I hate writing my own About pages.
Where to start? I’m Paul Skinner a thirty-something, married, father of one. I’ve been working in IT since 1995-96 where I began my “formal” career under contract with Canada Post Corporation as a help-desk analyst for retail post-office operational and technical issues. Since then I’ve worked in the field, sometime as a drone in a sea of cubicles, some freelance and currently sit on the executive team of a growing HR firm in Ottawa, Ontario.
My informal IT career began much earlier in life, as a child I was exposed to computers and a very young age. I was hacking on CPM based machines in MBASIC in the early 80’s progressing through the evolution to today’s PC.
I’ve worked in many different environments, developing VB applications, some MFC, some ASP, bash scripting and gobs of PHP. I’ve got countless hours of database work on MySQL, Microsoft SQL, PostgreSQL and Oracle. In addition to the “in-the-trenches” programming I manage the on-going support and development of our internal/external HR applications as well as oversee the day-to-day LAN and infrastructure components.
My recent IT interests are GPS/GIS systems, Telephony such as Asterisk, and Java. Outside of IT, I love spending time with my wife and daughter, biking and more recently Geocaching where my interests of IT (GPS/GIS) and outdoors/orienteering converge nicely! I’m a firm believer in the Open Source movement, use it all the time and contribute where I can. Vive la revolution!
An unforeseen consequence of this blog is the attention it’s brought me. I’ve been contacted by all sorts of individuals and companies regarding some of my posts, some looking for a full-time employee or a consulting engagement for a particular solution or issue within the IT space. Keep ‘em coming folks!
In order to better serve individuals and companies that are willing to engage my services, I am starting up a new IT service company. Please visit Poise-Technologies for more information; the website is brand new and we are working to get it fully functional as soon as possible.
