********************
*Under construction*
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Work
====

Present
-------

Surely one of the best jobs in the world: I help transcribe, annotate and publish all
the known letters to and from Charles Darwin. Yes, the Charles Darwin. I also
assist in the production of educational material, such as dramatisations and videos,
about his correspondence.

Not only are the letters' contents historically, philosophically and scientifically
fascinating, but the project also relies upon a substantial informatics infrastructure
supported by three separate divisions within Cambridge University (the University
Library, the Centre for Applied Research in Educational Technology, and the Computing
Service). This infrastructure is a topic of great interest to me all by itself. It
relies on the following software technologies (among others), most of which I use on a
daily basis:

* Adobe Premiere
* The GIMP
* GNU-Emacs
* Image Magick
* Java
* JIRA
* Joomla (PHP/MySQL/HTML/CSS/JavaScript)
* LATEX
* Linux (RedHat & Debian)
* Lucene
* MS Office
* Novell Netware
* oXygen
* Perl
* PuTTY
* Sakai/CamTools
* Windows
* WinSCP
* XML

[Darwin Correspondence Project]
[Comment]

Past
----

My more interesting paid work has included writing help pages for the historical
database of the Sao Paolo telephone network, editing videos for the Science Museum ...
and feeding chicken satay sticks to Halle Berry.
[Nortel Networks]
[Science Museum]
[Halle Berry]
[Comment]

Academic associations
=====================

University of Cambridge
-----------------------

As well as being a member of staff at the University of Cambridge, where the Darwin
Correspondence Project (see above) is headquartered, I'm an affiliated member of the
Emmanuel College MCR. When I have time, I attend the seminars and classes that interest
me, which tend to be ones held by:

* the Department of History and Philosophy of Science,
* the Computer Laboratory,
* the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH),
* the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion, or
* the Faculty of Classics.

I'm also a big fan of the various museums in the University (at least, those I've had a
chance to visit!).

[University of Cambridge]
[Emmanuel College]
[Comments]

UCL
---

I'm an alumnus of University College London, where I studied Physical Sciences for a
time before switching to History and Philosophy of Science. My main interest as an
undergraduate was the history and philosophy of the infinitesimal calculus. In addition
to the core courses, I took as much logic as I could, and some entry-level French,
mechanical engineering and computer science classes.

I was also elected President (and before that, Treasurer) of the UCL Union Human
Powered Flight Club, which built its own working human-powered hovercraft, and a
human-powered-flight simulator. The club's web site is not available at time of
writing, which is a great pity because it had some lovely photos of club members
hovering on the Solent and suchlike.

[UCL MAPS Faculty]
[UCL STS Dept]

Royal Institution
-----------------

I am a Member of the Royal Institution. (Wondered what the MRI after my name stood for?
Now you know.) The membership sadly isn't as useful to me now as it was when I was
living in London and able to attend RI events regularly, but I travel to see as many RI
lectures as I can. I think everybody likes the RI, don't they? The Christmas Lectures
and so on. The thing's a British institution for the people, one that's accessible to
all, informative and helpful. It's the institutional equivalent of David Attenborough's
TV programmes.

[RI]
[Comments]

London History of Science Society
---------------------------------

I'm the Secretary of the London History of Science Society, a fairly informal group of
friendly and learned folks, um, interested in the history of science and based in
London... If you are such a one, then join us!

As well as going to HOS-related events in and around London, the LHOSS produces the
wonderful magazine Phaeton, which gives Nature a run for its money.

[LHOSS]

Hobbies
=======

Interpreader
------------

I currently own and maintain the Interpreader - a project memorably described by Prof
Steve Miller of University College London as "A very bad idea." He was right, of
course. The aim of Interpreader is that it will:

* Provide an interface for users to register with that instance;
* Provide an interface for users to upload documents to annotate (documents will be
restricted to certain file formats, e.g. jpeg, ascii, html);
* Provide an interface wherein users can select documents hosted on existing web pages
(from the wider web) to annotate;
* Store these annotations along with the user's profile so that they continue to be
available to that user (and other users if desired);
* When a user is annotating a document previously annotated by another, provide
suggested annotations based on previous annotations for the page;
* Assist users in providing specifically syntactic annotations (e.g. parts of speech;
case; gender; etc.);
* Learn from the syntactic annotations of users and;
* Provide an interface to with tools and suggestions to assist users in translating
their annotations, or their viewed documents directly, into formal languages;
* Provide an interface wherein logical (semantic) analysis of these translations may be
carried out according to a variety of logics.

Interpreader is intended to be trialled on philosophers of science, but is likely to be
of use to scholars/professionals in any discipline that requires careful analysis of
texts, including linguistics, law, theology. It may also be useful to
scientists/engineers carrying out literature reviews.

[Check it out]
[Comment]

Music
-----

I play guitar, drums, bass, keys, vocal chords ... whatever it takes to get the song
down. These days I don't really have the spare time to play live (booking shows,
carting equipment around, hiring vans: what a hassle!), but I compose and record fairly
frequently.

I cut my teeth in a band called Abjure, best known for a split release with Kneejerk
(Frank Turner's former band) on Skipworth Records called "don't clap it startles me".

[Solo work]
[Abjure page on Skipworth Records site]
[Comment]

Family history
--------------

With the help of the excellent family tree prepared by my cousins Ruth Kuper and Elaine
Katz in Johannesburg, I want to begin putting together a family history database
online.

[phpGedView]
[Comment]

Lindy hopping
-------------

Not that I spend enough time doing it to be any good, but I enjoy lindy hopping with
the Cambridge Lindy Hoppers whenever I can.

[See their web site]
[Comment]

Cycling
-------

I'm in love with a Dahon Piccolo. Miniature chromoly diamond frame, 16-inch wheels and
better acceleration than half the bikes at the traffic lights. Plus I can take it home
on the bus if I get a puncture.

[Photos]
[Dahon web site]
[Comment]

Software development
====================

interpreader-core
-----------------

The software that runs the Interpreader. It's open source using PHP/MySQL/CSS, and
co-developers are very welcome to contribute.

[View SourceForge page]
[Comment]

php^2^
----

Personal Home Page software written in PHP: PHP-squared: php^2^ ... The software that
runs this site. At least, it will be if I find time to finish it...

[View SourceForge page]
[Comment]