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Profile
I am a broadly-educated engineer and software developer, with nearly twenty years' hands-on experience in the electronics, medical and education sectors, and some management experience. I have a strong academic background, including degrees in engineering and law, and a PhD in biophysics. Although now mostly involved with consulting and support, I have personally written over a million lines of code in five different programming languages. I also have wide experience of software engineering and architecture, gained on projects ranging in scale from heart pacemakers to oil platforms. I am a qualified teacher as well.Professional skills
Here are my main areas of expertise, in approximate order of amount of experience, greatest first.
Java and C/C++ development -- I've written hundreds of thousands of
lines of code in these languages, over a twenty-year period. I have used
development tools such as SunONE Studio quite extensively, but mostly I prefer
to work the old-fashioned way, using a text editor and command-line tools.
J2EE technology -- all my current clients make extensive use of
J2EE technology; I have contributed to the architecture and implementation
of these system; I have taught courses on J2EE and written a textbook.
Sun Microsystems' middleware products -- I work on projects using
these products every day. I am particular familiar with Sun's application and
web server products, e-commerce products, portal range, and mobile content
platforms. I'm also extremely familiar with Solaris, as a user and developer.
Linux development and administration -- I have always been hugely
enthusiastic about Linux; I use it on my desktop workstations and I've
contributed to the code. Many of my current customers are running
enterprise Linux installations.
Teaching and courseware preparation -- I have been involved in
teaching and instruction for ten years, and I'm a qualified teacher.
Software engineering, modelling, and project management -- in my
development work I have made extensive use of techniques like UML
and, in earlier days, SSADM, JSD, Mascot, and others. I have taught
software engineering and project management at postgraduate level.
Network planning and implementation -- I work every day with
routers, firewalls, gateways, and proxies; I know all the standard
Internet protocols (TCP/IP, HTTP, SMTP,...) inside out.
Mathematical and computer modelling and statistics -- my academic
background is in experimental sciences, so I have extensive experience
of developing software to solve mathematical and statistical problems.
Career history
2003-present: Consultant engineer, Sun Microsystems Ltd
In my present post I coordinate the maintenance of Sun's middleware products, particular Application Server, e-commerce, and telecommunications platforms. Because the systems I support are extremely complex -- sometimes with software from many different vendors running on hundreds of hosts -- I work closely with the clients and the field engineers to identify potential problems in the architecture and implementation of the system. In many cases I have to help clients modify their systems to improve reliability or throughput and, in some cases, to make them work at all. Where one of our products is shown to be defective in some way, I coordinate the creation of a fix and, wherever possible, provide a temporary workaround to get the system up and running. I therefore require a comprehensive knowledge both ot the internals of the Company's middleware products, and the ways in which middleware systems can successfully be programmed and deployed in the field. My main clients at present are the companies working on the National Health Service `messaging spine'; when complete this is expected to be the largest application server deployment ever undertaken in the world.2000-2003: Principal Instructor, Sun Microsystems Ltd
In this role I was responsible for teaching, and developing courses on, some of the most complex Java-based technologies available: J2EE, Enterprise JavaBeans, SunONE infrastructure and middleware products. My role in the classroom was not just to teach, but to help our clients solve specific problems and to get the most from the technologies. I also trained and supervised other instructors, and ensured that we have delivery capabilities for these demanding courses. When I was not teaching or developing courseware, I maintained my own development competence by contributing to a number of open-source projects, which have included JBoss and the Linux kernel. During this period I wrote a textbook, Applied Enterprise JavaBeans Technology which was published by Prentice-Hall, and is now selling well world-wide.1997-2000: Senior lecturer in computer science, Middlesex University
I was responsible for developing and teaching major undergraduate and postgraduate courses. In particular, I was director of the Interactive Multimedia MSc programme, responsible for student recruitment and admissions, staff selection, curriculum planning and development, and regulation of assessment. My main teaching focus was on Java programming and software modelling. My main research interest was natural-language computing. During this time I became one of the first UK lecturers to gain state accreditation as a teacher in higher education.1995-1997: Head of the Electronics and Computing Unit, University College London Department of Physiology
I had managerial and budgetary responsibility for the Computing and Electronics Unit which consisted of seven staff. Our remit was to plan, install and maintain a network and computing infrastructure on five sites in London, design custom electronic equipment for laboratory use, and develop custom teaching software. As manager of this unit, I directed the installation of two miles of cabling, 200 workstations and four servers on five sites. During this time I developed and implemented what I believe to be the first web-based student self-assessment system in the UK.1989-1992: Senior systems programmer, Royal Brompton Hospital, London
I this post I developed bespoke, safety-critical software for medical research. For example, as part of a small team, I designed and implemented a novel experimental heart pacemaker. My main responsibility was design and testing of the electronic hardware and programming the embedded microcontroller in assembly language. I also developed a new technique for predicting heart disease based on statistical analysis of heart-rate variability.Before 1989
A number of training and junior positions in the computing and electronics industries.Education
LLB (2:1)in Laws, University of London, 2005PGCert(HE) in Education, Middlesex University 1999 PhD in Biophyics, University College London 1995
BEng (1st class) in Electronic Engineering, Surrey University 1989
Accreditation and membership
State-accredited (SEDA) teacher in higher education since 2000 British Computer Society -- corporate member (MBCS) since 1999Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine -- corporate member (MIPEM) since 1997
Personal
I am married with two children. My leisure interests include martial arts, especially karate; garden railways; DIY; outdoor sports and, of course, doing dad-type things with my children.
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