Committee

Chairman Jose Casal-Gimenez FBCS CITP jose.casal(at)bcs.org.uk Jose has been a member of the BCS since 2007. He has recently become Chairman of the Kent Branch Committee and helps co-ordinate his company BCS group membership.

Secretary Roger Burnett MBCS CITP roger.burnett(at)bcs.org.uk Roger has been working in the IT industry since 1989. He spent the early years working for systems house installing and supporting systems for tool and plant hire companies (Cado/Contel/Versyss hardware). years working for systems house installing and supporting systems for tool and plant hire companies (Cado/Contel/Versyss hardware). From 1990, Roger spent 10 years working in the paper and board industry, carrying out engineering and support for a wide range of office and production control systems. Since 2000, Roger has been working for a multinational company, responsible for the architecture and engineering of infrastructure for the provisioning of PCs throughout the World. Roger has been a member of the BCS for most of his career. He is a chartered member, and has been a member of the Kent Branch committee since 2004

Treasurer Mike Smith FBCS CITP mike.smith(at)rbli.co.uk Having spent part of his career in senior financial management roles, both in the UK and overseas, Mike eventually masterminded his escape from the "numbers" side of business to focus on his interests in IT and IS. He has worked in a wide variety of industries, including copper mining in Zambia, civil engineering, toll road systems development and automotive components manufacturing in South Africa and the automotive components industry in Britain. All of these experiences have helped him to gain an overall appreciation of how information technology can be effectively used in a range of different contexts. Mike joined Royal British Legion Industries (RBLI) in 1998, based in Aylesford, Kent. Since 2000 he has been the Business Systems Manager for that organisation, a role that has provided a number of ICT-related challenges whilst working within RBLI's very diverse portfolio of business units that range from manufacturing to housing, healthcare and the provision of employment opportunities for persons with disabilities. Mike has an MBA from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, together with certificates in strategic information systems and strategies for change, two subjects that he believes are closely related. Between 1999 and 2005, Mike also taught IT-based subjects on a part-time basis to adult learners. Although no longer actively teaching in a formal setting, he is currently completing his dissertation for an MA through the University of Greenwich, focusing on technology-supported work-based learning and knowledge management as key drivers of organisational improvement. He plans to carry out further research in these areas should he survive his current course, assuming his wife doesn't reclaim a major part of the house that is currently covered in books, papers and storage media that he insists are essential for his project! Mike's recreational activities include walking and military history. He lives in Rochester, Kent.

YPG Representative Michael Brierley michael.brierley(at)poferries.com

Committee Member Nadine Smith NSmith(at)britishlegion.org.uk

Events Coordinator David White MBCS CITP david(at)david-j-white.com David has had a long and varied IT career commencing as a computer operator of an early ICL 1900 series mainframe with the ‘gigantic’ memory of 16k words, 8 exchangeable disk transports of 32k each and a bank of 12 reel to reel tapes – a configuration probably outstripped by most entry level PCs today! Moving into programming using ICL’s low level language – PLAN, and COBOL, David progressed to positions in systems analysis and then into software development management. Over the past 18 years he has held project and program management positions in a variety of business sectors. David’s industry experience began in retail, primarily responsible for point of sale systems and retail credit, moving into software house and management consultancy (retail) sectors before holding project and program management positions in public transport and pharmaceutical research and development. His most significant claim to IT fame was the design and introduction of smart card travel card terminals in London Transport. David has been a BCS member for the majority of his IT career, is a chartered member and has been on the Kent Branch committee for the past 8 years.

Committee Member Jonathan Exell MBCS CITP jon(at)jexell.co.uk Right from an early age when programming his ZX81, Jonathan's driving ambition was to be a computer programmer. He studied cybernetics and computer science at Reading university, specializing in artificial intelligence and in particular neural networks and genetic programming. During this time he also worked at BT's research labs in their natural language and cybernetics groups. Part of the research was subsequently covered by a patent application and this kindled Jonathan's interest in a world beyond the computer screen. It took 6 long years to qualify as a British and European Patent Attorney. He now works at Williams Powell, a private practice firm of Patent and Trademark Attorneys in central London, where he specializes in IT related Intellectual Property. His clients range from private individuals and start-ups to multinational corporations. He spends much of his time trying to dispel the myth held by many in the UK that patent protection is not possible for software inventions in UK and Europe. It is in many cases and he has a large portfolio of cases he has succeeded in getting granted to support this! Jonathan has never quite managed to jump ship and whilst the legal aspects are often interesting, the IT nerd is always fighting to get out. He is the network administrator for the business and also has a sideline in development of client-server database systems. He is a member of the BCS and a CITP.

University Liaison Bob Eager FBCS CEng CITP MIET rde(at)bcs.org Bob studied for a degree in Electronics at the University of Kent, and by the end of his first year had become deeply interested in computing; so much so that he spent most of his final year modifying a minicomputer CPU to 'improve' it. This naturally led to a Master's degree in Computing at the University of Essex, followed by an invitation to some further work back at Kent. This involved a lot of low level fiddling with PDP-11 systems (among others), which included operating system modification and development. He became a Lecturer in Computer Science at Kent in 1978, and was heavily involved in rolling out the EMAS operating system on the University's ICL 2900 mainframe a year later, as a replacement for the doomed VME/K system. This was the source of much fun, especially the installation of a second processor (and the related reverse engineering of the microcode to discover the programming interface to do this). Further amusement was caused by his discovery of a design flaw in the processor (never admitted by the manufacturer) and his engineering of a microcode fix for this. Bob went on to manage the University's VAXCluster for six years, before moving sideways to spend ten years as Master of Darwin College at the University. Through all this time, he continued to teach such diverse subjects as computer hardware, operating systems, compiler writing and a few other things. Bob has been a consultant for numerous companies, including BT, Olivetti, Pfizer, RHM Foods, and several others; the most notable was probably McCormack and Dodge (later Dun and Bradstreet Software Services) where he provided a core part of their Millennium system. He is still an unreconstructed geek; he is a member of the Computer Conservation Society, and likes talking about, and playing with, seriously old, large and underpowered computers.

Education Liaison Officer Tina Eager cje(at)tavi.co.uk

BCS Women Respresentative Soraya Viloria-Montes De Oca soraya(at)bcs(dot)org Soraya has been working in IT for over 20 years and by natural progression with the advent of the Internet and the development of WANs and mobile workforce she has developed both experience and understanding of InfoSec. Throughout this past 20 years she has been involved in IT Security at a variety of layers. Her main interests, apart from IT and Information Security, are art, education and equalities. Since the early ‘90s Soraya has tried to get involved in IT projects which enable women, minorities or young starters to get a handle on technology and progress in the workforce. Either through mentoring or hands-on consulting she has tried to balance work with both paid and pro-bono activities.