Welcome,

My name is Chad, but I go by Charims online. Why? I don’t really know. I have had the name for years.

I’m a privacy evangelist, which means I encourage people to find ways to increase their privacy, on the internet or in their day-to-day lives. I believe in a right to privacy, and I strongly disagree with the statements like “but I’ve got nothing to hide!”. Do I still use some services that compromise my privacy, yes, but I have minimized it to where I am comfortable, and continue to choose more privacy when I encounter choices in my day-to-day life.

Privacy isn’t about suddenly locking down everything, its a choice you make every day about what you want to share with the world. I want to have the opportunity to choose what I share, and with whom. I want others to have that opportunity as well. There are organizations who want to take that choice away(and are generally succeeding), some are in government, and some are corporations.

As well, I love computers (sometimes). I’ve been a GNU/Linux user since 2003 (I was there for Warty Warthog), but my first installation was Mandrake. I’ve always been a DIY type of person. I like to solve challenging problems. I’ve been automating Linux in the enterprise since probably around 2010. I’m not the biggest geek, but I do OK. I spent some time in college, and while I learned a lot of computer science theory, it was gumption and striving with peers and on my own that taught me a lot more in the end.

I’m also a hacker. No, I don’t break into computers or anything like that. I take disparate things and put them together in new and novel ways. I use python like a handyman uses duct tape… OK, maybe not that bad… Regardless, I get by, and I’ve built some pretty awesome things along the way. My strengths really lie in automation and building simple architectures. Somewhere along the way, computers got complex. Its up to us to make them simple again. Great, you managened to spin up 17 different programs all to serve a single slow loading javascript-heavy web page; I’m not impressed.

I run Archlinux everywhere I can. When i need a graphical UI, I run with swaywm (thanks Drew and crew!) and alacritty for my terminal.

I like to tinker with developer products and single board computers, like the rockpro64, and raspberry pi. I also have one of the first shipments of the pinebook pro, and the braveheart edition pinephone. Why? Because I want to help make this type of hardware better, and the software that runs on it. Open source software runs better on open source hardware.

Lastly, and of most importance, I’m a family guy. I have two beautiful little girls and a gorgeous wife, who all struggle with more than their fair share of health problems, but are stronger for it.