02/2005-Present, Trust Company of the West (TCW), Los Angeles, California
A consultant for this prominent investment institution, Erick has been responsible for the redesign and implementation of the trade compliance system in use by the Bank Debt and High Yield departments. Built entirely as SQL Server stored procedures, this system allows users to define arbitrarily complex compliance checks reflecting the rules of indentures to which the business must adhere. In this capacity Erick is responsible for the accuracy and performance of hundreds of rules critical to the business.
For the Credit Mortgage Group, Erick has been instrumental in introducing the SQL Server 2005 environment, helping to pioneer the company's Business Intelligence initiative. In this capacity, he has developed a dot-net infractructure consisting of C# stored procedures used to interface with the CDO Sentry vendor applications via web services. The code is used to retrieve information from the foreign system, archiving it to the SQL data store and transforming it, via an ETL layer (using SSIS), into a data warehouse. For this initiative Erick has performed all data analysis and the requisite dimensional modelling, as as well as building the Analysis Server cubes (MOLAP) used for presentation. Display of data is accomplished via Excel, the new Sharepoint (MOSS), and through Reporting Services.
Additionally, Erick maintains and enhances AIMS - one of the company's asset management systems - a VB 6.0 application with a SQL Server back end for which he has extensively re-engineered a dynamic entity editor, key to the application's flexibility, and a batch process manager. As part of this work, Erick also supports, fixes and enhances an existing base of Crystal Reports 7.0 reports.
Finally, Erick actively develops and maintains scores of Reporting Services (SSRS) reports for various departments and has diagnosed, documented and submitted over a dozen bugs with the platform to the Microsoft Product Support Services division, served as TCW's primary technical contact point for Microsoft.
Erick also sits on the SQL Standards committee, helping steer the company towards greater formality in its software development efforts.
09/2005-Present, The Writer's Guild of America, Hollywood, California
Retained by this labour union to develop a set of Crystal reports for the Creative Rights department, Erick quickly realised the immediate need for substantial database repair and remodelling work.
Well familiar with the complete development cycle, he established templates for report description, collected requirements from the user community and despite the need for a great deal of data analysis and cleaning, delivered on schedule and under budget, providing a level of service to which the organisation was unaccustomed. Please see  endorsement e-mail.
Subsequent work for this client includes the development of an ASP.NET application designed to allow the synchronisation of data with other guilds. The application provides workflow for data imports, giving the users the ability to select various ways in which records are to be handled, and provides exception and difference reports for auditing purposes.
Additionally, taking Erick's lead, the company has migrated to the use of Analysis Server 2005 for decision support activities. In this capacity, he has designed and implemented OLAP cubes for a number of target domains, making extensive use of the UDM (used as an interim solution before a data warehouse can be developed), and providing presentation through Excel pivot tables.
For this client, Erick also aided in the interview and selection of a new Director of IS and has taken part in the selection of developers, members of the DBA team, and business analysts. With his help, the company has also adopted a set of SQL coding standards and style guidelines, and is currently redesigning its migration process.
04/2004-02/2005, Western Asset Management, inc., Pasadena, California
Engaged by this financial institution to evaluate a high profile, behind-schedule and over-budget internal effort to develop a reporting system, Erick conducted a thorough assessment of the $1M+ yearlong Crystal Reports solution developed.
At his recommendation, the company discarded its prior architecture, committing to development of a web-based, componentised design proposed by him. In his role as technical lead, Erick architected and fully implemented a set of Cold-Fusion MX components and custom tags capable of delivering feature-rich reports in highly interactive tabular, hierarchical and freeform formats. The components served to abstract and automate database access functionality, report parameter collection, provide a standard look-and-feel and a navigational framework, and support printing and Excel export functions as required by the user community. In this capacity Erick also participated in writing and optimising PL/SQL code on Oracle 9i.
As proof-of-concept, Erick implemented the company's most complex and heavily used report - a hierarchical layout of securities nesting 7-10 levels deep and comprising optional layouts per security type, collapsible columns and rows, and filtering and top-side grouping, amongst other features - meeting with user and management acceptance and guiding the effort through to its production-level deployment.
