That's Jeri Ellsworth, one of the smartest ladies I know. ^^ She taught herself Verilog with no prior experience or formal training in electronics/logic, and has implemented an entire C64 in it for FPGAs (and later mass-produced masked VLSI designs).
If you've bought one of those "C64 in a joystick" things, she's the one that designed it. =) (The core silicon bits of it anyway). It's real hardware, not a software emulation like a lot of "games in a joystick" devices are! You can even access some of the C64's expansion buses by soldering connectors to pads on the device's mainboard.
So yeah, because of her sheer awesome geek cred, lots of hax0rs slobber over her, even though she's older than most of us (she's 32). That said, she looks damn good for 32 (and is cute by any measure, at least I think so). ^^
It's cool that she kept coming by where I was sitting for CTF to see what I was hacking on. I was pretty flattered. I've known her since 2000 or so, but it still flatters the hell out of me when I actually do something that impresses her. =)
Hey I was hacking in 6502 (well, 6510) assembly at CTF, which is what she came over to check on. =)
Knowing the guys (or girls) she pays attention to for more than 30 minutes, you have to have some pretty damn good credentials. I usually see her with people who did stuff like designing parts of the Amiga custom chipset, wrote major applications from the period that EVERYONE used, or created damn impressive expansion devices that let limited systems do things nobody expected. =P
In general, DefCon is definitely different from scientific conferences on say crypto. Different crowd. Different habits. Different clothes. More show off. Interesting...
I thought that she looked familiar when I saw her go by on roller skates, but I didn't realize it was her until after the con. She looked different than the last several times I've met her. And I guess my brain wasn't associating her with DefCon at all, even though I ran into her there last year. (We mostly cross paths at the Vintage Computer Festival in Mountain View, and a Commodore convention that I forgot the name of now — it was in Vegas the weekend before DefCon this year. Last year they were on the same dates, so I traveled back and forth between the two.)
That guy feeling her up posing with her, was the guy who was trying to talk me into doing some network security/forensics contracting work for NASA.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2006-08-16 11:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-17 01:51 am (UTC)If you've bought one of those "C64 in a joystick" things, she's the one that designed it. =) (The core silicon bits of it anyway). It's real hardware, not a software emulation like a lot of "games in a joystick" devices are! You can even access some of the C64's expansion buses by soldering connectors to pads on the device's mainboard.
So yeah, because of her sheer awesome geek cred, lots of hax0rs slobber over her, even though she's older than most of us (she's 32). That said, she looks damn good for 32 (and is cute by any measure, at least I think so). ^^
It's cool that she kept coming by where I was sitting for CTF to see what I was hacking on. I was pretty flattered. I've known her since 2000 or so, but it still flatters the hell out of me when I actually do something that impresses her. =)
no subject
Date: 2006-08-17 05:59 am (UTC)*still knows 6502 assembly*
no subject
Date: 2006-08-17 06:22 am (UTC)Knowing the guys (or girls) she pays attention to for more than 30 minutes, you have to have some pretty damn good credentials. I usually see her with people who did stuff like designing parts of the Amiga custom chipset, wrote major applications from the period that EVERYONE used, or created damn impressive expansion devices that let limited systems do things nobody expected. =P
no subject
Date: 2006-08-17 07:01 am (UTC)I am the go-to guy on EFI hardware and software for motorcycles, though. :D In fact, I wrote the only book on the subject. Is that cred enough? :D
no subject
Date: 2006-08-17 06:19 am (UTC)In general, DefCon is definitely different from scientific conferences on say crypto. Different crowd. Different habits. Different clothes. More show off. Interesting...
Jeri Ellsworth
Date: 2006-08-17 02:30 pm (UTC)I thought that she looked familiar when I saw her go by on roller skates, but I didn't realize it was her until after the con. She looked different than the last several times I've met her. And I guess my brain wasn't associating her with DefCon at all, even though I ran into her there last year. (We mostly cross paths at the Vintage Computer Festival in Mountain View, and a Commodore convention that I forgot the name of now — it was in Vegas the weekend before DefCon this year. Last year they were on the same dates, so I traveled back and forth between the two.)
That guy
feeling her upposing with her, was the guy who was trying to talk me into doing some network security/forensics contracting work for NASA.