Aviation
(holder of an Australian Private Pilot Licence, MECIR), Golf, Fishing,
Entertaining
Tertiary
Education
Bachelor
of Applied Science in Computer Science, Royal Melbourne Institute of
Technology, Melbourne, Australia (1982)
Skills Summary
–Solutions Architect for many major local and
global projects involving the documentation, design and development of predominantly
but not exclusively web based solutions for clients such as the Ford Motor
Company, Telstra, BHP Billiton, Harvey Norman, News Limited and others.
–Project estimation and costing for small to
medium sized projects.
–Strong collaborative skills illustrating the capability
to work together with project stakeholders to obtain efficient, solid outcomes.
–Illustrated long standing ability to work independently
in the design, implementation and management of projects to obtain cost
effective results.
–Creating analysis and solution design documents,
passing them to developers for implementation, then managing them through the
project process to help ensure timely and on/under budget project delivery.
–Management of developers, providing
implementation and code reviews and giving feedback to help ensure effective
project outcomes and to allow them to grow and mature. Also taking part in the
hiring process, interviewing and recommending the hiring of developers both
locally and in other remote technology centres.
–Integration architecture design and development
using RESTful services and web services with SOAP,
for both provision and consumption of services. I've dealt with a wide range of
service types from public cloud services, to client specific and 3rd party
services using various transport and authentication schemes.
–Extensive software development experience (17+
years) with Java, working with technologies including Servlets,
JSP, EJB, Spring, Hibernate, EclipseLink, JPA, JDBC, Struts,
Solr, lots of application support libraries, IDEs, app
servers such as IBM WebSphere, Tomcat, CygWin environment, build and test frameworks.
–Working with front-end web technologies, Javascript, CSS and HTML.
–Experience in other languages such as Perl, SQL,
C++, C, Pascal, COBOL, Z80 and x86 assembler. Exposure to ASP.
–The ability to quickly pick up new technologies,
languages where required.
–Platform security analysis and vulnerability
mitigation on both a network and application level.
–Application load and performance testing
management, development of test scenarios and test analysis and developing
performance improvements.
–IBM WebSphere / BEA Weblogic application server experience in both a
development and administration role (using versions 6.1 and 8.0 / 5.1 and 6.1).
Sun One Application server experience in predominantly a development role.
–Database development and administration using JPA,
Hibernate, Oracle, SQL Server, PostgreSQL and MS
Access.
–6 years experience with the Oracle WebCenter Sites Content Management System (previously known
as FatWire Content Server).
–2 years experience with the EMC Documentum Content Management suite of applications
including Content Server, Web Publisher, Site Caching Services and FTP
Services.
–Daily use of various Unix flavours (Ubuntu, Centos) from an application platform perspective
and as a development tool. Sometimes this is as a VM running under Windows (VirtualBox or VMWare) or in a
DEV/UAT/QA/Production server.
–Web site administration and maintenance
including host configuration, server software, networking and security (Linux,
OpenBSD, Apache, SSH, Qmail, HTML, Java).
–Extensive design, implementation and
administration experience with IBM PC and TCP/IP networks running Solaris,
Linux, Windows, Windows NT and MS-DOS (applications, utilities, device drivers,
networking hardware/software installation, security, configuration).
–Experience with interfacing software directly
with hardware, particularly in stand alone communications devices and IBM/PC
video hardware.
–Extensive application development and production
experience using 3rd party software.
–Solid CD-ROM production background including
formatting and pre-mastering of CD-ROMs using various CD-ROM production systems
(it wasn't as easy to create a CD-ROM 14 years ago as it is now!). Extensive
working knowledge of CD-ROM capabilities, standards and factors involved in
their performance.
–Sound client and end-user communications skills
including end-user problem troubleshooting.
–Director, Board member and Secretary of a
Victorian not-for-profit Co-operative (The Tau Ceti
Co-operative Limited).
Career History
2013
to present
APD
Limited (www.apdgroup.com) (formerly Next Digital Limited)
Role:
Senior
Solution Architect within the Global Clients Group
Summary:
One
of two Solution Architects within the Global Clients Group
As a
solution architect I have the role of developing solutions to client
requirements, working in partnership with project managers, business
analysts, developers and testers. I also act as development team leader
managing small teams working on the implementation and testing phases.