With success behind him, Erick's attention was turned to streamlining and enhancing the company's vendor data import processes, which included benchmark information from Bloomberg, JP Morgan, and Standard & Poor's, amongst others. His efforts in this area concentrated on developing a series of Perl-based classes for abstracting FTP retrievals, complex data transformations, and finally, database imports and downstream processing. In addition to writing the above-named functionality, Erick also rewrote many of the existing processes, as well as creating new scripts for data imports of previously unavailable data.
In addition, as part of various database-migration efforts, Erick developed a highly customisable Perl script used to generate data-set comparisons between heterogeneous sources including Sybase and Oracle stored procedures, Excel spreadsheets and non-delimited data files. The script allowed the creation of regression tests across disparate sources of data whereby complex manipulations had to occur before comparison could be made. The script was written as a CGI program and presented its output in the form of Excel workbooks containing the original result sets as well as their comparison.
04/2001-03/2004, CES Partners, Los Angeles, California
As a managing partner in this start-up consumer-electronics firm, Erick has served as the concept lead, designer and sole developer. Immersed in Linux and related technologies, Erick built both a web-driven set-top application and a peer-to-peer network architecture. His work in this endeavour has included database design and management tasks, front and back end development, systems administration work, and interface design to foreign systems, . Below please find greater detail:
- Installations of various versions of RedHat Linux, including kernel recompilations and manual configuration.
- Installation and configuration of the Apache web server, Sendmail MTA, TinyDNS name resolution server, Samba, WU and VS ftp servers, NFS, and the MySQL engine. Additionally, Erick has installed, configured and is proficient with a myriad utilities and clients, having often both compiled and packaged them, amongst which figure: SpamAssassin, SCSI tape support, WiFi drivers, RPM, iptables, ptal print drivers, Webmin and SSH.
- In his development work, he used the following technologies: Perl, PHP, the POE state engine, DHTML/CSS and a wide array of CPAN modules. As a by-product of his efforts Erick also developed the cpan2rpm packaging utility, which creates RPM packages from CPAN modules and which may be found on SourceForge and at its home site.
- At the data end, Erick was responsible for data modelling and database design. His work included extensive research into the use of the RDF model, vis-à-vis other XML-based technologies, to represent the problem domain.
- In the middle layers, Erick was responsible for writing a number of Linux daemons, each packaged into numerous small modules and offering HTTP interfaces with data returned as URL-encoded strings and XML. The technology was developed using the POE state engine. Additionally developed a number of web-page scrapers and maintenance utilities.
- At the front end, the system was designed as a PHP web site with extensive use of Javascript. Erick was responsible for all graphics design and testing.
For a closer look at the set-top application, please refer to http://www.memiki.com - for a look at the perr-to-peer architecture, see http://www.memiki.net
In conjunction with the above Erick has become an active member of the open-source community, publishing a number of POE classes and CPAN modules, some of which may be found at http://perl.arix.com
Sundry other sites Erick has developed and currently maintains include a DNS-based RBL which may be found at: http://nospam.arix.com, a web-based data repository: http://www.infoslice.com, and http://www.arix.com/animalis/ an RDF-like implementation of animal information.
01/2001-04/2001, Load Media Inc., Hollywood, California
Acting in the role of interim CTO for this content distribution network company, Erick's activities included the following:
- Introduced and implemented RUP (the Rational Unified Process) as a methodology for development, conducting in-house seminars of the process and persuading management and key personnel of the need for a development methodology.
- Performed Business Modelling functions, assembling the senior-level management team in order to define a Business Vision, identify stakeholders of the system and in general, define the boundaries of the IT effort.
- Performed system analysis of the company's current software, identifying areas to outsource and integrate. Analysis included UML diagramming of business use-cases, component and deployment models, and activity charts for various representations of the IT effort.
- Researched market solutions in the areas of Digital Asset Management, Portal packages and video display technologies, bringing vendors in-house for presentations and performing evaluations of their various offerings. Amongst the companies evaluated were: Vignette, Artesia, eMotion, WorldWeb (now StarBase), iPlanet, Sequoia Software, and Plumtree.
- Researched business-core technical solutions, identifying and producing proofs-of-concept for key requirements including true bandwidth-throttling (accomplished with Windows port of BSD Packet Capture library), a small web-server (various open-source solutions were considered), and web-crawler technology.
