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| Contacts | 199 Swaton Road Bromley-by-Bow London E3 4EP U.K. | Phone: +44 (0)20 7515-7685 Mobile: 0786 789 4380 Email: dc@strum.co.uk |
Experienced in:- |
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Computer skills |
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Additional skills:- |
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Career Summary | |
| 2003 to 2005 | Technical Author for Sortex Ltd. Sortex is a company designing and manufacturing specialist sorting equipment - I compile manuals and on-screen help-files, for a range of skill levels - from shop floor to specialist engineers. This has required a high level of concern for Health & Safety matters. It has also required translation into many languages. |
| 2005 to present | Various personal projects, mainly writing and maintaining my three web-sites, based at www.strum.co.uk (see under Personal). |
| 2002 | Dispensing justice. This year was dominated by a period of jury service - at the Old Bailey. Although the case itself lasted only 15 weeks, September to December, delays in starting (first summons was in February) disrupted any attempt to find new employment. Meanwhile, I continued with personal projects. This included involvement with open-source projects (as honorary 'editor-in-chief' of the Virtual-Access project on Sourceforge). I also worked on my own web pages and music. |
| 2000 to 2001 | Technical Author - Magex. Working as Technical Author for Magex - a company specialising in Micropayments & Digital Rights Management (DRM) |
| 1998 to 2000 | Various free-lance jobs - including continuing maintenance work with CDC (see below) and IT business research.
I also developed a number of personal projects - detailed below, under Personal. |
| 1996 to 1998 | Contract Technical Author for CDC (Commonwealth Development Corporation). I produced manuals and intranet web help for CDC's in-house software, and had a special responsibility for improving its user interface and for quality assurance. I also set up CDC's Intranet from scratch. When I left, it had over 1,300 pages of information available to about 300 staff - with early steps into a ground-breaking, world-wide WAN. Meanwhile, I undertook the analysis and description of the corporation's business procedures - allowing them to know what they do (and to standardise they way they do it). I also advised on Internet access and strategy, negotiating their new ISP agreement. |
| 1995 to 1996 | Freelance Technical Writer. Continuing to write manuals for Ashmount whilst working on other guides - including an exam-marking application for schools and a questionnaire maker/scanner. Also working on various Web projects. |
| 1993-1995 | Ashmount Research Ltd. Technical Editor. I was responsible for writing, designing and producing a range of manuals for WigWam, PowWow and Virtual Access (Ashmount's software, giving access to various on-line services). These required continual updating, as the software was always developing. I wrote manuals for individual services (CompuServe, CIX etc) and for 'Personal' and 'Workgroup' versions. This work was carried through from writing to dealing with printers. In addition, I offered on-line support for the product(s) on the services to which it connected. I was also part of Ashmount's development team, helping to design and plan future projects - with particular reference to usability and dialog design. |
| 1982 to 94 | McGuffin Productions Ltd (and freelance) McGuffin provided production services to advertising photographers. This involved casting, location-finding, model-making, set-building. Above all, it required a quick understanding of a brief, the ability to cost its elements and to manage the available budget. This also involved assembling and managing small, ad-hoc teams of various talents. |
Personal | |
| Interests | I have written, built and continue to maintain three websites:- From Watford Gap to Camelot - This is a "four-dimensional travelogue", drawing in elements of history, geography, the mythic and the mundane. Lycos included this site in their "Top 5% of the Web", and it remains well-reviewed and used. Webbery & Nettery - This site contains advice to businesses wishing to make the most of the Internet. I have received acknowledgments and recommendations from individuals, companies - even governments. This is now largely of historical interest - since the Internet has moved on so much, over the years. However, some it is still surprising relevant. Strum's Songs - I am a songwriter, and these pages showcase my songs. |
| Education | Graduated 1973 - B.A. (Geography) University of London. |
| Status | Single |
| Nationality | British |
| Date of Birth | 1951 |