Jim Gettys is interested in open-source systems for education on very inexpensive computers.

He was previously at HP's Cambridge Research Lab working on the X Window System with Keith Packard, both on desktops and embedded systems such as the HP iPAQ. He helped to start the handhelds.org project and has also contributed to freedesktop.org efforts.

Gettys continues to serve on the X.org Foundation board of directors and served until 2004 on the Gnome Foundation board of directors. Gettys worked at W3C from 1995-1999; he is the editor of the HTTP/1.1 specification (now an IETF Draft Standard). He is one of the principle authors of the X Window System, edited the HTTP/1.1 specification for the IETF, and and one of the authors of AF, a network transparent audio server system.