BRADEN SHEPHERDSON

Bachelor of Computer Science, Honours Co-op, Business Option

University of Waterloo

abphof@r.postjobfree.com

226-***-****

Knowledge Summary

Equally comfortable working independently or with a team on complex software projects.Excellent problem-solving skills; see problems as challenges, not as frustrations.Extensive experience developing for many paradigms: mobile devices, personal computers, web applications, and distributed high-assurance systems.Fluent in C, C++, Perl, Haskell, Java, Python, SQL, JavaScript, Scheme, HTML.Proficient with bug-tracking (Bugzilla, Google Code, FogBugz) and version control (CVS, SVN, darcs, git, mercurial, Perforce) software.Extensive experience programming in Linux environments; significant experience with Windows and mobile environments.Maintain personal computing environment consisting of custom-built desktop dual-booting Windows 7 and Arch Linux, Asus Eee laptop with Arch Linux, VMWare Server with lightweight Linux VM.

Interests and Goals

My fundamental objective is to learn how to create business value by applying my technical skills. Learning new languages and technologies adds to my scope for solving new problems, and old ones in new ways.I am especially interested in developing internal tools and automating workflow. This is a common thread through most of my projects; I constantly question manual tasks, searching for ones that can that be automated.

Co-op Work Experience

OptumSoft - Menlo Park, CA

Position: Systems Software DeveloperDomain: Tacc ("taxi") is OptumSoft's pre-release product, a platform for painless, high-performance distributed systems.Period of employment: May-Aug 2009Contributions:Built several small- and one large-scale apps using the tacc platform to shake out bugs, bad assumptions.Designed, implemented and demoed a system for deploying the apps to a heterogeneous cluster.Completed a 64-bit port of the tacc compiler, test suite and libraries.Knowledge/Experience Gained:Learned best practices for high-performance, fault-tolerant distributed systems from cutting-edge research.Noted the impact of a contrasting development culture on innovation and productivity.Experienced firsthand how unspoken and unchallenged assumptions (e.g. 32-bit) can have grinding consequences later in a project.Employer's evaluation: Good (May-Aug 2009)

Fog Creek Software - New York City

Position: Software DevelopmentDomain: FogBugz is Fog Creek Software's flagship product, an intelligent web-based bug tracking solution.Period of employment: Sept-Dec 2008Contributions:Designed, implemented, tested the back-end and user interface for tags in FogBugz 7Suggested, debated and argued for and against design decisions and elements of the specification.Collaborated with developers working on other new features when functionality would overlap, to ensure consistency and avoid duplication of effort.Knowledge/Experience Gained:Experience integrating a pervasive change into a large existing codebase.Understanding of the demands of designing and developing a user interface for external users.Employer's evaluation: Excellent (Sept-Dec 2008)

NAV CANADA - Ottawa

Position: CAATS Life Cycle Support, CAATS/MAATS Engineering groupDomain: The Canadian Automated Air Traffic System (CAATS) is a 15-year project to completely replace existing air traffic control systems in Canada. It is a distributed, highly redundant, 24-7-365 high-assurance system based on HP-UX.Periods of employment: May-Aug 2007, Jan-Apr 2008Contributions:Continued and completed a project for collecting, processing and displaying (via a PHP website using JpGraph) performance data from the machines in the nationwide CAATS network.Defined requirements, designed, implemented, tested and deployed two new tools to support the development and build process. These tools focus on different areas of the process to catch errors early, so they could be fixed before they break an overnight build. Their use saves on average one failed overnight build per week, saving a day of schedule and developer time per week.Worked closely with 15-person development team to solicit feedback on the tools, improving them to provide more the information needed by the developers to better address the discovered errors.Knowledge/Experience Gained:Understanding of the requirements of distributed high-assurance systems, and how such an environment differs from personal computer development.Further experience with creating internal workflow tools.Employer's evaluation: Outstanding (May-Aug 2007) and Outstanding (Jan-Apr 2008)

