I've been a software developer since the early 90's. Prior to that I was firmly ensconced in the hardware side of the world: wire wrap, PLDs, FPGAs, ASICs, schematics and all that. At some point I got the idea that it would be more fun to develop the software used to develop the hardware so I made the switch.
My paid gig is in EDA (Electronic Design Automation) developing software used to design chips - DSP algorithms in FPGAs, for example.
What do I want to explore in this blog? Lots of stuff. My interests are many and varied, maybe even eclectic. Most recently I've been exploring functional programming. I'm involved in a local programming group here in Portland dedicated to discussion of functional programming: PDXfunc. Whereas all the smart kidz seem to be learning Haskell, I decided a while back to go against the tide and learn OCaml. I'm a fan of the Pragmatic Programmers and their admonition to learn a new programming language every year - though I my case I'm learning a new one every 3 or 4 years. So make that "Learn a New Programming Language Every 3 or 4 years" - actually, I think that's pretty reasonable.
I'm also exploring some ideas related to concurrency & parallelism. How about using FPGAs to accelerate certain types of algorithms?
My favorite programming language to date? That would be Ruby. I was an early adopter. Picked it up in 2001. Prior to that my favorite language was Perl, but since I started using Ruby I haven't even wanted to look at any Perl code for many years now.
Where do I live? Near Beaverton, Oregon.
What are some of my other hobbies, you ask? Gardening - the Fava beans are coming along nicely, thanks. Coral Reef aquaria - I've got a little 12 gallon nano-reef with live corals in my living room.
What operating systems do I use? Linux and OS X.
...Oh, and I prefer cats. No dogs here.
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