Sections

• What is LessThanDot?
• What Technologies do you actively use?
• What/How many projects have you been involved in?
• What do the names "Tarwn" and "Tiernok" mean?

LessThanDot.com

Several years ago, a group of like-minded technologists founded a site together to provide a platform for sharing what we knew and what we were learning. I personally blog on specific technologies, project management, process improvement, and other tangentially related topics.

Technologies

Prior to university I learned enough Pascal and Basic to write some simple programs. I learned C and then Java as part of the CS program I was in, also picking up some PHP, JSP, and Perl. Based on my performance, I was able to get hired on to several grant projects (which was a beneficial change from 40+ hour pizza delivery), where I quickly learned classic ASP, JavaScript, some VB, embedded VB, and SQL (MS Access and SQL Server). These grant projects, besides paying the bills and giving me experience beyond the classroom, also focused heavily on new technologies and allowed me to work with web services, web standards, wireless, and even what came to be called AJAX a few years later.

Once I graduated from the university, I was able to get a job working as a manufacturing integrator and programmer, responsible for installing and integrating data historians into plant information and engineering systems. Besides granting opportunities to work with a lot of vertical systems and high-colume data fliows, I also was able to work on several operational projects for the company (utilizing ASP and VB), help test out several potential products (including a web dashboarding system based on the precursor to SharePoint), and eventually take over responsibility for finishing and launching a product (VB.Net) to help build a spinoff company.

Since this time I have had opportunities to continue deepening my web experience. I experimented with several languages (python, perl, PHP, etc) on my own while continuing to actively work wit C#, VB.Net, web technologies, and databases (mostly SQL Server). Later lead and individual projects gave me opportunities to dig deeper into system design, applying lean principles to development, enterprise architecture and analysis, and several other areas that may be considered less technical, but have just as much depth behind them. I've continued to develop my technical skills as well, with my current focus being heavily oriented towards continuiong learning on C#/VB.Net, JavaScript, HTML5, and some surrounding technologies.

Projects

Though my project log may be missing a few projects here and there, it currently includes a list of 78 small to medium projects that I have been involved with. 57 of these have been individual projects or lead roles. Through the course of my career I've seen a lot of adhoc projects, some Critical Path, tried Critical Chain Project Management on one, and more recently some Scrum and Agile-like projects.

The Names - Tiernok and Tarwn

Once upon a time in the early 1990's I was logging into a local BBS and needed a name for my account. Unfortunately there was another "eli" already in the system, so I picked a name at random from a D&D character I had once played so I wouldn't end up with eli45362 as a handle. The site name, similarly, came from a city a designed on an early MUD (Multi User Dungeon) and was once again chosen for it's uniqueness.