People

Below are the current list of Birmingham Perl Mongers, who have been brave enough to have some of the details available on the site. Most of us are at each meeting, so hopefully you'll recognise at least one of us, if you want to come and join us. We're a friendly bunch, and always willing to meet new Perl Mongers.

If you wish to include your details, send a brief bio of yourself and photo to webmaster@birmingham.pm.org. See examples of the bios below for an idea of what to include.

 
barbie
Name:barbie
Level:Board Member
Job:Senior Perl developer, a professional lighting engineer, a roadie, a father of 2, a CPAN Author and a general Perl ligger :)
CPANID:BARBIE
Links:

I started programming BASIC and Assembler on my ZX80, ZX81 and ZX Spectrum from 1980 onwards. Studied a HND in Computer Studies at Coventry, and started commercial programming (C/Unix ... there was no Windows then) in 1986.

As a software programmer & systems designer, I have been involved with the design & development of many different applications, including The System-X Telephone Exchange Design System (using AI & Expert System principles), fruit/quiz machines, The System5 Medical Management Software, many n-tier architecture solutions and Mephisto (a comprehensive web site management tool for LEAs) covering a range of software languages and skills.

In early 1999, a friend went on a Perl course. When I saw what was possible with it, I realised that it was the language for me. Up until that point I had been a dedicated C/Unix programmer and knew most of what there was to know of C, shell script, sed, awk & regexs, so Perl was quite an easy transition.

Aside from being the leader (and co-founder) of the Birmingham Perl Mongers, a speaker at numerous Birmingham.pm technical meetings, international conferences and workshops, as well as an invited guest speaker at numerous Perl & Linux user groups. I am a CPAN author, and the caretaker behind CPAN Testers, looking after many of the CPAN Testers websites and administering the tools that service the data and perform statistical analysis.

I was one of the organisers of the 2006 YAPC::Europe Perl Conference in Birmingham, and now a member of the YAPC::Europe Foundation Venue Committee, helping to provide support and advice to future organisers. Following the 2006 YAPC::Europe conference, I started the YAPC Conference Surveys, which has resulted in greater responses each year. From 2009 the survey will now be conducted for YAPC::NA as well as YAPC::Europe. The data and analysis from the surveys can now be found at the YAPC Conference Surveys website.

My non-IT career involves being a professional lighting engineer, drum technician and roadie. Have worked with many unknowns, a few famous people, but had the most fun with IQ, Ark and Prolapse.