Danese Cooper is an American programmer,[1] computer scientist[2] and advocate of open source software.

[9] In October 2018, Danese joined Irish tech company NearForm as VP of Special Initiatives.

[4][11] She was recruited, while at a sushi bar in Cupertino, to a position at Sun working towards opening the source code to Java.

[6] She has also made public speaking appearances discussing open sourcing, speaking at the Malaysian National Computer Confederation Open Source Compatibility Centre, OSCON, gov2.0 Expo, and the Southern California Linux Expo.

[6][12] Cooper credits her time with the Peace Corps as fostering her desire to travel and work within the developing world to explore policy, education and how open source software can "give certain kids another alternative".