About me

I've been writing software since I was 12. I'm passionate about it, enjoy it and wouldn't want to do anything else. After graduating from Loughborough University, I worked in various large and small companies over the last 14 years. I've created systems for some big name brands such as the BBC, Channel 4 and Rolls Royce, using lots of different technology - predominantly Java (I'm SCJP Certified). I taught Java and Unit Testing at Rolls Royce and Delta Rail. I was permanently employed for about 10 years and then moved into contracting/freelance work.

Skills

I've used a lot of technology in my time but at the moment I use these most of all:

• Java (JEE and Java for Android applications).
• PHP (site scripting and modifying CMS systems).
• Javascript (front-end scripting).
• JQuery and JQuery mobile (mostly for mobile phone applications and mobile websites).
• Ruby on Rails (for large, bespoke web-based applications from scratch, this is my tool of choice).
• It goes without saying: HTML and CSS (for just about everything).

What is ‘Well Balanced Design’?

Design of anything is always a balancing act. You often have to compromise between conflicting requirements.

Your customers don't want to 'think' to use your website. They want everything to be intuitive and easy. You probably want lots of features but you don't want to overwhelm the reader with choices.

You want style and elegant design but not something that's distracting and complicated, hindering the user-friendliness or accessibility of your product, site or software.

It isn't easy to get right and even the largest companies get this wrong sometimes (just look at Windows Vista).
The first rule of good website design is 'know thy user'. That's where I start, learning about your customers and what they want and your business. I help you pick a set of simple goals to achieve with your site - whether it's a brand new site or an overhaul of an existing one. Then I find the best design that supports all those goals in the most effective way.