Paul Vixie is the author of several RFCs and standard UNIX system programs, among them SENDS, proxynet, rtty and Vixie cron.

In 1988, while employed by DEC, he started working on the popular internet domain name server BIND, of which he was the primary author and architect, until release 8.

After he left DEC in 1994, he founded Internet Software Consortium (ISC) together with Rick Adams and Carl Malamud to support BIND and other software for the Internet. The activities of ISC were assumed by a new company, Internet Systems Consortium in 2004.

In 1995, he cofounded the Palo Alto Internet Exchange (PAIX), and after Metromedia Fiber Network (MFN) bought it in 1999 served as the chief technology officer to MFN / AboveNet and later as the president of PAIX.

In 1998, he cofounded MAPS (Mail Abuse Prevention System), a California nonprofit company with the goal of stopping email abuse.

He also ran his own consulting business, Vixie Enterprises.

Along with Frederick Avolio, he co-wrote the book Sendmail: Theory and Practice (ISBN 1-55558-127-7 first edition, ISBN 155558229X second edition).

He has also stated that he "now hold[s] the record for 'most CERT advisories due to a single author.'"

Although working for ISC, the operator of the F root server, he at one point joined the Open Root Server Network project and operates their L root server.

Vixie served as a judge for the Mozilla Foundation's "Download Day", an attempt to set a Guiness World Record for most downloads in a single day for a new piece of software.

He attended George Washington High School in San Francisco, California.

Vixie was elected to the ARIN Board of Trustees in 2005, and was selected as Chairman in 2009.