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Committee
2008/2009 Branch Committee
James Bacon
| Background |
Dr C. James Bacon's IT career has been full and varied. From consulting roles in the City and on Wall Street to University
lecturing, he has worked as far afield as Australia and New Zealand.
More about James in this BCS Member Case study.
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| BCS Background |
James joined the BCS Oxfordshire Branch committee in May 2008.
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Eur Ing Tony Cox TD MSc FHEA FBCS CITP CEng
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| Background |
Tony has been working with 'electronic data processing equipment' since 1970 and in this time has performed all information
systems roles (often concurrently) across a broad spectrum of industrial sectors (including Metals, Brewing, Hotels, Publishing,
Property and Manufacturing). As a complete contrast he also served for 21 years in an infantry battalion of the Territorial
Army, again performing (and enjoying) all roles from rifleman to operations officer. As you would expect from these diverse
experiences he is by now a business analyst rather than a technical specialist.
Having started out as a computer operator (IBM 360 series) he progressed in the "traditional" way through programming (in
COBOL and assembler) to team leader before progressing to systems analysis. Subsequently his career broadened to include all
aspects of business systems but has sustained the twin themes of financial control systems and telecommunications, which are
now merging as e-commerce reaches maturity.
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Brian Day PhD CEng CSci MBCS CITP
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| Background |
Brian is a Consultant with Tessella Support Services, which specialises
in the application of innovative software solutions to scientific,
technical and engineering problems. He is currently responsible for
support and development of their Internal Systems.
Brian has worked in the IT industry for over 25 years, which has
encompassed a spectrum of roles ranging from FORTRAN Programming,
through Capacity and Performance Analysis, Computer Services / Systems
Management, and operational responsibility for a large Supercomputer
Centre. In that time the operating environments have ranged from
mainframe MVS, through Unix on workstations to supercomputers, and to
Windows, NetWare and Linux. More recently he has acted as a solutions
architect, where his interests have included infrastructure, data
storage management, a number of Internet related technologies.
He holds a PhD in Physical Chemistry, and during his scientific career,
worked on the experimental investigation and computation of molecular
properties, before being subverted(?) by IT.
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| BCS Background |
Brian became a member of BCS in 1981. He has been an active member of the Oxfordshire Branch Committee since 2002, when he
took on the role of CPD Representative, before becoming Secretary in 2003.
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Tim Lambertstock FBCS CITP MIMIS
| Background |
Tim joined VocaLink (then BACS) in 1999 to lead the development of the vision and architecture for what became known as NewBACS, a major programme to upgrade the Bacs payment service. VocaLink runs the Bacs, LINK and Faster Payments services, processing
over 95 million payments on a peak day. Tim is now responsible for delivering new products and services.
Prior to joining VocaLink, Tim spent over 20 years in various government departments - mostly in IT management roles. He is active in Intellect (the
IT Trade Body) and EURIM (the Parliamentary-Industry IT body) and is a frequent speaker at IT and finance-related conferences.
He was previously Chairman of the International SSADM Users Group and involved in the development of various IT initiatives.
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| BCS Background |
Tim joined the Branch Committee in April 2004, became a full member of BCS in 1995 and was elected a Fellow in 2007. He is
also a member of the BCS Elite Group
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Sheila Lloyd Lyons BSc(Hons), MBA, FBCS CITP
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| Background |
Sheila is currently working freelance and has many years experience as a project manager. For four years she worked in a Microsoft
consultancy practice and gained a wide range of experiences in different businesses and technologies. These included: a music
publisher, solicitors, accountants, charities, government and funding bodies and academic institutes.
Since starting her career in ICT she has worked in a software development environment for a wide variety of applications and
platforms. These include MS DOS, UNIX, Windows XP and the various other shades of Windows. Applications include databases,
Web based solutions, communications and video on demand. Earlier she worked for four years on a large project for an applied
research group at Oxford Brookes University. This EU funded project was a proof of concept experiment using asynchronous transfer
mode communications and video technology.
