I worked for software and hardware vendors for over 30 years. While acting as a software engineer and project manager, I had many opportunities to undertake major writing projects in several media.

Corporate Newsletters

My first writing opportunity in a corporate environment was to write a 4-page tutorial for a bi-monthly corporate newsletter. Any employee could contribute articles, and many of mine were published. There were a couple of people who thought their articles should be given preference because they had graduate degrees that I didn’t, or had more experience than me.

What was the difference? I wrote in conversational language, rather than academic jargon. The material was always technically correct. Most importantly, my articles were always in the Email to the editor in time before her deadline.

Why does this matter to you? Content marketing doesn’t require writers to create great literature. You need writers who produce clear prose. You need writers who do through research, avoiding numerous revisions for correctness. Most of all, you need writers who submit their material to you on time. I’ve been exhibiting these work habits for decades.

Marketing Videos

In 1991, I was forced into a product marketing role, and quickly excelled at it. I was the engineering manager responsible for developing the a unique software product. It was the first commercial compiler to perform interprocedural optimization on multiple languages.

When the software was finished, we talked with the marketing manager assigned to our product group. He didn’t understand the significance of the product for our market. Even worse, he had no clue on how to position the product in that marketplace.

So, I wrote and directed both a training video and a marketing video for this product. The two-hour training video used a Q and A format. It answered all the questions that the technical support people received from customers.

I hired a professional videographer. Then I recruited several of our best pre-sales and post-sales engineers as on-camera talent. They did a great job.

The marketing video used animations, common household objects, and even children’s toys to explain the product. Management was very happy with the results. They awarded me and my wife a 5-day Caribbean cruise, among a group of the top performers in the company.

Why does this matter to you? I have a demonstrated talent for making complex technology subjects accessible through video. I see marketing technology products in a corporate environment as an educational task. I’ve been writing scripts for explainer videos on and off for decades.

Computer Science Books

Computer programmers spend much of their professional lives debugging programs that they or other people wrote. In 2000, I became concerned about the lack of training that computer science students receive in debugging. So, I decided to write a book about debugging.

I read every book, book chapter, and article ever written about debugging in English. I read many dozens of books in a half dozen different disciplines, from fictional detective mysteries to Cognitive Psychology. No subject was irrelevant if it could provide insights into the debugging process.

I wrote a number of small applications and created a complete log of my testing and debugging activities. This enabled me to test my theories and to present real-world bugs committed by an experienced programmer. In contrast, the competing books all used toy programs and artificial bugs as examples.

A friend who taught computer science in a university asked me to teach a special course on debugging to his graduate students. Their feedback helped me to tune my material.

I spent four years researching and writing Debugging by Thinking: A Multidisciplinary Approach. Apparently, some people think it is still valuable. After nearly 15 years, the royalty checks are still coming in.

Why does this matter to you? I thoroughly research what I write. I use a multi-disciplinary approach that seeks analogies and insight from whatever fields will inform the topic. I use fresh, creative approaches that communicate even in complex technical fields. I have used innovative ways of explaining complex technology subjects for decades.

Professional Experience

Prior to starting my own business, I have written, programmed, and managed while working for these high technology businesses and organizations.

Texas A&M University, Computer Science Dept.		Largest university and highest-ranked engineering school in Texas
Convey Computer Corporation		Heterogeneous computing hardware manufacturer
Hewlett-Packard Company		Fortune 100 manufacturer of computer systems software and hardware
Convex Computer Corporation		Original and most successful mini-supercomputer manufacturer
CCI, Inc.		Telephony and fault tolerant systems manufacturer
I.P. Sharp Associates		International software and computer time-sharing vendor

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