- Aided in staffing, interviewing applicants in the search of the Chief Technology Officer and VP Engineering positions, as well as of Project Managers and C++ programmers. Personally introduced several candidates, placing a Database Administrator. Interview eventually led to the hiring of a CTO, a Systems Architect, and others.
- Participated in evaluation of various toolsets, including the Rational Suite, TogetherSoft's products, Embarcadero's GDPro, and the DOORS and Caliber Requirements Management offerings.
04/2000 - 10/2000, Guidance Solutions Inc., Marina Del Rey, California
At this website design studio Mr. Calder served various clients in
different roles.
For Moveline Inc., developed a Java Server Page (JSP)
solution using Enterprise JavaBeans (EJBs) on BEA's Weblogic
Server. Amongst others, tasks included installing and configuring the
Weblogic server, developing a proof of concept and investigating the
Microsoft COM interface to Java classes. Additionally, as an
integrator took ownership of sections of the website, developing in
Microsoft's ASP (ActiveServer Pages) and coding to a XML-based COM
layer.
For StreetZebra.com, served as a trouble-shooter, performing
analysis on a poorly performing production system and making design
recommendations which resulted in substantial improvement to the
satisfaction of the client.
For Venator Inc., performed a Phase II redesign of
eastbay.com's back-end in collaboration with client's business
analysts. In addition to data-modelling, responsibilities included
architecting the physical layout, installation and configuration of 5
Sybase XII servers. Also participated in migration aspects from previous
system and helped co-ordinate co-location of servers to server farm.
05/2000 - 06/2000, ez2plan.com, Manhattan Beach, California
As a short-term contract, re-architected client's web-based application. Work performed included layout redesign, functionality reorganisation and analysis of new site features. Site developed on Microsoft ASP against a SQL Server back-end.
09/1999 - 04/2000, Hughes Space & Communications, El Segundo, California
Retained to re-design the heart of the company's satellite telemetry
system, Mr. Calder served as both the project lead and sole developer. A
high-visibility system in the critical path, the project required from
Erick such tasks as preparing project schedules and making design review
presentations to management, performing analysis of the existing
production system, as well as personally implementing his designs for the
new web-based solution.
Rebuilt from the ground up, the new web-based application consists of
approximately 3,500 lines of fully commented Perl code, a similar number
of lines of Sybase T-SQL and a fair amount of DHTML/CSS and Javascript.
Along with a fully working application Mr. Calder delivered database
schema diagrams, process flow diagrams, code-maintenance documentation and
a user manual, implemented as a set of web-pages tightly integrated into
the application.
Additionally Mr. Calder assumed a leadership position, redesigning the
department's internal web-site. In this assignment, Erick made use of both
Macromedia's GoLive! web-authoring tool, and the Cold Fusion server.
Please see letter of
recommendation.
05/1999 - 09/1999, City of Hope, Duarte, California
As a database administrator (DBA) for this cancer research
organisation, Mr. Calder supported and maintained over 132 databases on 11
servers comprising mission-critical corporate systems and their interfaces
to vendor packages which included the Oasys system and its gateway, and
the Dun & Bradstreet SmartStream accounting system. Amongst others,
his duties included installing OS patches and EBFs, analysis of Sybase
configuration parameters and performance and tuning of various servers,
standardisation of script code and automation of various tasks.
At COH, Erick worked with Sun Solaris versions 2.4, 2.5, 2.6, Sybase
versions 11.01, 11.0.2 & 11.5.1 and MS SQL Server 6.5 and 7.0. The
largest database on site was 20GB.
02/1999 - 03/1999, Hughes Corp., Los Angeles, California
Under contract for the Space and Communications division, Mr. Calder
developed SQR program to produce an 8 part report consolidating and
detailing information regarding telemetry feeds from satellite stations.
Report included table of contents, and several cross-indexes to
engineering key data. Output presented to engineers via intranet, as Adobe
Acrobat files.