Responsibilities:
–Architecting solutions to client requirements,
predominantly in a web environment.
–Project estimation for existing clients and
when pitching for new work.
–Developer, testing, project management
support.
–Developer code reviews.
–Problem troubleshooting, fixing and/or
identifying the teams required to resolve an issue.
–One of the go-to guys for technology advice.
Significant
experience:
I was
the APD lead in a project to upgrade Ford's website CMS platform from FatWireversion
7.6 to Oracle Web Center Sites 11g (a later version
of the software, renamed after Oracle purchased FatWire
Software). This involved developing and documenting the upgrade, data migration
and roll-back processes for the various Ford environments (Dev, QA and
Production) and upgrading APDs dev servers. The system was being moved to a
new virtualised environment and involved significant interaction with many
Ford teams (architecture, networking, firewalls, DB, support groups) in both
the US and India. The project itself ran for over a year and the migration
was done in groups of markets over a 4 week period.
The
architect and development lead for various Ford projects integrating vehicle
data into many of the Ford web sites. For example, implementing an end user
software download component. This involved SOAP web service integration, Java
applet and Microsoft ActiveX Control development, then later integrated with
an Azure cloud solution as browser support for Java declined. This is
actively used today in many markets globally.
In
concert with APDs Head of Technology I developed an Enterprise Architecture
piece for a disruptive supply chain start-up company. An initial central
element of the architecture was a web site and portal designed to bring
on-board clients. I architected this system based around the Liferay portal CMS, and was the development lead for a
group of developers and testers based in APD's Manila offices delivering the
solution to the client in 8 weeks.
Designed
and built a cloud application with Google App Engine based around aggregation
of social media content feeds (for example from Twitter tweets or Facebook comments) using a tool known as Yahoo Pipes,
passing this through a filtering and approval process and finally integrated
into the Ford web platform for display on the Ford Australia website. This provided
social media feedback of new vehicle releases or feedback on motoring
enthusiast events to the Ford site, depending on how the sources were
configured, sometimes in near real-time.
Mar
‘05 to 2013
Next
Digital Limited (www.nextdigital.com) (formerly WDG Limited)
Role:
Initially
a contracting programmer, then a full-time staff member (Oct '05) with the
Java software team, then taking a senior development/architectural role as
lead Java technologist.
Summary:
Part
of a team (then lead developer) migrating several of Telstra's document
management systems built using Documentum from unsupported Documentum
versions to current versions.
WDG's
lead developer of a team implementing a Java based front-end search interface
to BHP Billiton's document knowledgebase using the Verity search system.
Technology
lead for the Data Migration project with News Digital Media migrating the
content of the News Limited mast head websites (e.g. heraldsun.com.au,
theaustralian.com.au) from NDM's legacy Vignette Content Management System to
their new FatWire based system.
Lead
member of the team redeveloping the Harvey Norman website using the FatWire Content Management System.
Development,
architectural and advisory roles for many other smaller projects over the
years as well as being involved in project estimation tasks and selection of
prospective staff members.
Responsibilities:
–For Telstra, the development and
implementation of Documentum docbase migration strategies. Also responsible
for re-implementing required functionality using the Documentum Java API, and
co-ordinating deployment of systems to the UAT and Production environments.
Other development responsibilities include re-implementation of various
end-user tools using Java servlets, JSP and Perl. I
also provide Telstra Level 4 support for the migrated Documentum systems.
–For BHP, the implementation of a corporate
Enterprise Search application using JSP and Java servlets
interfacing to the Verity K2 search API.
–As Lead for the NDM Data Migration project I
was responsible for getting the project completed and the content migrated in
time for the newly developed mast head websites to go live.
–With the Harvey Norman project I was
responsible for implementing content indexing and search functionality using Solr search technology.
Significant
experience:
–Becoming familiar with various Documentum
technologies including administration with Documentum Administrator,
publishing with Web Publisher and Site Caching Services, use of the
Documentum API (through Java and DQL) and customising Webtop
and Web Publisher applications.
