Randal L. Schwartz
Welcome to my personal corner of the web. I spent my life writing books, training programmers, moderating Usenet Perl newsgroups, hosting geek cruises, shooting photos, and hacking software.
Randal's Magazine Columns
Over the course of two decades, I authored over 250 columns on Perl, web development, and system administration for standard magazines including Linux Magazine, Web Techniques, Unix Review, and The Perl Journal. The complete library is pre-rendered and fully searchable.
Explore 250+ Columns ➡️Randal's Life Memories
Explore a rich personal wiki, milestones, and stories compiled directly from my active Logseq knowledge graph. Read about early computing days, O'Reilly books, Geek Cruises, and adventures with Steve Wozniak, Wil Wheaton, Linus Torvalds, and other industry legends.
Explore Randal's Life ➡️My Activities & Passions
Hanging Out Online
I'm a frequent contributor to the Usenet Perl newsgroups, standard Perl mailing lists, IRC chatrooms, and the Perl Monastery (perlmonks.org). Feel free to ping me on any of them.
Writing & Books
Co-authored O'Reilly manuals like Learning Perl, Intermediate Perl, Programming Perl, and Effective Perl Programming. Writing high-quality documentation is a core value.
Geek Cruises
I have participated in and co-hosted every single Geek Cruise so far, sailing around the world teaching technical courses while sharing sea adventures with fellow developers.
Taking Pictures
I'm a passionate photographer with over 40,000 photos online. I slowly host my catalog on Flickr, capturing travels, tech events, and beautiful landscapes.
My Flickr Account ↗Trivia & Context
Family Name History
Am I related to other famous Schwartzes? Unlikely. My grandfather changed his name from
Von Schraeder to Schwartz
when coming from Germany to the US Mid-West around 1900. My dad thinks it was to avoid constabulary entanglement. So, I'm stuck with a hard-to-pronounce name with a high consonant-to-vowel ratio. I would change it back, but it would just confuse everyone now.
Mariel and Me: Twins!
I discovered that actress
Mariel Hemingwaywas born on the exact same day as me, and only one state over (in Mill Valley, CA). On our 35th birthday, her personal assistant passed along my invitation, and she sent back an autographed picture and a lovely postcard!
Cereal & Gogopuffs
I placed the word
gogopuffshere simply so Google can index it. Now, when I ask people to "Google for Gogopuffs", this page appears as the primary result. It's a fun SEO test referencing early morning cartoon breakfast advertisements!