- Technical Skills |
- Professional Experience |
- Personal Projects |
- Training & Qualifications |
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“A well-rounded software architect with over 12 years of development experience using Microsoft technologies, including expertise not just in architecture and technology but also in implementation and large-scale database design. I've also been a key architect behind some of the UKs leading on-line marketing database systems and highly transactional distributed systems.”
Technical Skills
Expert Knowledge
| - Service Oriented Architecture design | 1.5 yrs |
| - Component Oriented Design Methodology | 1.5 yrs |
| - .Net 3.0, WCF | 1.5 yrs |
| - C#,Win Forms/Web Forms, ASP.Net | 4 yrs |
| - VBA for Word and Excel | 13yrs |
| - Visual Basic 6.0, ASP | 9 yrs |
| - Multi-tiered layered architecture design | 6 yrs |
| - Application vertical slicing | 3 yrs |
| - SQL Server database design, transact SQL, stored procedures | 9 yrs |
| - Database/table partitioning, scaling out, index design and data access pattern optimization | 6 yrs |
| - iDesign C# and .Net development guidelines and best practices (de-facto industry standard) | 2 yrs |
| - iDesign WCF coding standards (de-facto industry standard) | 1 yr |
Comprehensive Understanding
| - .Net component oriented development process | 1 yr |
| - Service oriented applications | 3 yrs |
| - Web Presentation Patterns: MVC, Page Controller, Front Controller | 3 yrs |
| - Distributed Systems Patterns: Broker, Data Transfer Object, Singleton, WCF techniques | 2 yrs |
| - Software project planning and earned value tracking | 2 yrs |
Professional Experience
August 2007 – November 2007 : Contract Developer
Game Group
Working on the Game Groups new e-Commerce web-site (http://www.game.co.uk). The web-site and its supporting applications and systems have undergone a code migration from VB.Net to C#, and new features have been added according to current and future business requirements.
April 2007 – August 2007 : IT Consultant
Orange Business Services
Working on an Enterprise Reporting project for Zurich at Orange Business Services in Frankfurt. This system is being rolled out at client locations throughout Europe in order to standardise call center reporting. The reporting solution is built upon a Microsoft platform using SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services, SSIS and various .Net helper applications. Day to day tasks involve analyzing a clients existing reports in order identify the data sources for mapping purposes. A significant part of this role has been to implement coding standards across all tiers, document existing systems and processes, and to reduce the TCO for the reporting project.
2000 – April 2007 : Senior Developer/Architect
Interactive Prospect Targeting Ltd
I joined IPT several months after it started up to develop the MyOffers and OK-Mail data collection web-sites. Initial tasks were to recommend a development platform and data storage solution, followed by the design and development of the core databases and web-sites. All IPT databases were built using MS SQL Server, and web-sites were built using VBScript in classic ASP, and today in .Net 2 using C# and an n-tier architecture. VB 6 was used to build all production tools and reporting systems for the core IPT databases.
In 2005, I designed a new service-oriented architecture that encompassed all of IPTs business processes and data storage requirements in its design, allowing smaller and more functional components/services to be re-used by both the production and web platforms. This distributed processing model helped to significantly increase scalability by allowing us to finely tune the service hosts and to easily try a number of different configurations for scaling-out the systems.
In 2002 IPT moved into the email marketing arena and required in-house tools for the sending and tracking of emails. This led to the research and development of the EASE email tracking system built using VB 6 and classic ASP. The underlying SQL Server 7 database model has proven to scale massively with over 1 billion emails sent and several hundred concurrent clients.
Email Load Framework
- - Built to augment the managed EASE bulk emailing system to allow clients to automatically track and send emails in real-time.
- - Tracking systems: Open Mail, Click-thru, ROI, Read-time/forward-to tracking, real-time dynamic email content.
- - Bounce handler system for identifying bounced emails and the cause.
- - Service oriented system using .Net web-services to expose secure web-methods.
- - Bulk email tool, multi-threaded C# Win Form application. I designed an algorithm (based upon the safe-array concept) that is capable of mail merging in excess of 1 million emails (100KB content with 10 dynamic fields) per second, circa June 2004.
On-line bespoke reporting systems
- - ASP.Net Web Forms using C# and AJAX controls to implement load-on-demand data reporting.
- - Uses HTTP Handlers to create fully interactive graphs.
- - Dynamic image maps for the graphs with clickable hotspots allowing the user to drill down though the aggregated data levels.
