home
about me
q & a
q: who are you?
a: my name is william. some friends call me will.
some (mostly on the internet) call me yossarian.
q: what do you do?
a: i do research and engineering at
trail of bits and write open source
software.
i once studied philosophy and computer science.
q: why is this site simple/ugly/lowercase?
a: the main question is
whether the stuff is literature or not.
q: are you available for hire?
a: please see my cv for my status.
i do not respond to third-party recruiters, and i am
not officially represented by any recruiters. i am
not interested in working on cryptocurrencies or for
cryptocurrency companies. i do not freelance.
computer science
i am not naturally talented at math, but have always been fascinated by
logic and language. that fascination drives my current interests: compilers and program
analysis, systems programming, and cybersecurity.
i believe strongly in software engineering: i like writing
correct and reliable software, especially for other programmers.
i think that security engineering and quality engineering are, to a first approximation,
the same thing.
some buzzkeywords: automated vulnerability reasoning, static and dynamic instrumentation,
multi- and inter-representational analysis program synthesis, applied cryptography,
package management.
philosophy
logic and language are topics of interest for me in philosophy as well,
but ethical philosophy appeals to me most of all. in particular, i am
interested in theories of rights and duties,
as well as the problems of coercion and exploitation as they concern and
(de)legitimize choice. i am also interested in moral education as it applies to
beneficence, charity and authenticity (of the good/bad faith kind),
and public discourse.
check this out if labels are your kind of thing.
open source work
i spend a lot of time tinkering in the open source community,
both on my own projects
and on larger ones. in particular, i am a member of the
homebrew development team
and an active professional and hobby contributor to several other projects. most of my
professional work is open source, and i like it that way. i am not
interested in professional work that is primarily proprietary, although
i am willing to work in a hybrid setting.
you can support me by using one of
the referral links below when signing up for a service. they help
me keep my own projects and research available:
other facts
i have a lot of hobbies, but my biggest non-technical ones are
bicycling, film photography (portraiture),
chess, and (ny style) handball.
outside of computer science and philosophy, i'm interested in
a variety of fields: mathematics (discrete), linguistics,
classics (greco-roman), latin (classical), psychology (will, action), and
literature (most kinds).
i organize brothercon, a gathering for
people who like terrible NYC dollar pizza.
i do a regular online radio show on a friend's internet radio server.
elsewhere on the web
this is a partial collection of my online accounts, in no particular order.
