Since you're reading this, you are at least curious about who am I? I have my bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering and Masters in Computer Engineering from Michigan. In early 90’s when I graduated I wanted to be a Design Engineer, work on research projects and had a different notion of what I want to be. My dad who is retired physician now, wanted me to go for PhD or at-least an MBA and my argument was – Why? No one is buying it anymore!! If you recall that time (late 80’s early 90’s), that time was a time of recession, economy was slow and NAFTA was in play. Manufacturing jobs were disappearing and R&D types of roles were even scarcer. Economy was turning into consumer service oriented economy, a technology landscape was shifting from big iron (mainframes) to client-server and dumb terminals were getting replaced by networked desktops running emulators. Microsoft DOS 5 and Windows 3.1 were standard desktop configuration running on Intel 486 with 4MB RAM and 40 MB Hard Disks.
I am glad that in my graduate coursework I had many computer sciences & software engineering courses about programming languages, data structures and how operating system works. Object oriented programming was not just an academic subject but was actually getting used in new software innovations.
I made my first resume on a type writer and second on an Apple Macintosh in Rutgers’ University Graduate Students Computer lab. Job search process was based upon newspaper ads and sending resumes by fax or postal
In NJ Star Leader and NY Times’ Sunday classified wanted sections, the jobs related to networking were on the rise and Novell’s NetWare people were in demand. My wife, who was doing her medical residency at UMDNJ (University of Medicine and Dentistry – New Jersey) talked me out from classical engineering market and made me look into this growing Novell and desktop networking. I decided to go for CNE. It was not an easy transition to start but turned out to be an easy transition to complete and get into a new service oriented marketplace.
From dumb terminals to desktops and thick client applications, from IPX to IPXODI and from AppleTalk to TCP/IP, Novell Netware 2.22 to Windows Server Systems, and from Local Area Networks to Internet revolution, it has been a long winding road. My role also evolved with changing technologies and market trends. I always felt compassionate about the use of technical innovations to resolve real life scenarios and what is the next big turn that tooling myself to deal with the challenges hidden behind that big turn.
From simple local networks to complex internetworking and internet networking technologies, and from different operating systems (Mac OS, UNIX and Windows) I worked and contributed in many different capacities and ways and secured professional certifications from Novell to Cisco and from PMI to Microsoft, I am fully vested in Microsoft Technologies in IW (Information Worker) space. Calling IW space my home ground I try reaching out to all enabling technologies and how can I best use them on projects that I work on.
With the limited resources and shoe lace string budget and time that I can find, the behind the scene story of this web site is just an example and testimony of it. <LINK READ MORE ABOUT HOW IT IS IMPLEMENTED>
I was working on a Trading Floor Build Out and Migration project for Freddie Mac in Tyson Corner, Virginia, I was contacted by Microsoft for a new group initiative Microsoft was working on – Information Worker Group. I was flown to Washington and met with several group leaders. This was new to me and that was the first time I heard about something called SharePoint. I was told that I already have it. The first version of SharePoint (aka STS v1 – SharePoint Team Services) was part of Microsoft Office XP media CD.
When I came back, first thing I did was to load the Office XP Media CD and installed the STS on my desktop PC (yes, SharePoint used to run on desktop OS). It was a turning point, and I start using it to collaborate on the project that I was working on.
From 2002 and onwards, I've been focused almost exclusively on Microsoft SharePoint Product and Technologies, and some of the consulting roles I have filled are Evangelist, Business/Technical Analyst, Solution/Technical Architect, Developer, Administrator, Systems/Build Engineer, Advisor and Learner. I don’t hold back any advice or suggestion and learning never stops no matter what role I am in.