She effected a career change to ICT in 1987 and took her first degree in computing and accountancy. Her first job in computing
was in 1990 and she has been very happy ever since in the computing industry.
Prior to this Sheila's career was no less varied and included bringing up a family and teaching in a horticulture and field
studies centre.
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| BCS Background |
Sheila became an associate member of BCS in 1990 and a full member in 2002. She joined the Oxfordshire Committee in 1995 and
has thoroughly enjoyed the role. Apart from her share in Committee tasks she served for three years as the CPD Representative.
For the bi-annual Oxfordshire schools' web page competition, Sheila was Secretary for the 2001 competition, Chair for the
2003 competition, joint secretary for the 2005 competition, and is co-chair for the 2007 competition. She was elected a Fellow
of BCS in 2006.
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Simon Marsh
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| BCS Branch Role |
Committee Member |
| Employment |
Principal Engineer (Software)
Radstone Limited
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| e-mail |
marsh(at)radstone.co.uk |
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| Background |
Simon works for Radstone Limited (trading as Radstone Technology and formerly Plessey Microsystems) as a Software Engineer.
Radstone is the world's leading independent supplier of rugged COTS (Commercial-off-the-shelf) VMEBus computer products, subsystems,
and support software for defense and aerospace applications. Customers include NASA, Boeing, BAE Systems and DERA.
Simon has been involved in both Product Development (porting real-time operating systems to VMEBus hardware) and Customer
Support roles over many years. He holds a B.A. (Hons) in Computer Science and is a Chartered Engineer (working so close to
the hardware!).
He remembers saving up his pocket money to add RAM to his first 6502-based home computer (approximately 1Kb every 6 months
or so) !
Simon joined BCS in 1994 and has been a member of the Committee of the Oxfordshire Branch since 1999
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Dr Brian Read BSc DPhil MBCS CITP CEng
| Background |
Brian has over twenty years practical experience in the design, implementation and support
of database and information systems. This grew out of research work in physics where analysis
of accelerator experiments involved compilation and support of a worldwide scattering database.
Since then, projects have ranged from space satellite and air pollution data to administrative,
personnel and financial databases. He wrote early relational software in Fortran as well as working
with modern products such as Oracle Financials. Always receptive to interesting data management challenges,
a current project with a research student is data mining of Stock Exchange data.
A member of BCS since 1989, Brian has organised database conferences and has participated as a Supervisor in the Professional
Development Scheme.
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Gerry Rohling
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| Background |
Gerry has over twenty years of experience in the IT industry starting in the early 1980’s with the oil and gas industry where
he developed new algorithms to support experimental exploration techniques in the far northern reaches of Canada. Gerry further
broadened his experience by working in various IT roles at the University of British Columbia, Vizon SciTec, Ericsson and
IBM to name a few.
Since 2007 Gerry has also taken on the role of Managing Director of DynPro UK Limited, a consulting firm specializing in CRM
solutions. Gerry has extensive experience in software development, project management, customer relations management and enterprise
solutions architecture on both the Microsoft and UNIX platforms. Gerry is a Certified Siebel Consultant and holds a Masters
in Mechanical Engineering from the University of British Columbia. Gerry is currently working as a Technical Architect in
the Life & Pensions arm of Capita.
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| BCS Background |
Gerry joined the BCS Oxfordshire Branch committee in May 2008.
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Geoff Stone FBCS CITP
| Summary |
Geoff has worked in the IT industry for over 20 years performing both customer facing roles and design of systems and products.
Originally working in Data Communications he has more recently moved into security and e-commerce.
He is currently specialising as a software test analyst, developing software test strategy primarily in the field of complex
software applications testing, on Windows and Unix based platforms.
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| BCS Background |
Geoff has been actively involved on the Oxfordshire BCS committee since 1998 and is a member of both the Institute of Analysts
and Programmers and the British Computer Society. Geoff also sits on the BOG regional group committee (the Berks/Oxon/Guildford
- Think Tank).