Magmic Inc. - Ottawa

Position: Porting Engineer (Jan-Apr 2006) and Tools Engineer (Sept-Dec 2006), Porting and Tools TeamDomain: Java 2 Micro Edition cell phone game development and porting.Periods of employment: Jan-Apr 2006, Sept-Dec 2006Contributions:Ported cell phone games from handful of base ports to over 500 target devices.Further performed Quality Assurance on the games on each target.Recognized the need for tools to streamline the porting and QA process. Made business case to supervisor, and then designed, implemented, tested and deployed a tool to upload freshly compiled game files to the servers for download to the devices, saving an average of 90 seconds per test run per device per game, totaling over 10 hours weekly.Refactored and improved a Java post-compilation bytecode editing tool used to insert bug fixes for specific devices post-compilation.Knowledge/Experienced Gained:Understanding of constrained environments. Small displays, small memories, slow processors. Gained the sense that one cannot always "just" allocate large arrays.Experience working to tight deadlines that cannot slip. Worked one all-night, and several post-midnights to meet deadlines.Employer's evaluation: Outstanding (Jan-Apr 2006) and Very Good (Sept-Dec 2006)

Other Work Experience

Virtivia Development in contract for Instrumental Software - Paris, ON

Position: Contract Software DeveloperDomain: Blackberry application developmentPeriod of employment: May 2010-PresentContributions:Continued development of a Blackberry application for truck drivers under contract with Instrumental Software.Implemented system to evaluate drivers' logs for violation of complex government regulations.Adapted application to device with smaller screens.General interface and functionality additions, improvements and fixes.Knowledge/Experience Gained:Learned to adapt to rapidly changing requirements as employer explores the market.Learned to work with a non-technical client who does not understand the application, while I do not understand the market.Further experience in mobile development, and in the Blackberry platform.

StyleTap, Inc. - London, UK

Position: Technical and Marketing ConsultantDomain: Mobile Application Developer Trade ShowPeriod of employment: Apr 2008Contributions:Small company required someone with a technical background to attend the trade show to man the booth and make initial contact with other attendees.Answered questions and described the products to members of other mobile companies, including Nokia and Samsung.Knowledge/Experience Gained:Marketing exposure: talking to mobile industry professionals about their products and StyleTap's product.Business travel experience. Learning to manage air travel effectively.

Electronic Ink Display Integration - Ottawa

Position: Contract Software DeveloperDomain: Adapting an embedded, E-Ink-based device for use as a display by a desktop PC.Period of employment: Apr 2007-Jan 2008Contributions:Investigated capabilities of device's embedded Linux system.Conceived, designed, developed and tested VNC remote desktop solution.Performed on-site installation and continued to provide support after updates to the device software.Knowledge/Experienced Gained:Much more experience with embedded, constrained systems.Developed a complete software product from customer requirements to delivery and support.

Volunteer Experience

The xmonad Open-Source Project - November 2007 to Present:

Contributed one major and several small extension modules, as well as code patches to the core and other extensions. Regularly provide support to other users online via IRC and the mailing list. xmonad is an open-source tiling window manager for X, written in Haskell.5th Ranger Battalion Gaming Unit - September 2005 to Present:

Ongoing maintenance of game and web servers. Developed web and command-line applications to streamline and automate personnel processes. As longest-serving member of Command Staff (unit managers), have extensive experience in managing individuals, groups, processes and projects, for an online community of volunteers that has seen over 1000 members pass through during my time (currently 120).Ontario Engineering Competition - Carleton University, Ottawa - Oct 2006 - Jan 2007:

Designed, implemented and deployed a website for competitor registration, which performed well in production use by 200 registrees. The software was donated to future OEC organizers and has been used several years since.

Sports Spectacular - Graceland University, Lamoni, Iowa - August 2005:

One of two de facto leaders of the backstage technical crew during a week-long camp, planning, testing and debugging lighting and sound systems for several theatre shows. Managed crises backstage calmly and efficiently to ensure performances ran smoothly.

Education

University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario - September 2005 to June 2010Bachelor of Computer Science, Honours Co-op, Business Option.

Awards and Achievements

Placed first in the school in Grades 11 and 12 in the University of Waterloo's Canadian Computing CompetitionPlaced near top of the school in the University of Waterloo's high school mathematics, chemistry and physics competitions.

References

Ben Kamens, Software Development, FogBugz Team, Fog Creek SoftwareVlad Kluew, Senior Engineer, CAATS/MAATS Engineering, NAV CANADA.Gregory Sokoloff, President, StyleTap Inc.

Interests

Functional programming, guitar, Bridge, aviation/flight simulation, video games, piano, skiing, water skiing

Contact this candidate