10/1996 - 02/1999, The Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, California
Retained by this prominent newspaper to overhaul its in-house
Compensation and Commission Calculation System, Mr. Calder worked
closely with Times analysts and became responsible for:
- redesign of data model
- development of the nearly 3,500 lines of production-level Transact
SQL which comprise the entire back-end of the system, including nightly
and weekly batch-level processing
- assisting with import/export issues to the corporate mainframe and
other foreign systems
- advising on front-end interface issues
Running Sybase
System XI on IBM AIX 4.1 with a Windows NT 4.0 front end, the system
currently handles all of the Times’ 800+ sales force and their
management’s commission distribution, bonus calculation and other
compensation needs, including interfacing to G/L and the current cheque
issuing system.
Mr. Calder also served to establish Sqribe’s SQR development platform
as the corporate standard for report generation. Working with UNIX version
3.0.12, he personally developed over a dozen reports consisting of over
6,000 lines of SQR code.
Under separate contract Mr. Calder also developed the Automated
Report and Distribution System (ARDS). A mixture of technologies, ARDS
consists of a database-driven web-page solution which allows Times’
employees to run and view reports via the local intranet.
With Netscape and MSIE 4.0 at the front end, dynamically generated HTML
(embedded with fairly sophisticated JavaScript) allows for user
interactivity with live data e.g. users may specify report criteria in
terms of current data. A hybrid CGI middle layer, consisting of over 6,800
lines of both Perl and Korn Shell, handles requests from the browser and
generats reports via SQR, iSQL, Korn Shell or other means. Once generated,
these reports are returned to the browser as either plain ASCII, HTML
tables or Adobe Acrobat files. Postscript output from SQR is converted
into PDF format suitable for the plug-in at the front end, by the Acrobat
Distiller. Additionally, the system allows for printing of reports, not
only to the local workstation, but also to remote printing facilities via
standard UNIX queues and IBM’s PSF software. Other means of delivery
available through the system include e-mail and FTP.
Aside from being solely responsible for its design and coding, Mr.
Calder’s efforts in this project included:
- Installation and configuration of a local intranet, including Apache
web servers using virtual domains.
- Installation of SQR 3.0.12, Perl V and the SybPerl module on AIX.
- Creation of over 30 AdVision reports comprising 3,200+ lines of SQR
code, including the development of an application framework for
creating reports. Included among these reports figured several which
correlated data across separate databases on separate servers
- Development and set-up of bi-directional replicated stored
procedures and configuration of remote servers for RPC procedure
calling.
- Design and implementation of all web pages in the system, including
maintenance and configuration modules, and user-end report query
screens.
- Establishment of a report access hierarchy and permission structure
for sales representatives and managers and system administrators.
- Writing of both system and user documentation, both available online
(as web pages) and in printable form (as Word files).
- Modification and overhaul of several thousand lines of existing
AdVision report code - a CText product, AdVision serves as the Times’
off-the-shelf ad order entry package.
- Consulting on performance, data replication, RPC functionality and
foreign system import/export issues.
- Spearheading an effort to consolidate the creation and management of
user profiles on an enterprise-wide level.
- Additionally served as on-call, production-level DBA support in a
24x7 environment.
Finally, in addition to exploring and writing
in-house papers on complex issues as pre-exploded data mirrors, the safe
nesting of transactions in recursive functions, generic tree walking SQL
and the use of RPC in cross-server reporting, Mr. Calder had the privilege
to serve as a tutor and mentor to some of the Times’ internal staff. This
effort included mini-conferences, code walk-throughs, and private
discussions on language, technology and development-cycle issues.
During his term with the client, Mr. Calder worked between 70 and 80
hours per week and worked through holidays to make sure product delivery
kept on schedule. As a professional courtesy to the client, Mr. Calder
still advises and consults on ARDS/AdVision related problems via e-mail.
Please see letter of
recommendation.
08/1996 - 10/1996, NetLOCK Inc., Fullerton, California
Engaged by this division of Hughes Corporation, responsible for
installing Sybase System XI and the Scopus call-centre
product on a Sun Sparcstation running Solaris 2.5.
Principally responsible for data conversion to Scopus/Sybase from
existing Macintosh Act and Filemaker Pro databases. In this capacity,
performed analysis and clean-up of existing data. Also solely responsible
for writing of data mapping plan and SQL scripts for Scopus framework
modifications, as well as for performing data transfer.
Additionally participated in design meetings and assisted with
knowledge transfer of Scopus structure and functionality.
