Ted Hess
Retired at Kitschensync
Hudson, Massachusetts, United States
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolTed Hess is a retired technical leader and hands-on architect with over 30 years of experience building operating systems, networking, embedded systems and security-focused infrastructure. He spent a substantial portion of his career as a principal/consulting engineer at Digital Equipment Corporation and later led development of continuous backup technologies through Network Integrity/LiveVault/Iron Mountain Digital. In recent years he’s remained active in open source, contributing significant embedded and audio support to high-profile OpenWrt/LEDE trees and improving CircuitPython’s web workflow for low-power devices. His deep expertise in Windows NT/2000/XP/2003 internals complements long-standing mastery of Linux kernel and hardware-specific driver work. Based in Hudson, Massachusetts, he now pursues hobby projects in custom networking, video and home automation while continuing to maintain and shepherd community firmware improvements. A lifelong engineer with a BSEE from Rutgers, he blends low-level systems craftsmanship with practical product-focused delivery.
12 years of coding experience
30 years of employment as a software developer
BSEE, Electrical Engineering, BSEE, Electrical Engineering at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey-New Brunswick
Github Skills (41)
build-configuration10
integrate10
py10
package-management10
scripting10
patch10
build-system10
c-programming10
c1110
perl10
linux-kernel10
makefile10
microcontroller10
integrations10
c1710
Programming languages (11)
Github contributions (5)
openwrt/packages
Jul 2014 - Nov 2022
Community maintained packages for OpenWrt. Documentation for submitting pull requests is in CONTRIBUTING.md
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:6 reviews, 976 commits, 759 PRs in 8 years 5 months
Contributions summary:Ted contributed to package imports from oldpackages, importing and integrating code, specifically relating to the avahi, mpd, mpc, shairport, libdaemon, libmms, flac, libaudiofile, libmad, alsa-utils, cmdpad, triggerhappy, argp-standalone, mjpg-streamer, libv4l and sox packages. These imports often involved refreshing patches and adding themselves as package maintainer. The user updated various configurations and init scripts, along with fixing builds.
openwrt
openwrt/openwrt
Jan 2018 - Sep 2025
This repository is a mirror of https://git.openwrt.org/openwrt/openwrt.git It is for reference only and is not active for check-ins. We will continue to accept Pull Requests here. They will be merged via staging trees then into openwrt.git.
Role in this project:Embedded Systems Engineer / IoT Developer
Embedded Systems Engineer / IoT DeveloperContributions:3 PRs, 1 push, 1 branch in 7 years 9 months
Contributions summary:Ted contributed significantly to the OpenWrt repository, focusing on the integration and support of the Gateworks Avila family, which involves embedded systems. Their work includes adding audio support, updating kernel versions, and modifying build scripts related to image generation for the IXP4XX architecture. The commits demonstrate a strong understanding of kernel configurations, patch management, and hardware-specific drivers. The user's modifications enable audio functionality and address compatibility issues for the Gateworks Avila platforms.
openwrt
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