RobMeerman.co.uk

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====== Curriculum Vitae / Resumé ======

{{rob.jpg?150 |Click to enlarge}}

^ Name: | Robert Meerman |
^ Date of birth: | 1983-Oct-29 |
^ Work sought: | I am not currently seeking employment |
^ Qualifications: | 2:1 in Computer Science from Warwick University, UK((Warwick University is consistently rated to be among the top-10 Universities in Britain, and among the top 5 for the discipline of Computer Science)) |
^ Strengths: | Thorough, good analytical skills, excellent communicator((I am often told I would make a good teacher when I am explaining technical things to non-technical people)), leadership/organisational skills, confident and out-going, persistent and not afraid to work long hours when required |
^ Current Occupation: | Software Engineer for ARM Ltd's Media Processing Division|

===== Summary =====

  * Good university qualification
  * Programming experience in multiple languages and environments
  * Work experience authoring websites in Hong Kong, Cyprus and the UK
  * International background and lifestyle. Have lived in Malaysia, Syria, Cyprus, Gabon and Hong Kong
  * Organisational skills
  * Good communication skills

===== Personal Introduction =====
I am a recent graduate looking for challenging technical and creative work, and am not afraid to work under pressure. Particularly I am interested in working with (realtime) visual media, human-computer interaction and/or low-level systems which interact directly with hardware.

I have always loved working with video and special effects (at the age of 17 I produced a short light-sabre fight clip((You can view this [[http://robmeerman.co.uk/gallery/displayimage.php?album=9&pos=23|here]])) using a toy camera and a lot of patience) and have produced an "ident"((An "ident" in the context of a television station is a short clip used to help establish the television broadcaster's brand, and commonly appears between news-clips and before/after ad-breaks.)) clip for my University's student television station. More recently I have become interested in electronics and the use of microprocessors (c.f. my University project)

===== Contact =====
^ Email: | [[robert.meerman@gmail.com]] |
^ Tel:   | 077 636 09 286               |

===== Qualifications =====

  * 2:1 BSci in Computer Science from [[http://dcs.warwick.ac.uk|Warwick University, UK]]
    * For a list of modules taken and results obtained, please visit [[cv/modules]]
  * A-Level Grades
    * A --- Art (Animation and Photography)
    * A --- Physics
    * B --- Mathematics
  * AS-Level
    * A --- Information Communication Technology (ICT)((I did not do a full A-level in ICT as I found the AS level to be rather trivial and unchallenging))
  * Miscellaneous Awards/Prizes
    * Science prize at secondary school
    * ICT prize at secondary school
    * Regional IT award for Young Enterprise company

==== Experience ====

=== Organisational ===
  * President of my University's 90+ member Anime & Manga (Japan-culture) society for a year
  * Representative for my year with the Computer Science Student-Staff Liaison Committee, where I represented the views of my peers when making requests and complaints to the members of the board.

=== Communication ===

  * Departmental tour-guide for prospective students
  * Participated in an 'Academic Cousin' system, where I was mentor to first year students
  * Kept up a personal website since 1999 (age 15)

===== Skills =====
==== Software ====
=== Applications ===

I am competent with and frequently use the following software:
  * Microsoft Windows
  * Linux
  * Adobe Photoshop CS2
  * Macromedia Flash MX 2004
  * MS Office
  * OpenOffice.org

I have used the following for past projects, and understand the concepts involved:
  * Adobe Premiere
  * 3D Studio Max
  * Z Brush

I have a solid understanding of how the Microsoft WindowsNT family of operating systems function, and frequently modify the registry and system files to remove petty annoyances (such as the default action for picture files being 'Preview' via Microsoft's included viewer, instead of 'Open').

Recently I have become very fond of Linux-based operating systems, and now run a BASH-like shell on my Windows PC. I enjoy writing scripts to overcome tricky/tedious problems such as authenticating my broadband connection via a (cumbersome) web-portal. [[:unix:unison]] is a popular page on my site which demonstrates some of my understanding.

==== Programming ====

I thoroughly enjoy using the following languages/technologies:
  * PHP
  * Java
  * HTML / CSS
  * C/C++

I'm looking to expand my knowledge in the following:
  * OpenGL
  * XML
  * C#
  * .NET Framework
  * General Windows APIs

=== Software Projects ===
Software I have written that I am proud of.

== TV Series Renamer ==
This command-line utility renames TV episode video files by processing each file in a directory, extracting the season & episode number and matching it to data parsed from a webpage --- the end result is each file renamed to a consistent format including the episode titles supplied by the webpage.

See [[/coding/file_renamer/|TV Series Renamer]]

== Cluedo Assistant ==
I made a Java application for my mobile phone to help me test an idea I had on how to win at the board-game "Cluedo" by keeping track of all moves in the game. This was just a fun little project to make use of my smart-phone.

