Hello, my name is Dennis Hamilton.  I have completed eight course modules of the M.Sc program: 

1. MSC-CS: Computer Structures, the 1st course we all take
2. MSC-SE: Software Engineering
3. MSC-JV: Java with OOP (my programming requirement)
4. MSC-WA: Web Applications
5. MSC-DB: Databases (my technologies requirement) 
6. MSC-CC: Computer Communications
7. MSC-SN: Information Security Engineering  
8. MSC-PM: IT Project Management

9-12. MSC-DS: Project Dissertation, making up 1/3 of the M.Sc in IT, is my current preoccupation.

I had planned all along to complete my dissertation in March 2005 and graduate at the July, 2005, commencement in Liverpool.  I had taken a couple of long breaks between modules and thought I could make it up by taking MSC-PM (a great, recently-introduced course) concurrent with the initial stages of the MSC-DS.  That wasn't smart.  My 8-month allowance for the Project Dissertation began on November 28, 2004.  My dissertation proposal was accepted on February 1, 2005.  I am now immersed in repairing my plan (I seem to require an exception review monthly) and moving from project design to implementation with, let's see, 11 weeks to go.  This is definitely a breakthrough training experience for me.

I am in this program for a serious tune up of my skills and to equip myself to teach at this level.  My desire is to pursue computer science as a scholar and as a teacher.  My intention is to excel in my participation here, and in the future beyond.

I live in Seattle, Washington, with my wife Victoria (Vicki) and our 3 cats.  We are on Pacific Daylight Time, gmt-0700, until the end of October.  I reached my 65th birthday in January 2004.  We celebrated with a trip to Rome and Florence, in the country that Vicki has always dreamed to live in.  Vicki is a master potter and teacher.  

We have 3 sons, all grown and unmarried.  The youngest, Yogi Japendranatha, is at the Hindu monastery on Kauai, Hawaii, where he supports the monastery's network, among other duties.  The oldest son lives in Portland, Oregon where he is a rock musician and in a recovery program.  The middle son is a professional stage manager for local theatrical productions in Seattle.  

Vicki and I have 3 sisters between us.  The middle one, my youngest sister, Carol, works in special education in St. Cloud, Minnesota.  Vicki's sister Elizabeth and my sister, Judy, live nearby to Seattle.

I wrote my first computer program (in Fortran) in May of 1958 while I was working as an engineering aide at Boeing in Renton, Washington.  I had dropped out of college the year before.  I had been interested in computers before that, and I have worked in practically all aspects of software since.  Some of my experiences as a young and then not-so-young developer are described in an on-line article on the O'Reilly Network.

By 1995 I had completed my undergraduate education with a Bachelor of Arts degree in an external degree program.  I earned credits in computer science by taking the Graduate Record Examination in CS and challenging the major.  I then focused on philosophy, economics, and anthropology in a variety of classroom courses over the years.

My last corporate employment was at Xerox Corporation, where I worked as a software scientist and system architect of document-management systems.  I retired at the end of 1998 and I have continued as a semi-retired consultant.  The most rewarding consulting assignments have included travel to Japan, where I have several colleagues.

I have also committed myself to produce some software:

• Initial nfoWare development with the support of the Microsoft ISV Empower Program.  This has stretched out while I work on my dissertation project,
• TROST: Templates for Raising Open-System Trustworthiness, conducted as an open-source project, that also allows me to advance my support for
• ODMA and ActiveODMA, developments I support along with DMware, the Document Management Interoperability Exchange.

 My first love is always computing at the personal level, and that now includes collaboration and coordination of work by computers.  I want to provide information-processing components that can be used to blend collaborative computing applications together. 

I have also succumbed to blogging: 

• My first blog, Orcmid's Lair, started as I was beginning my M.Sc in IT.  This is now my general-interest blog, but it always leans toward computer technology.
• To organize my writings a little better, I have recently started another blog, Professor von Clueless in the Blunder Dome.  One of my first postings is about an adventure with security software.  This blog is all about computing at one level or another, and you'll find topics that interest me in the context of TROST and my other focus in computing.
• Numbering Peano is a different sort of Blog.  It is about abstraction and how we employ computers as "carriers" of abstraction, what that means, and what it doesn't.  There's even some Java code all to make a point about how little there is anything that means very much in a computer program.  Numbering Peano and some more-deeply abstract topics will have to wait until the completion of my project dissertation.

-- Dennis E. Hamilton
Seattle, Washington
2005 May 11

0.50 2005-05-11: Update for my current immersion in the M.Sc in IT Project Dissertation

I'm now heavily into the MSC-DS and this is my way of introduction for now.  I tidied it up to provide access to related materials that are also on-line now.

0.30 2004-10-01: Update for Autumn 2004 initiation of Dissertation

 Bring current and reflect the status at this time.  Set up emphasis for easier spot-reading and also potential links to expanded material.

0.20 2004-06-24: Update for Summer 2004 start of MSC-SN (orcmid)

Create version that reflects my status at the beginning of MSC-SN today.

0.01 2004-02-28: Updated Spring 2004 Introduction (orcmid)

Update for use as my introduction for both the Staff-Student Discussion project and my seventh course.  Frozen with switch to strict versioning model on 2004-06-24.  The content is as it was at the end of April and the start of MSC-AT.

0.00 2004-02-05: Initial Erudizione Version (orcmid)

Adapt the introduction used for MSC-DB for current use with MSC-CC and use as the initial Web-based introduction..