"I thoroughly enjoy helping to run the branch and liaising with BCS HQ on operational and policy issues. A recent highlight
which was very rewarding to work on was our special project to run the schools Web design competition."
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Committee members retired at end of 2008/9 season
Jenny Adcock
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| Background |
Jenny started working as an IT consultant shortly after leaving University. While enjoying the freedom and travel of consultancy
she is now settled in Oxford and enjoys her role as a Software Tester.
Jenny believes the joy of working in IT is the speed and pace of development and always seeing something new that will enhance
everyday life.
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| BCS Background |
Jenny joined BCS in early 2007 after attending BCS meetings and being impressed by the organisation.
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Adrian Walmsley MA FBCS CEng CITP
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| Summary |
Adrian's first brushes with computing were as a vacation student in the mid 1960s with the Martin Marietta Corporation in
Baltimore, Maryland (working with IBM 7090 Fortran and punched cards) and at ICI's Central Instrument Research Laboratory
(using Algol and paper tape).
Since graduating, he has worked in the IT industry for over 40 years, much of the time in a variety of technical roles with
IBM in the UK and USA.
His first customer assignment was to debug a programming problem with the IBM 605 Calculating Punch.
He is now running his own IT consultancy company, having taken early retirement from IBM at the beginning of 2003. IBM
hideAt IBM, from the mid 1970s onwards, he was widely known as an expert in IBM's VM/370 virtual machine technology, running courses,
advising clients and IBM's own development labs, and speaking at conferences in three continents. So he notes with interest
the current trend for virtualisation, and uses virtualisation on an almost daily basis himself.
Prior to leaving IBM he was a practising IT architect in IBM Global Services and later the IBM Software Business, specialising
in internet and e-business infrastructure, and is the author of several technical redbooks. He was always keen to mentor younger professionals. He sat on IBM UK's IT architecture professions board which handled cases
for certification and triennial recertification of IBM Systems Architects.
In 2004 he led the BCS Information Systems Examinations Board (ISEB) working party which defined the syllabus and examinations
for their new Certificate in IT Architecture.
Community
hideIn his local community he is in his fifth term as a Parish Councillor, having been first elected in 1992. During that time
he has held a number of posts, including that of chairman for 6 years. He also serves as webmaster and co-editor of the Parish
Magazine. Although he is proud that, back in 1995, the parish was one of the very first to establish its own website, he is also aware that its 1995 frame-based design is now rather dated and it is overdue for a facelift. Pending an overhaul
of the whole site, he has established a Parish Plan sub-site based on pmwiki. The published Parish Plan, for which he was largely responsible, is recognised by Winchester City Council as one of the
best documents of its kind.
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| BCS Background |
Adrian joined BCS in 1997 under the scheme for senior professional entry. He has been an active member of the Oxfordshire
Branch committee since 2002, branch webmaster since May 2003, and was a keen participant in the BOG and one of the main authors of the 2004 "BOG Paper".
He played a key role in organising the 2002/3 Oxfordshire Schools Website Competition, chaired the branch 2004/5 Schools Website Competition committee, and was co-chair of the 2007 Schools Website Competition. He is assisting with the 2009 Schools Website Competition and, inspired by a session at Oxford Geek Night 9, set up a TiddlyWiki version of the competition website
He is particularly keen to encourage productive use of online collaboration tools within BCS. To this end he is an active
member of several Yahoo! Groups, the Specialist Groups' SGnet and the KIDMM Knowledge Community. He set up an experimental wiki for the branch, and served on the Streaming Media Working Party commissioned by the Member Services Board in 2004.
He is also keen to encourage collaboration with other groups in the BCS, so was pleased that the branch has been able to organise
joint meetings with the Open Source Specialist Group and the Data Centre Specialist Group in recent years, and joint meetings
with Chester and North Wales branch using the CCLRC video link.
In November 2003 he was invited to sit on the BCS Knowledge Services Board, and elected a Fellow of the Society in October
2004.