==== Hardware ====

=== USB Implementation for Game Boy Advance ===

{{usbprojectbreadboard.jpg?300 |Click to view full-size}}

This project was a solo project done as part of my degree course. It took 8-months and was supervised by Dr Roger Packwood((See [[http://www.dcs.warwick.ac.uk/people/staff/Roger.Packwood/|Dr Roger Packwood]])).

I implemented the USB 2.0 Basic Speed specification on some hobbyist hardware (a MicroChip PIC16F877 micro-controller and a Philips PDIUSBD12 USB bus-interfacing chip). The aim of the project was to create a no-hassle PC <-> GBA interface for bi-directional communication. The Philips chip took care of USB-bus interactions (receiving/transmitting packets), while the micro-controller was responsible for reading and creating packets.

I assembled the chips into a device and wired up the communication buses via detailed understanding of the chips data sheets and the USB protocol. The firmware produced directly manipulated this hardware and responded to USB requests from the host device (PC), first implementing device enumeration, and then the Human Interface Device class.

The project was a success, and the finished product does not require drivers for either the PC or the GBA. The PC uses the operating system's built-in HID drivers, while the GBA uses standard serial I/0 (RS232) via its native serial controller.

This project's documentation (including the submitted report and CD) is available [[:project|here]].

=== Pong ===
{{ pingpong.jpg}}

I worked in a pair with a peer from my course, and together we assembled the necessary hardware to create a simple 'Pong' game which worked on an oscilloscope in XY mode - using ADC/DACs, address decoders, buffers, latches and variable resistors we created a simple console where rotating the variable resistors would move paddles on the screen, which would bounce a ball back and forth and keep score.

My role in the project included designing the hardware schematic and implementing it, and then watching over my partners shoulder as he coded the game, offering optimizations and corrections while also documenting the project.

{{pingpongreport.doc|PingPong Project Report}} (518kB)

=== Automated Mains Controller ===

As part of a solution for an unstable home ADSL-modem I modified an electronic walltimer to use an external source to decide when to switch the mains power on or off, and linked this to my PC. I then wrote a small windows service (i.e. headless system application which appears in the list of services) which pings the router periodically, and cycles the modem's mains power after a certain number of consecutive connectivity failures.

See [[:walltimer]].

===== Work Experience =====
==== Websites ====
Most of my work experience involves doing freelance work on dynamic websites.

=== Parlain Cosmetics Ltd. ===

I worked as a full-time website implementer when I was 18, during the summer between finishing secondary school and starting university, and was employed by a cosmetics merchant based in Hong Kong. I was flown to Hong Kong and worked in their main office along side their head of IT for 3 months. I had to deal with non-English speaking staff via a go-between - this required good organisation to ensure I had enough materials to be able to work while the resident translator was unavailable.

While officially I was only responsible for the company's website, I got on well with their head of IT and helped sort out office networking, Unix-based web servers / routers, helped rebuild PCs and even re-carpeted some of the office with him one evening.

From a technical standpoint, my work involved much image editing (done in Photoshop) and interfacing with Macromedia Fireworks and Freehand documents from their publicity team. I was also required to make the websites available in 4 languages (English, French, Chinese-simplified and Chinese-traditional) which required learning about Unicode and UTF-8 standards.

I learnt to automate much of my work through Photoshop's Java-like scripting facility and other tools such as Macromedia Dreamweaver / Flash.

=== Other ===

Recent projects include:
  * [[http://www.FitzgeraldCyprus.com]] for a local estates agency in Paphos, Cyprus. I under-took to update their website, but ended up recreating it from scratch using a modular approach which better lends itself to extension and change. I help weekly face-to-face meetings with my clients to discuss their needs and documented the project in a transparent way so they could monitor my progress.
  * [[http://www.AnimeSoc.co.uk]] for our university's Japan-culture society, of which I was president for a year. The real complexity of this website is hidden in an "Executive Committee Administration Area", which allows control of a fairly sophisticated library manager and similar member-management facilities.
  * [[http://www.ChrisWhiteConservative.com]] for a local politician in the Leamington Spa constituency, intended to help with the run-up to the regional elections. //Unfortunately this site has been discontinued by its owner.// !!Please note this was a business venture, and does not necessarily reflect my political ideology.!!

==== Volunteer ====

I often volunteer my skills to help a local TV station in Paphos, Cyprus --- helping with office networking, hardware failures and software difficulties such as video codecs and remote administration. Much of their equipment is less-than-desirable and I find this creates interesting challenges.


==== Present Work ====

2006-07 to present: I am employed by [[http://www.arm.com|ARM Ltd]] (Cambridge, UK) as a "Graduate Software Engineer" as part of the graphics-drivers team in the "Media Processing Division".

===== Hobbies =====

I enjoy photography and always carry a digital camera around with me. I enjoying image manipulation and animation (and have a stylus-driven graphics tablet) and enjoy animated films and series. I find animation more compelling as it requires the use of imagination.

I enjoy being outdoors and exploring places on my bicycle. My idea of a good night is to get into a passionate conversation over a good meal in good company.
RobMeerman.co.uk

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