Other Information

I've been involved with electronics and computers since my schooldays, and I was fortunate to attend a forward-looking secondary school which taught both subjects. I first used the Internet in the late 1970s, when it was still called the Arpanet, to run a compute-intensive A-Level project at an American University. I worked on Project Shoestring in the mid 1980s to bring TCP/IP to Manchester University and other UK academic institutions, and I've worked on and with the local Internet ever since.

I was taught to touch-type at age 8, because I'm afflicted with moderate dysgraphia. This disability means that I'm much better at doing things than writing about them, but perhaps as compensation I absorb new programming languages and semantic constructions with very little effort.

I'm highly self motivated and almost entirely self taught, and I have always written my own software, mostly for fun but also because I'm never totally happy with commercial offerings. I enjoy fixing things, solving complex problems, and providing speedy solutions for others. Much of my development work is carried out at home, where I have business-class DSL and good quality, self-built UNIX servers.

I met my partner of some 20 years while we were both working at UMIST, and we share a charming but neglected Victorian house near Christie Hospital. She is a fully qualified Integrative Psychotherapist, one of a handful working in the UK.