Dates: August 1997 – October 2002 

Contract Client: [snip]  

DBA 

I was engaged at the [snip] as part of the DBA team maintaining the core Unix systems availability for managing multiple Shopping Centres across the UK.  

This role had several aspects. The primary purpose was to act as second-line support to a dispersed population of users solving their problems in a quick and accurate manner. A secondary purpose was to serve as a technical resource investigating and solving Production and Performance problems, and also investigating promising technologies or techniques. 

Additionally out-of-hours cover was provided in the early morning and late evening to ensure that the overnight batches had run smoothly and allowed access to the [snip] core systems from early morning. 

Normal DBA duties relating to System Upgrades (Patches), backups and Performance were undertaken. In particular upgrades to OpenINGRES 1.2 and II were planned, tested and implemented. 

Liaising with CA over Support Calls was also managed. 

A major Ingres Replication and Enterprise Gateway (to MS SQL Server) project was installed for over 250 tables. 

A migration to newer Unix hardware (NUMA) was competed. 

A supplemental role was to undertake background mini-Projects as time permitted. A typical project would be to provide IPM-like (Ingres Performance Monitor) facilities to Developers using IMA (Ingres Management Architecture) on OpenINGRES and C. 

Some DBA tasks in relation to MS SQL Server were undertaken. 

Web Technologies 

As time progressed Web technologies were investigated and implemented around the core database structure. 

The Apache Web server was obtained and built under Sequent Dynix and NUMA Dynix environments. 

Perl was obtained and built under Sequent Dynix. 

Mod_perl was implemented.  

An Apache module was implemented. 

Perl CGI.pm and DBI modules were used to give a Web front-end to various Unix system, Web server and Ingres tasks, often involving the use of interactive forms, JavaScript, DOM  and CSS Stylesheets.

Dates: July 1995 - August 1997 

Contract Client: [snip]

[snip] was a joint venture subsidiary of DEC and [snip] Systems based at [snip] Slough offices supplying Billing systems for the Cable TV/Telephony industry. It is currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of [snip] Inc of America. 

Alpha Porting

I was initially contracted by [snip] to port versions 25.3 and 26.1 of [snip] SMS (Subscriber Management System) from their DEC VAX development box to an DEC Alpha 2100 as an production system demonstration but with an intention of moving the main development environment to the Alpha box. This role evolved into a continuing effort to mirror-release production versions of SMS beyond 26.1 as releases became stable on the VAX. ie 26.2, 26.3, 27.0, 27.1 etc. Eventually I was part of the Migration team which moved main development of SMS from VAX to Alpha, whereupon the mirror-releasing process could stop. 

This project was unusual in that rather than fulfilling one role such as Developer or DBA I  fulfilled a number of roles in order to accomplish the ports. 

Part of the project was to configure the Ingres Installation and disks in order to first build a SMS development environment, and then, later, build SMS run-time and test environments. This phase entailed carrying out DBA and System Administrator roles. 

Interleaved with this there where periods of intensive A/P work during which SMS components had to be successfully ported from a CMS/MMS code control environment to a non-CMS/MMS environment on a regular basis. The languages involved where: Embedded SQL COBOL, C, FORTRAN and Macro. 

As a consequence an in-depth knowledge of Compilers and pre-compilers on both platforms was gained. A particular problem was the COBOL Compiler that couldn’t add or subtract or multiply or divide correctly! 

A Port was also made to OpenINGRES 1.1 on Alpha where further peculiarities where discovered. 

In-depth knowledge was also gained of the [snip] version release mechanisms which involved CMS and MMS. 

As the Contract was extended and each mirror-release became more routine I was deployed to the Financial Maintenance Team part-time to bugfix/enhance/maintain SMS. 

DBA

Eventually [snip] moved its main development focus from VAX to Alpha and the mirror-releasing process came to an end. I was then re-deployed to the Database Group to use my skills as a DBA. 

This role included management of the Ingres Installations on [snip] VAX/VMS, Alpha/VMS and Unix boxes. In addition to everyday tasks such tasks as setting-up users, databases and test systems I also  was used to trouble-shoot developmental and performance problems on a adhoc basis in support of Development Teams. 

Dates: March 1995 - July 1995 

Contract Client: [snip]

Support Analyst/Programmer at LBM on a Unix box accessed via PCs over a ICL/ISO Network and Ingres 6.4/05. 

The Contract at LBM was a short-term one to produce Ingres Report-Writer scripts against Merton’s’ bought-in Housing package from Sherwood Plc for the Housing and Social Services Department. This later developed into a more general Support role with tasks such as installing new versions of THRESHOLD, performance reviews and weekend Support. 

The development and production machines were ICL DRS/NX 6000s running Unix System V/Sparc release 4.2, CA-Ingres 6.4/5 and Sherwood’s/Capita’s/Academy’s Housing package THRESHOLD releases 20, 21 and 22.1. 

Dates: November 1993 - December 1994 

Contract Client: [snip]

Analyst/Programmer at TSMS on a Unix box accessed via PCs running a Novell Network and Ingres 6.4. 