–Significant amount of Solaris and Oracle
system administration experience maintaining the WDG environment at Telstra
to support the migration process.
–Becoming familiar with the Verity K2 API.
Other technologies I gained experience with include the Struts application
framework and the Hibernate persistence layer.
–Working with the FatWire
Content Management System.
–Use of many Java projects, APIs and frameworks
such as Solr (for full-text search), Spring and
it's various aspects, Hibernate, JDBC, JUnit,
Eclipse and so on.
May
‘04 to Oct ‘04
Myrestu (www.myrestu.com)
Role:
Contracting
programmer with the Software Development Group.
Summary:
Member
of a 2-person team implementing a Digital Rights Management system.
Responsibilities:
–Software development, testing and
documentation of a DRM system using Java, Oracle and the Sun One Application
server.
Significant
experience:
–The DRM system was implemented in Java in a
J2EE environment using the Sun One Application server as the delivery
platform and Oracle 8i as the database server. The J2EE technologies used
included EJBs (mostly BMP beans), servlets and JSP
with the usual smattering of JNDI.
Member
of the Hyro Technologies technology team working with all aspects of the
companies technology solutions as required.
Responsibilities:
–Software development and maintenance of client
solutions using Java, ASP, Perl, Oracle and SQL Server.
–Implementing and supporting in-house
infrastructure support systems such as CVS (Concurrent Version System - for
software version control) and Bugzilla (for defect tracking).
–Client consultation and liaison in technical
and production aspects of projects.
Significant
experience:
–Member of the 5 person development team
responsible for the implementation of an oil trading application for BP
Australia. This was implemented as an intranet application using J2EE
technologies including enterprise Java beans, servlets and JSPs, running
within the BEA Weblogic application server and interfacing to an Oracle
database and other legacy systems. My role was the development of EJBs, JSPs
and controlling servlets to implement major parts of the system. I was also
involved in the initial specification of the system, meeting with end-users
and producing Use Cases and other documentation based on their input.
I currently have sole responsibility for the maintenance of this continually
evolving application. This includes client interaction, estimation and
development.
–Member of the development team responsible for
the implementation of BP Australia's eBusiness Customer Internet application
(www.bpplus.com.au). Again this involved significant J2EE development working
with the Weblogic application server platform, Oracle database systems and
heritage data systems. My role was similar in scope to my role in the oil
trading application, but perhaps with less emphasis on client interaction.
Professional
Development:
May 2002: BEA Weblogic 6
Administration course, Canberra.
Aug
‘94 to Oct ‘99
Connect
4 (www.connect4.com.au)
Role:
Technical
Director
Summary:
With
the departure of one of the two technical staff from Connect 4, and a shift
in the company's focus from client services to development of information
products for sale, I assumed greater responsibility as the technical work
increased and changed over time. Also, with the emergence of the Internet as
an information delivery platform, my skills were extended to develop, deliver
and support Connect 4's web site.
Responsibilities:
–Software development for products using C,
C++, Java and Perl for Windows and web based applications.
–Design, develop and maintain various
information databases that are used as the basis for Connect 4's products.
They include full text searchable CD-ROM, HTML and RDBMS databases.
–Develop, deploy and maintain Connect 4's web
site (webmaster).
–Perform and supervise Connect 4's production
tasks. This includes CD-ROM production, data preparation production and
client services.
–Interviewing and hiring data production staff.
–Design, implementation and maintenance of
Connect 4's network infrastructure for both Internet and intranets. This
includes hardware, software, DNS, email, security and firewalls.
–The helpdesk.
Significant
experience:
–Production and software development for
Connect 4's various information products: The Annual Report Collection,
Company Prospectuses, Mergers and Acquisitions, Takeovers,
New Issues and Company Announcements. Several of these are
delivered via both CD-ROM and the Internet, the CD-ROM applications being
Windows applications developed using C++. Others are Internet based only and
have been developed using Java servlets or as CGI
scripts using Perl.
–Responsible for the design, implementation,
configuration and deployment of Connect 4's web site. This included software
development, HTML development, configuration of the web server software,
network design, firewall configuration, site selection, security and
everything else.
