Curriculum Vitae

Objectives

I am currently working part-time at the University of Leeds as the web developer for the Faculty of Education, Social Sciences and Law. I’m also the technical director of the company e-2.org limited, whose current activities largely consist of working on the website healthylunch.org.uk.

I am always looking for a new position in which I am encouraged to learn new skills, and utilise my current abilities on creative and interesting projects, but do not currently have any plans to take on a new job. One particular area where I wish to develop my skills is in working as part of an agile software development team – although I have worked with designers and artists in my projects with e-2, I have never worked with other programmers to realise any of these projects.

I am very hard working and committed to all the projects I undertake, and enjoy working with other individuals who have different skill sets. I love to solve seemingly intractable problems, both in programming and in those involving interpersonal dynamics between stakeholders in the projects I am involved with. My main strength in this regard is an ability to think outside the box and employ lateral approaches to problems – I think this is the main reason for my recent interest in Agile approaches to problem solving and software development. I thrive under pressure, and the most rewarding part of web development for me is learning new skills and new technologies.

Skills

Programming:

  • PHP (10 years)
  • Perl (9 years)
  • Java (1 year)
  • ASP (3 years)
  • JavaScript (13 years)
  • XHTML/HTML (13 years)
  • CSS (10 years)
  • XML/SVG (8 years)
  • Flash/ActionScript (5 years)

Software:

  • Extensive knowledge of Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems and software.
  • Linux (RHEL, Fedora, Ubuntu, CentOS, Debian) and Windows (NT/2000/XP) system administration.
  • Web server configuration and administration (IIS 4/5, Apache 2).
  • Database configuration and administration (MSSQL Server 7.0, MySQL, PostgreSQL).
  • Mail server configuration and administration (Netscape Messaging Server, qmail, sendmail).
  • Web authoring packages and IDEs including eclipse, Visual InterDev and Dreamweaver.
  • Image editing and multimedia packages including Photoshop, Illustrator, Inkscape and Flash.

Experience

I have a broad range of programming skills utilising several different web technologies, but I am committed to using open source software. My PHP skills are excellent and I use Obeject-oriented design (utilising PHP5) and design patterns in all of my projects. I am currently working with the modx content management framework and the Zend Framework. I have extensive knowledge of XHTML, XML, SVG, JavaScript/ECMAScript, and in-depth knowledge of a number of JavaScript frameworks (including Prototype and my current favourite, jQuery). I also have extensive experience in the use of Google’s web services and APIs (AJAX, Search and mapping). I have knowledge of the full development lifecycle from the work I did with e-2 on behalf of the Royal Academy of Arts, where I wrote detailed technical and functional specifications and developed my own systems on top of an existing codebase. I use SVN to manage my own projects, but I am as yet unfamiliar with its use as a development tool within a team of programmers, as I usually work in isolation.

I am currently developing my skills in the use of PHP frameworks, Ruby on Rails, and extending my knowledge of RESTful services and the MVC architectural design pattern which underpins these technologies. I am also using the jQuery JavaScript library extensively in the web applications I develop to increase their responsiveness and interactivity in an unobtrusive, accessible and standards-compliant way.

Intersts

My main personal interests are in art, music and literature. I have published a small run of cassettes containing sounds produced by manipulating samples using a computer and have also had a small piece of music featured on a 12” vinyl E.P.. I love to read, and my main fields of interest are 20th Century fiction, music and art. I also try to keep abreast of developments in contemporary art and visit galleries  regularly.

Education

I attended schools in Lancashire, where I learnt enough to get into Leicester University in 1988 to study Chemistry with Biochemistry. I left university with a BSc (Hons) 2(ii) degree. In 1995 I started a Postgraduate Diploma in Information Management at the University of North London while working in Newham’s Library Service as a librarian. I paid for the course and did job share to free up time as my employers refused to fund my studies – I am highly self-motivated and committed to continuing professional development. Some aspects of my degree (computer modelling water molecules to investigate solvation) and the diploma (fortran programming, HTML and scripting used on CD-ROMs at the time, and cataloguing) made me realise that my interests lay in programming and markup languages. I have spent the last 14 years undergoing a programme of study in programming and markup languages – I learn new concepts very quickly and easily and I continually strive to improve the quality of my work.

Employment History

I left University with a strong desire to go to sea and become a sailor, and worked on the ferries out of Dover for a year and a half to secure my seaman’s papers. Unfortunately, the job market for container ships and tankers was quite depressed when I was trying to secure a job, so I took up a position on a cruise ship, which destroyed my desire for a seagoing life quite quickly. I love books and reading, and became a librarian – a job which I thoroughly enjoyed for 10 years until I realised that working in the public sector as a librarian was becoming a rather tenuous career choice (book selection and stock management was being taken over by the major book suppliers). However, during a Postgraduate course in information management, I became fascinated by web technologies when I realised that I found using and understanding markup and programming languages quite easy. A few years after completing the course, I embarked on a career as an intranet development officer on the strength of skills I had built up, and worked in this position for three years before starting out with my present company, e-2.