[1] in 1996.
Early life and education
Perlman was born to a large, native-southern Californian family on January 6, 1964. The son of an electrical engineer who designed communications equipment for military purposes and a social worker, Perlman attended University High School in Irvine, California. Perlman first became interested in programming at age 10 while watching Star Trek and learning about the technology of the future. To feed this interest Perlman spent time at the University of California at Irvine computer science lab learning about mainframe computers. A few years later Perlman’s father brought home a Texas Instruments portable terminal that allowed him to further develop his programming skills.
Early career
In 1984, Perlman took a job as a customer service/billing technician at AT&T in an office that housed approximately 300 employees. The office phone system reported the number of calls each employee would take per hour and staff managers reviewed this information on a weekly basis and compared it to employee’s seniority to determine when lunches and breaks would be allotted. Perlman went to his manager and suggested he could write a program to automate this process; something that took each manager a full day per week to do—his program would reduce the task to 15 minutes. He was given an office and a computer to build this application.
Career
Perlman then went to work for a computer store in Costa Mesa in 1986, where he met Stephen Douglas (Redheads International) who was then the editor of a video magazine. Douglas, becoming close friends with the young Perlman, convinced him to start working for himself. Perlman took Douglas' advice and started his own design/publishing company, while continuing to work on his knowledge of computer programming. Using his knowledge of database design, he has spent most of his career working for companies he founded, although midway through his rise up in the tech world, he worked in Silicon Valley for 4D (then ACIUS) from 1990 to 1994. He was hired to conduct training classes across the US teaching users how to develop database applications using 4D and its programming language. Initially he was the only trainer the company employed.[2] He quickly grew the department, hiring three additional trainers and quadrupled the training revenue.
Founding Real Software
Perlman founded development tools company, Real Software,[3] in 1996. At the time there was nothing like Visual Basic for the Mac.[4] Realbasic (now Real Studio[5]), Real Software’s flagship product, was meant to offer the flexibility of Visual Basic to Mac users while offering them an integrated drag and drop user interface builder. It was clear to Perlman that cross-platform development was the way of the future with the increasing marketshare of Mac and Linux.[6] Realbasic quickly released the option to cross-compile applications for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux, making it the only true cross-platform development tool on the market at the time.
Perlman continues to serve as the CEO of Real Software where they recently released Real Studio Web Edition,[7] which is one way to develop powerful, modern web[8] applications without the need to learn multiple programming languages. Web Apps written with Real Studio Web Edition are also running in modern Browsers of Mobile Operating Systems like iOS and Android.[9]
Publications
Perlman is the author of Inside 4th Dimension,[10][11][12] which was published by SYBEX in 1993. This book describes the basics of database management including creating files, new features that were included in the old 4th Dimension product, and building an introductory database for custom applications.
Perlman has written articles about development tools published in Dr. Dobb's Journal,[13] VentureBeat[14] and SD Times.[15]
Personal life
Perlman currently resides in Austin, Texas, with his wife and two children.
References
- ^ Perlman, Geoff (October 12, 2010). "Geoff Perlman Linkedin Page". LinkedIn. Retrieved 2010-10-12.
- ^ "4D Training". 4D Training. 4D.
- ^ Howe, Guyren G (2004). "REALbasic Best Practices: An Interview with Geoff Perlman". MacTech.
- ^ "Real Software Press Release". REAL Software Ships REALbasic 1.0. Real Software. Retrieved 20 December 2011.
- ^ "REAL Software Ships REAL Studio 2010 Release 1; Announces New Product Name, Adds Improved ActiveX Support". Real Software Announces New Product Name. Real Software. Retrieved 20 December 2011.
- ^ "Real Studio for Commercial Programmers". Real Studio for Commercial Programmers. Real Software. Retrieved 20 December 2011.
- ^ "REAL Software Announces REAL Studio Web Edition; Revolutionizes How Web Applications are Developed". Real Studio Web Edition Announced. Real Software.
- ^ Ohlhorst, Frank (June 2011). "3 Tools to Accelerate Web Development". IDG. Retrieved 2011-06-17.
- ^ "Real Studio on iOS". Real Studio on iOS. Real Software. Retrieved 20 December 2011.
- ^ Perlman, Geoff (1993). "Inside 4th Dimension". Sybex. Retrieved 2010-10-15.
- ^ Porter, William (February 2000). "Looking into the 4th Dimension". MacTech. Retrieved 2010-10-12.
- ^ Fourer, Robert (1997). "Database structures for mathematical programming models. Decision Support Systems". Unknown. Retrieved 2010-10-15.
- ^ Perlman, Geoff (2011). "HTML5: Where Are All the Apps". Dr. Dobb's Journal.
- ^ Perlman, Geoff (August 2011). "Luck and 4 Other Keys to Surviving the Startup Phase". VentureBeat. Retrieved 2011-08-04.
- ^ Perlman, Geoff (June 2011). "Are Your Web Apps Safe?". BZ Media LLC. Retrieved 2011-06-01.
External links
- Real Software, Inc., makers of Real Studio
- Real Software Blog, Real Software/Cross-Platform Development Blog
- Inside 4th Dimension, a book on 4D published by SYBEX