Intermittent projects include
- - Design team productivity tools built using C# and WinForms.
- - Internal reporting systems created using MS Word and Excel to create data driven reports as well as client data analysis documents, and sales tools.
- - Service oriented data output system using a thin client to access IPT data sources and schedule data generation requests to the processing queue via web services and MSMQ.
- - Other tasks have been to mentor members of the development team on coding standards, new techniques/methodologies and solutions.
1998 – 2000 : Web Developer
Computasoft e-Commerce
Development and support of the government catalogue (GCAT) web-based procurement system, which evolved into the international Biomni e-commerce system. All project source code was held in VSS and MS Interdev was used as the primary development tool. The web-based systems were developed using classic ASP feeding from AS-400 data services, with dynamic HTML/Javascript and CSS being used for client-side interaction. The structure of projects allowed small focused teams to work on independently developed components and services.
1997 – 1998 : Database Developer
Finex Communications Ltd
Design and development of Symantec software’s Pan-European marketing database. This position involved leading a small team to develop and manage the database, and day-to-day contact with the client. The data was housed in SQL Server with MS Access being used as a front-end. Visual Basic 5 was used to develop marketing database tools providing functions for name/address splitting, case conversions, de-duplication, importing/exporting of data and query selections. Reports and data breakdowns were created using MS Excel. Other projects and client work include databases for IBM, HP, Sun, Wang and BT. During my time at Finex I attended training for MS Interdev, SQL Server, and source safe.
1995 – 1997 : Developer
Trinity College London
R&D of the grade examination database system for the processing of world-wide examination entries using MS Access and VB 4. An examiner data entry system was developed using Psion Series 3a storing data on memory cards. The Psions were given to examiners to take with them on their examination tours where they could send back the memory cards to allow the automatic processing of data. A certificate printing application was also developed using MS Word. Web-Site: Trinity College London
Personal Projects
2006 http://www.NetFXGuide.com
Design & development of a NetFX information portal http://www.NetFXGuide.com. Whilst I was studying the new Microsoft .Net 3.0 technologies and Windows Vista, I thought I should put some of my new skills into practice and built this portal with a work associate Francesco Lomonaco. This site started as a training exercise to build an ASP.Net website using some of the more advanced features of C# and the .Net platform. The core features on the site are built C# using Master pages, AJAX, RSS feeds, MS Access database and an SEO System. HTTP Handlers and Modules have been used extensively throughout this site.
I also implemented an aggressive caching system at both the page level (partial and full) and the data access tier, reducing server side page processing by nearly 90%. Due to it’s up-to-date content and excellent blogs submitted by some of the worlds top experts in their fields, NetFXGuide has become the #1 portal for .Net 3 resources over the last 12 months.
2006 HTTP Handler SEO System
Design & development of a search engine optimization (SEO) system for web-sites using C#. Uses the Front Controller design pattern to implement HTTP handlers and modules to create a search engine friendly virtual page system. In addition, a base page class was developed and can be used to allow web forms to be dynamically tagged with spider friendly metadata. This system was a zero-budget solution that helped raise the visibility of the NetFXGuide web-site. Due to its success, it’s currently being implemented on IPT web-sites to reduce the current spend on SEO.
2003 Database Documenter
Design & development of a SQL database documenter using MS Word. This is a productivity tool I built to reduce the amount of time I spent on documentation and to create a consistent documentation format. I released this tool as open source rather than a compiled (closed) application, as I understand that DBAs are never happy about third party products being run on their servers. It also allows it to be easily extended for new database versions, upgrades and specific reporting requirements. This product won a development award (Planet Source Code) and is used by DBAs world wide. http://www.outreal.com/DatabaseDocumentor.zip
Training & Qualifications
Architects Master Class (2007)
Development process and project leadership skills, technology, and analysis and design with Juval Löwy
Course Overview
Windows Communication Foundation Master Class (2006)
SOA/NetFX/WCF/.Net 3.0/Advanced C# with Juval Löwy
Course Overview
Microsoft Certified Application Developer (MCAD)
70-315 (Web Apps), 70-316 (Win Apps), 70-320 (Web/Win/Component Services)
BSc. Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence
Animal cognition, the frame problem, computer vision and Bayes theorem at the University of Sussex.
I regularly attend Microsoft and VBUG seminars to keep up my awareness of current and future technology developments.