About

My name is Matthias Friedrich and I'm a computer scientist from Germany. Currently, I work as a software architect for a large Internet company where I design and build big data applications and high performance web services, most of the time in Java. I love designing data intensive, distributed systems, but I've also worked in IT consulting and technical project management.

At Apache I'm a committer and PMC member for Apache Crunch, a Hadoop-based framework for writing efficient MapReduce pipelines. My past accomplishments in the Open Source area include python-musicbrainz2 and libdiscid, both sub-projects of MusicBrainz as well as several smaller bits and pieces. I am also co-author of the XSPF playlist format which is used by dozens of applications, including web sites like Yahoo!, Amazon, and Last.fm.

This blog covers technical topics that I consider interesting enough to learn and write about. The typical scope ranges from scripting hacks up to software engineering or computer science topics. Most of the time I write HOWTO-style articles mixed with reviews of useful tools, software engineering best practices, and occasionally opinions on various subjects.

All code samples and scripts published on this blog are placed in the public domain unless stated otherwise. Use them however you like but always at your own risk.

To get in contact with me send mail to blog at mafr.de.