Mikke Torvalds is the mother of Linus Torvalds, who is the creator of the Linux operating system. Mikke does not use Linux herself, but she is quite proud of her son's accomplishments. Here is what she had to say about Linus in her own words.
Linus was (and is) one of those. A single-minded knowledge-and-mastery fanatic, to use an even stronger word than his sister's "perfectionist" (which does sum it up nicely).
I still don't think Linus has any "special" talent, certainly not "for computers". If it weren't computers, it would be something else. In another day and age he might focus on some different challenge, and I think someday he will. (What I mean is, I hope he won't be stuck in Linux maintenance forever). I think he's motivated not by "computers", and certainly not by fame or riches, but by honest curiosity and a wish to conquer difficulties as they arise. He's driven to do things the right way, because that's the way they should be done.
I suppose I have already answered the question of what Linus was like as a Son: easy to raise. As Sara and I used to say, just give Linus a spare closet with a good computer in it, feed him some dry pasta, and he will be perfectly happy.
I must admit that there was a period during his youth where I was worried about him: how on earth was he going to meet any nice girls that way? I had to resort to the tried and true parenting measure of keeping my fingers crossed on that matter. And lo and behold: it worked! He met Tove while teaching at the university. When she made him forget both his cat and his computer for several days, it was immediately obvious that Nature had triumphed, as is her wont.
Of course I'm very proud of him. He is, after all, partly responsible for the existence of the two loveliest little girls on this planet, Patricia and Daniela. And I´m happy that he is now experiencing their curiosity and growth, sibling rivalry and all. I only hope the Ghouls of Fame won't distract him too much. He seems unaffected by his fame, although he has mellowed. These days he tends to talk to people when they approach him. He even seems to have difficulty saying no. But I suspect it has more to do with his having become a husband and father than with all the media hullabaloo.
Mikke Torvalds
< ************** the great self imposed rewrite***************
A very wise editor had started to audit me, and I quickly realized (from his msgs), that I have a lot more bad nodes then I thought. So I am going to rewrite almost all of my nodes (at least the first 500 or so). I will starting at my very first node, and redoing them in order. I will list them here as I redo them. Even my best nodes could probably use a bit of work. So I will leave no node unturned (except my daylogs, which I will simply spellcheck). Comments with a lot of stars next to apply to this writeup.
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Friday, March 29, 2002 at 10:50:37
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