Miguel de Icaza spends his days as a computer-network administrator at the Institute of Nuclear Sciences at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, in Mexico City. Watching over the network, he says, "gives me a lot of spare time"-time he spends answering e-mail and working on "fun little projects." His current spare-time computer activity, he thinks, is "really great." De Icaza is coordinating the GNOME project, a volunteer effort to develop a computer desktop-a mouse-and-windows interface-that will outdo the various incarnations of Windows that form the foundation of the Microsoft empire.

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