From January 2005 until early 2009 he was consultant manager of the BCS Engineering and Technology Forum and its Strategic Panel.
He was appointed Chair of the BCS Member Services Board in November 2008 and Vice President, Member Services in January 2009.
In 2006 he took on the duties of email coordinator in addition to his role as branch webmaster. The branch's monthly eBCSOxon
newsletters are now HTML-formatted to improve their visual presentation, modelled on the eBCS newsletter from BCS HQ but with
two key improvements:
- There is an online archive which allows people who join the branch to catch up with past issues.
- The newsletters are personally addressed. There is much anecdotal evidence that people prefer to be addressed by their own
name rather than something like "Dear Valued Customer". The same technology allows us to send different versions of the email
to people who are BCS members and to those who have asked to join the mailing list but have not (yet) joined BCS.
The eBCSOxon workflow, starting from from XML source, was presented at the April 2007 Branches Congress.
In 2007 and 2008 Adrian was delighted to be asked to assist with the preliminary judging for the BCS MP's website awards competition, which bears a striking similarity to our own Oxfordshire branch's web competitions.
Engineering & Technology Forum
hideAs Forum Manager he was behind the BCS sponsorship of two MSC projects at Lancaster University Management School to look into
reasons why IT Projects are Successful (to counteract the often bad press received by less than successful projects), and
BCS-sponsorship of lectures at the Cheltenham Science Festival in 2007, 2008 and 2009. He has been driving the production
of a BCS position paper into "Building Trust in Critical Systems", which is intended to be the first in a series of "Top 20"
position papers on key current issues.
In collaboration with the Management Forum he has been working on the creation of a BCS Futures Group, and gathered four distinguished
authors to contribute to the BCS FutureTech/FutureSoc blog which launched in late 2008. He also contributed, on behalf of his Strategic Panel, a draft for the Software Section of the
Carbon Reduction Best Practices Guide being developed under the auspices of the Ethics Forum.
He stood down from the branch committee at the 2009 AGM in order to concentrate on his new role as Member Services VP.
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Eur Ing Robert G M Ward BSc. MSc. FBCS CITP CEng
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| Background |
Robert is a QA Manager at Site Intelligence Limited, based at Harwell in Oxfordshire.
His working career has seen him as principal QA resource on various projects, from Telecoms and Energy billing to a range
of financial projects including internet banking systems and online credit cards. He has also been involved in the QA and
testing of E-Procurement, E-Billing, and Electronic Document Management (EDM) solutions. With over 8 years software testing
background, he has a strong knowledge of business process, and the business needs for quality software and the impacts when
this does not happen.
Robert holds a bachelors degree in Software Engineering, and a Masters Degree from The University of Leeds in Distributed
Multimedia Systems. His industry qualifications include the ISEB practitioner in Software Testing, which is the highest certified
qualification in the IT testing industry. His undergraduate thesis, entitled 'Developing Internet Sites for Cross Browser
Compatibility' was the start of his interest which led him to his current position.
He is married with one child.
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| BCS Background |
Robert has been a member of BCS since 1995, when he was a student member with the West Yorkshire Branch. He has been on the
Committee with the Oxfordshire Branch since 1999. He became a full member of BCS in October 2001, CEng in October 2003, was
accepted onto the FEANI register of European Engineers (Eur Ing) in July 2004, and FBCS in February 2007.
Robert served as branch chairman from 2004 until November 2006, when he stood down because he was finding it increasingly
difficult to combine the role of chairman with the pressures of his new day job.
In addition to roles for Oxfordshire Branch, at the Spring 2004 Branches Congress he was elected to the BCS Branches Management
Committee (BMC), which is the national committee for BCS, supporting and managing the activities of the branches. At the conclusion
of his three year term on BMC, Robert agreed to take on the role of Branch Vice-Chairman.
In autumn 2007, Robert was elected to a three year term on BCS Council.
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 Secure area for committee use
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