–Responsible for the design and implementation
of the shrink-wrapped consumer oriented product Shareholder on CD-ROM.
–Responsible for the data preparation and
production of CD-ROMs for a large number of Connect 4's clients including
organisations such as the Commonwealth Department of Finance, Telstra, the
Victorian Ministry of Education, Unilinc Limited, Food Liaison and the
Commonwealth Department of Immigration, Local Government and Ethnic Affairs.
Sep
’91 to Aug ‘94
Connect4 (www.connect4.com.au)
Role:
Senior
Software Engineer
Summary:
In
mid-1991, several members of staff at INFO-ONE left that company and formed a
new company - Connect 4. As one of two technical staff at this time, I shared
equal responsibility in the provision of services to Connect 4's clients.
Responsibilities:
–Perform and supervise Connect 4's production
tasks.
–Software development, end-user applications
and data preparation tools (MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows applications).
–Database preparation - taking the client's
data and transforming it to a form suitable for use with Connect 4's
publishing products and end-user software.
–Client consultation and liaison in technical
and production aspects of projects.
–End-user problem trouble-shooting in both
hardware and software situations.
Significant
Experience:
–Complete design and implementation of the
successful Pathways Through Education multimedia extension to the Victorian
Ministry of Education's Job and Course Explorer (JAC) project. Due to the
successful completion of the Jobs Illustrated project for the Ministry of
Education, Connect 4 was awarded the contract to co-produce this successor
project. I was responsible for the entire design and development for both the
user interface and data preparation components (C and assembler), CD-ROM
design, liaison with the content providers and co-ordination of the CD-ROM
production in the US.
–Production and software development for a
Windows based Trademark image database CD-ROM system containing images of
most Australian Trademarks. This was implemented using Microsoft Visual C++
and the MFC library. The system, developed for a group of Australian Patent
attorneys, continues to be produced 10 times a year.
–Performed and supervised the production of the
majority of Connect 4's CD-ROMs.
–The majority of the design and implementation
of the CLANN CD-CAT bibliographic full text retrieval system developed for
Unilinc Limited, a network a tertiary libraries in NSW. This was a project I
originally started while working at Disctronics. It was implemented in C, C++
and assembler (for fast screen I/O). It also involved a large amount of data
conversion in the process of storing about a gigabyte of bibliographic data
onto a 670MB CD-ROM and leaving room for keyed and full-text index files.
Jul ’90 to Sep ‘91
INFO-ONE International
Role:
Production
Supervisor / Resource Manager (Melbourne) / Senior Software Engineer
Summary:
In
June 1990, due to changes in the responsibilities of several of the staff in
the Melbourne office, I was able to take on the added responsibilities of the
direct supervision of the development and production staff and manage the
production/development resources.
Responsibilities:
–Supervise the tasks of the Melbourne CD-ROM
production team (software development, data preparation and CD-ROM
pre-mastering).
–Production team resource allocation and
production administration.
–Development resource allocation and
procurement (both hardware and software, involving sourcing, evaluation and
recommendation).
–Software development for applications and data
preparation tools.
–Leadership of a 4 member Windows product
development team.
–Client consultation and liaison in technical
and production aspects of projects.
–Advising potential clients on all aspects of
optical publishing.
–Training of new production staff members.
–Setting documentation standards for
development and production.
–End-user problem trouble-shooting in both
hardware and software situations.
Significant
Experience:
–Project leader for the INFO-ONE team
developing a Windows based full text retrieval system.
–Performed and supervised the production of the
majority of INFO-ONE's CD-ROMs.
–Complete design and implementation of the
successful Jobs Illustrated (JILL) multimedia extension to the Victorian
Ministry of Education's Job and Course explorer (JAC) project. The project
was based on CD-ROM/XA technology and was the first of its kind in Australia.
It used interleaved audio and image data to present career information to
school leavers and job seekers. This project was launched by the Premier of
Victoria and was being used in over 100 schools and career centres around
Victoria.
–Leading member of the INFO-ONE team
implementing the successful Commonwealth Manager's Toolbox product for the
Australian Commonwealth Department of Finance. The CD-ROM was distributed 4
times a year to government bodies throughout Australia.
