About Tim Scarfe, Your Host!

I am passionate technologist and passionate about the application of technology to solve real world problems. At the same time I am a business owner and a keen entrepreneur. Some people describe this wicked combination as an "entrepologist" but that's just a made up word and smacks a little pretentious. This web site is very "techie" oriented so I probably won't cover much of the business side here.

Here are a few head line items to describe the areas of Computer Science/Computing which interest me the most.

Microsoft Technology

• Powershell
• .NET 3.0
• WPF (Presentation Foundation)
• WF (Workflow Foundation)
• WCF (Communication Foundation)
• C# 3.0/Orcas
• Integrated Language Query (Linq)
• ADO.NET 3.0 (Conceptual Entity Framework)
• Office Productivity Products
• SharePoint 2007
• BizTalk 2008
• SQL Server 2005 DB/Analysis Services

Computing General

• Data Mining
• Artificial Intelligence
• Artificial Neural Networks
• Support Vector Machines
• Clustering
• Classification
• Feature Detection
• Words
• Image
• Video
• Audio
• Visualization
• Automation
• Computationally Intensive
• Algorithms
• Heuristics

My route into computing was through the web. Along the way I have picked up some pretty hardcore web based skills i.e.

• HTML
• CSS
• DOM
• JavaScript
• ASP.NET
• AJAX
• ASP.NET AJAX
• XHR
• JSON

For years I was involved with www.dhtmlcentral.com with Thomas Brattli (who works with us at Dot Net Solutions along with Dan Pupius for a while). And made several components such as the tabs which some of you may remember. I thought at the time it was a great way to learn how to code because you could look at the source code for anything online (JavaScript is an interpreted script language and therefore not compiled) and start hacking around with it.

Although I don't regret my entry point into computing I have to admit now with experience that it has taken me years to unlearn the bad habits I learned from the web scripting and lack of a formal introduction to computer science and programming. I'm not trying to make bold statements; there are a bunch of guys out there that thrive given the lexical flexibility of JavaScript and write amazing code. In particular I would like to point out Erik Arvidsson who I maintain to this day is the best DHTML coder out there in my opinion. And yes Google snapped him up.

It's been a blast but I'm done with the web for any kind of application development now where it can be avoided. I strongly believe that the future of applications for the masses is Windows Presentation Foundation and this is where I am going to invest my time in the near future. It's a gamble that many people won't agree with but we shall see!

Choosing a presentation technology for an application never was easy. You are making a series of quite complicated engineering trade-offs:

• Rich vs. Reach
• Deployment
• Offline Support
• Local Processing
• Development Time

Until recently I would always have pushed Windows Forms for a LOB (line of business) application unless there was a very good reason for a web application. ClickOnce technology is fantastic and it turned deployment from a weakness into a strength over night. The general rule of thumb I have used is that a web application takes roughly 4 times longer to write than a windows equivalent. At this time I am willing to suggest that a WPF application will take roughly 2 times as long (as a WinForms app).

I'm writing this in mid November 2006 and .NET 3.0 (with WPF) has just gone RTM. At this time it's still fair to expect major online communities such as Flickr, Last.FM and YouTube to provide web front ends only, but no one will question how much richer their online services will be with WPF. It's just a matter of time.

We shall see what the future holds!

So Why Microsoft?

I'm no Microsoft-only zealot; but their technology stack is astounding. I believe they currently lead the field on many of their headline products. I love their technology, passion, vision and transparency. The smart folks at MSFT have caused an information technology revolution over the last 20 years and I have even higher hopes for the next 20 years.

It's not like I'm having a stab at open source, far from it. I simply believe that great software is incredibly expensive and painstaking to produce and no one understands that better than Microsoft.

Microsoft is a really big hub of innovation in the industry right now. There are many other innovators; big (i.e. Google, Yahoo) and small (i.e. Last.FM, Touchstone, YouTube).

Your Experience?

My work through Dot Net Solutions has given me some amazing experiences over the last few years:

• Development of a revolutionary Legislative Compliance Management System (also web-enabled). Currently used by many of the major Oil & Gas players in the UK
• Development of Dot Net Solutions "Catalyst" best practice C# framework
• Development of Microsoft Word/WCF powered Web Content Management System
• Involvement on several large projects i.e. Mortgage Originations, Online Price Monitoring, Automated Intelligent Research, Electronic Trade Mark Registration, Web Sites (Traffic Info/Gadgets etc).
• Development of a data analysis/3d visualization application.
• Working with companies all over the world; including a week at Microsoft in Redmond!
• Getting interviewed on Channel9
• Doing a podcast for Computing magazine in the UK from Mix06 in Las Vegas
• Got to meet Robert Scoble and Robert Hess!
• Interviewed by local media around Windsor for setting up a successful software company at young age
• Speaker at Microsoft Developer 3 event at Microsoft UK

Dot Net Solutions has been trading since April 2004. Before that for several years I headed up the EnCana development team in the UK creating a cutting edge web based business management system for (what was) their "Buzzard" Development (circa $2,000,000,000 capital North Sea project). Before that I spent many years doing IT Consultancy and Web/Software development.

Also noteworthy; when I was 17 I won a 40,000UKP contract to build about 20 computers + network for the foreign office (exported to the remote UK dependency "Tristan Da Cunha"). When I was 14 I passed the full UK amateur radio examination (heavy physics/maths).

I don't want this to turn into a CV so I'll shut up now!

Other Interests

When I'm not in front of a computer I pursue what has been described as an "advanced and complex fitness routine" J

Some headline pursuits in Training:

• Training
• Nutrition/Diet
• Gymnastics
• Flexibility
• Acrobatics
• Strength Skills
• Trampoline
• Running (HIIT/Sprinting)

I have set up a training section for this stuff.