The Contract at TSMS was for basic A/P services on a Pyramid/PC Novell network developing and maintaining a large Administration/Marketing application (SUNDIAL) written in ABF, C, RW, Ingres Knowledge-Manager and Unix Shell under DC/OSx. 

TSMS (using SUNDIAL) was the airtime Marketing Sales arm of Anglia, Central and Ulster ITV companies. Later it represented Meridian, Harlech, S4C, Grampian, Ulster, Discovery, Bravo, et al TV Companies. SUNDIAL was additionally sold onto other TV Companies. 

Dates: August 1991 - November 1993 

Contract Client: [snip] 

The Second Contract I undertook was for the Factoring arm of a major High Street Bank; [snip] (BCS). 

My role with BCS was two-fold. The first was to function as an Analyst/Programmer with the Project Teams involved in a large-scale Project to redevelop BCSs existing Systems as an integrated Ingres system (FALCON, initial size of 3Gb). This involved a dual emphasis for me in Converting Data from an idiosyncratic BASIC system to Normalised Ingres Tables, and in Optimising certain sub-systems of the new System.  

This System was developed under VAX/VMS, Ingres version 6.4 and involved use of Knowledge Manager (Rules, Database Events, Roles and Groups) and  ESQL 'C'. Also I evaluated ViGraph and Vision. The majority of the design effort was spent in ABF and SQL Scripts. 

My secondary role was to be a source of Ingres expertise for members of staff at BCS in aspects of Ingres, such as locking Strategies, QA and appropriate techniques and methods. 

The Project was developed under the Prototyping (Rapid Application Development) auspices of the Hoskyns PRISM Methodology.
 

Dates: March 1991 - May 1991 

Contract Client: [snip] 

My first Contract Client was with the Marketing Division of [snip]. They are, of course, of "Lotus 1-2-3" spreadsheet and Notes Groupware fame. 

I was retained by Lotus to provide both the Ingres application maintenance Support and the Ingres System Support for all their Marketing Systems. These systems are used by Lotus to support their dealers in the British Isles. This involved my being in contact with Marketing managers. This contract continued until a suitable permanent employee was found. 

These systems ran under both Ingres version 5 and 6.3.

Training: 

Education: 

Higher Education: 

            University:         The City University

                                    Northampton Square

                                    London EC1V 0HB 

            Duration: October 1981 - July 1985 

            Course of study: Computer Science (Hons.) Sandwich Course. 

            Result:  Class 2 Division II 

Secondary Schooling: 

            School :            Richard Challoner RC School

                                    New Malden

                                    Surrey

            Duration :          September 1974 - July 1981 

            Exam Results :

                        'A'‑levels:           2 at grade B, 1 at grade D

                        'O'‑levels:           9 Passes 

Misc.

            Associate Member of the British Computer Society.

            Member of the Professional Contractors Group.

            Member of the Federation of Small Businesses.
 

Permanent Employment History 

Dates: July 1990 - January 1991 

Employer: [snip] 

Whilst at [snip] I was a member of the three-man DBA team supporting the two large Ingres VAX clusters there. Although late releases of Ingres were used (6.3/01 and 6.3/02) many problems occurred that required close technical support by the DBA team. I was on first or second line support continually. Support was also given to [snip] developers - some of whom were based in Paris. 

Languages, Tools and Facilities Used: SQL, Embedded SQL 'C', Sema Groups Advanced Data Dictionary (ADD). Other Ingres Products Supported: Windows/4GL on DEC VaxStations. 

Dates: April 1987 - July 1990 

Employer: [snip] 

During this period I was employed as programmer (mainly in COBOL and Ingres) and later Ingres DBA at the Management Services Department (MSD) of [snip] on their VAX Cluster. 

From September 1989 I was the Production DBA for MSD. In the role I was responsible for the four Production Ingres systems. Three of them were relatively small stable systems which required little attention other than periodic inspection and occasional trouble-shooting. 

With the fourth system (SOONS), I was involved in the Development phase as developer and development DBA. 

This system was the largest (1.2M blocks or 0.6Gbytes) Ingres system that MSD had produced and I was involved with all the normal DBA tasks of setting up backup procedures, table structures, secondary Indexes, table protection, locking issues, database access, and database performance. 

In addition to the above I was also managing project disk resources and giving out-of-hours DBA cover during month-end runs. 

Many technical issues were encountered and dealt with, including to a long running problem relating to the Ingres bug in multi-tape checkpointing. 

Languages and Tools used included: SQL, Embedded SQL Cobol, OSQ, Report-Writer DCL, Cobol, Focus and Datatrieve.

Dates: September 1985 - March 1987:  

Employer: [snip] 

Employed as programmer at [snip] (known for [snip] products), a manufacturer and distributor of office equipment, furniture etc on DEC VAX machines using COBOL, IMPCON and Datatrieve. 

Dates: August 1983 - August 1984 

Employer: [snip]

Sandwich year part of my degree course at [snip] , Basildon, Essex as Programmer on various Mini-computers.