06/1996 - 08/1996, Dunn Edwards Corporation, Los Angeles, California
Involved in the redesign of this paint manufacturer's existing revenue
and commission system, became responsible for feature additions, debugging
of current process-flow and code obsolescence analysis. System hosted on a
Compaq ProLiant running Sybase System X.
10/1995 - 02/1996, Packard-Bell Computer Co., Magna, Utah
Brought-in as a back-end specialist, formed part of team to assemble
complete solution for company's 24-hour, OLTP, call-center system.
Directly involved with all database issues from beginning until production
roll-out, consulted on system configuration issues, capacity planning, and
performance analysis and projections. Also advised on redundancy and
fault-tolerance issues particularly important in 24-hour production
systems. In addition, actively participated in back-end customisation of
Scopus call-centre product.
Duties and responsibilities during all stages of the project were as
follows:
- Responsible for installation of Sybase System 10 and OS patches on
HP 9000 T-500 platform (4 processors, 1.3GB RAM).
- In charge of devising and helping to implement stress testing
procedures for pre-release pilot. Stress testing included multiple
log-in simulations, network traffic generation, processor overloading
and index usage. Made recommendations based on resulting data regarding
possible bottlenecks and general system performance.
- As primary resource for security issues, wrote UNIX scripts and SQL
stored procedures for the automation of co-ordinated Sybase and Scopus
account creation. Such mechanisms allowed for the creation and deletion
of test sets of accounts and also aided in the production-level creation
of nearly 1,000 user accounts.
- Actively involved in back-end customisation of Scopus call-center
product. Work done included analysis and modification of triggers,
indices and database structure. Also became involved in optimising and
re-writing existing SQL stored procedures to reduce program logic
complexity.
- As DBA (database administrator), responsible for fulfilling
developers' requests for table, index, and view creation, as well as for
stored procedure version management.
- Established start-up and shutdown procedures to deal with frequent
power outages and management of the UPS system.
- Installed Sybase threshold mechanisms for prevention of resource
depletion, as well as an automated monitoring scheme to alert DBAs of
resource failures.
- Automated database back-up routines. Also created simplified UNIX
interface for handling database restore and emergency database fix
processes.
- Suggested the need for and authored client's Emergency Procedures
Guide - a nearly 150 page document describing step-by-step procedures to
follow in case of emergency.
02/1994 - 08/1995, Walt Disney, Buena Vista Home Video, Glendale, California
As database programmer, involved in optimisation and performance issues
as well as providing advice and support to front-end programmers on Sybase
System 10 technology. Work done includes writing of stored procedures,
triggers and views, creation of indexes, use of declarative referential
integrity code, debugging and tuning of existing code including
implementation of server-level cursors for efficiency. Responsible for
maintenance and administration of over 300 stored procedures. Also
involved in co-ordination of data transfers to/from company's AS/400
systems and of overnight batch processing
Additionally fulfilling database administration duties such as
maintaining consistency of code and data across multiple servers,
performing data backups, automating tasks through UNIX scripts, scheduling
and monitoring of batch jobs and providing security services such as
creating login id's and granting or revoking permissions to tables and
databases.
10/1991 - 11/1993, ARCO Products Company, Los Angeles, California
Project leader responsible for development of the Arco Document
Management System (ADMS) for engineering and manufacturing divisions. In
charge of co-ordinating integration of other in-house systems into ADMS
including code re-writes, optimisation and streamlining. Also provided
end-user support and maintenance of production-level system.
Windows-hosted MDI front-end consists of over 30,000 lines of VB and
VC++ code, in addition to use of Q+E's access library, the VBSQL language
and custom control and many other VBXs. Sybase SQL Server 4.2.9 back-end
constitutes over 50 stored procedures, triggers and views (10,000 lines of
SQL). Also responsible for full context-sensitive electronic
documentation.
Program makes extensive use of DDE to other applications including
AutoCAD, Excel and MS Word, as well as various raster and vector viewers.
Utilisation of Novell API for automatic connection and manipulation of
file servers. System also makes use of Open Server API for remote
procedure calls (TI-RPC) to UNIX systems.
Co-ordination of department-wide implementation of version control
system, including teaching seminars and providing technical support to
other developers.
Also performed duties of software evaluation and in-house testing of
outside vendor systems.
|
Microsoft Word
Plain text