11/17/2010 Kymberly Burkhead-Dalton
Written by Kymberly Burkhead-Dalton
What is the single largest programming disaster you’ve ever been a part of?
I'm not sure I can point at any "disasters" but there have been quite a few projects that have run far over the desired time. The most common of these were projects where the users were disconnected from the development team so that when the system was delivered for user acceptance testing (usually just days or weeks before the target delivery date) the users said, "oh, this wasn't what I wanted at all!" A particularly large project related to delivery of streaming prices for real-time foreign currency trading that slipped from a target release date around Thanksgiving to an actual release date in mid February was the motivation for myself (and much of our development team) to make a concerted push into agile methodologies -- no more waterfall for us!
How did you get your first job?
My first job was picking vegetables on my parent's farm - and it wasn't something I volunteered for. In fact, escaping farm work was a big part of my motivation to do well in school! My first paid programming job was while I was an exchange student in Germany in 1994. A friend of mine heard that several research groups affiliated with the university were hiring student programmers. Normally they only considered students in their 4th year or later (my friend and I were in our 2nd year) but we talked our way into interviews and both got jobs - but they wouldn't tell us what exactly we'd be assigned to do. Mine turned out to be enhancing a suite of rendering and visualization tools to support 3D shutter glasses. Lots of cool new SGI hardware (back when SGI was a big deal in computer graphics) and C/C++ hacking in a research lab where most people worked normal hours but to which I had a 24 hour key card... I would have been happy to do the work for free - so the fact that I was getting paid 11 DM / hour was just icing on the cake.
How do you envision computers in 2020?
Hmm, in 2020 I expect that computers will continue to migrate deeper into the fabric of everyday life. People will spend less time "at a computer" but rather will interact with information-based services via a number of devices (hand-held, desk-top, wall-covering, etc.). I think the focus will continue to move from devices to services and information. The semantic web and better data mining algorithms will allow people to take for granted the ability to "know" all sorts of factual information in real-time the same way that people feel comfortable today relying on Google or Wikipedia to find certain kinds of static information with good reliability. I also think it's a safe bet that most of the things which are important and exciting in 2020 will have been barely on the radar in 2010 -- so I'm looking forward to being surprised.
About Andrew Brook
Andrew Brook is the Chief Technology Officer for Selerity, a technology start-up focused on real-time event data for the financial services industry. Andrew is responsible for the overall architecture, development, and strategy of the firm’s technology infrastructure and operations. Immediately prior to Selerity, Andrew was the Executive Director responsible for Morgan Stanley’s foreign exchange (FX) e-commerce platform, providing low-latency pricing and execution services to the firm's clients. Previous to Morgan Stanley, Andrew managed the FX Prime Brokerage Technology, FX Electronic Trading Technology, and Market Risk Technology teams for the Global Corporate and Investment Banking division of Bank of America. Andrew was also the co-founder of an early stage venture that delivered innovative scheduling software to the agile manufacturing sector. In his free time, Andrew avidly follows developments in the fields of climate science, energy technology, public policy and enjoys spending time with his family in the outdoors. Andrew holds a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and lives with his wife and daughter in Jersey City, NJ.