Professional
Development:
–May 1991, INGRES/Windows 4GL Developers
course.
–October, 1990 - Fred Pryor Management Course -
"The Technical Person in a Management Role".
Jan
’90 to Jul ‘90
INFO-ONE
International
Role:
Senior
Software Engineer
Summary:
INFO-ONE
acquired the CD-ROM development group from Disctronics in January 1990.
Disctronics divested itself of the CD-ROM development group to concentrate on
its core business of CD mastering and replication. As a part of the group
from Disctronics, I joined INFO-ONE.
Responsibilities:
–Development and implementation of software
development strategies.
–Development of software in all CD-ROM
production areas (user interface, data preparation tools).
–Design of CD-ROM solutions for clients.
–CD-ROM data preparation operations including
formatting and pre-mastering.
–Liaising with clients on data preparation,
user interface and CD-ROM requirements.
–Providing advice to potential clients on all
aspects of optical publishing.
–Overseeing other software engineers within the
development group.
Oct
’87 to Jan ‘89
Disctronics
Limited
Role:
Software
Engineer
Summary:
Disctronics
formed a CD-ROM publishing business in April 1987 to foster and service an
evolving optical publishing market. I was the first (and subsequently
principal) software engineer under the direction of the Software Development
Manager.
Responsibilities:
–Design of CD-ROM solutions for clients.
–Development of CD-ROM database systems,
including data preparation tools and user interface software for both text
and graphical environments.
–CD-ROM data preparation operations, including
formatting and pre-mastering.
–Liaising with clients on data preparation,
user interface and CD-ROM requirements.
–Providing advice to potential clients on all aspects
of optical publishing.
–Liaising with Disctronics' manufacturing
staff.
–Overseeing other software engineers within the
development group.
Professional
Development:
–November 1997 - Ful/Text
search and retrieval software developer's course taken at Fulcrum
Technologies, Ottawa, Canada.
–November 1997 - Meridian Data CD-Publisher
operations course taken in California, USA.
Jun ’82 to Sep ‘87
Royal Melbourne Institute of
Technology - Computer Centre
Role:
Computer
Systems Officer, Grade 1
Summary:
I
joined the staff of RMIT Computer Centre in the capacity of communications
programmer. Much of my work involved asynchronous communications software at
both a high level (intelligent communications front-end) and low level
(protocol handing and device drivers interfacing directly to hardware).
Responsibilities:
–Design, implementation and maintenance of
several microprocessor based projects (both IBM-PC based and dedicated
hardware built around Z-80 microprocessors), including:
·Communications
software for interfacing asynchronous plotter devices to a CDC mainframe
(Cyber).
·Front-end
system to central node devices in a state wide educational network (CAE
network - VICNET).
·Statistics
data collection software for VICNET.
·Asynchronous
file transfer package for use within RMIT by staff and students.
·Asynchronous
communications utilities.
–Maintenance of the Computer Centre's Minnesota
Pascal compiler on the Centre's mainframe (CDC Cyber).
–Advice to RMIT staff members regarding
microprocessor based software.
–Supporting RMIT staff and students in their
use of the Centre's facilities.
–1984, PC Networks course, Management
Technology Education.
–1986, SNA Communications course, Management
Technology Education.
–1986, NOS/VE course, Control Data.
Additional
Information
During
the period 1980 to 1988, I was involved in the development of a retail pharmacy
computerised dispensing system. In partnership with my father (a pharmacist), I
designed, implemented and supported the system. Pharmacists throughout Victoria
used this system to support their day to day dispensing operations. It was well
received and noted for its ease of use.
Tau Ceti Co-operative Limited
A founding
member of the Tau Ceti Co-operative which was set up
to provide members and others with server facilities to host their Internet
presence (web sites, email and/or other services). This has been set up as a
Co-operative in the State of Victoria under the Co-operatives Act 1996. I have
been a Director, a Board Member and Secretary for the 13 years that the
Co-operative has been running. This is a not for profit organisation and is run
on a volunteer basis. It has statutory reporting and other requirements
mandated by the Act and other legislation which we need to comply with and as
Secretary I see that we do.