Bill Pringle

Here is the Pottermore section of my web site

Are you looking for a job also? You might be interested in what I have learned so far.

Career

I was a senior staff programmer for the Weather Group of Unisys. which provides weather-related products and services to a wide variety of customers.

I also worked on a variety of government projects. I was working on a project for the Transportation Security Agency (TSA), working on several programs dealing with air cargo security. Unfortunately, the contract ran out and was not renewed, which is why I was laid off.

Since early 2000, I have been working on web related projects. I was the lead software engineer for an e-community portal project for Unisys. The project involved web design, ASP (Active Server Pages), and databases. The software worked fine, but the business plan didn't. The projects I was working on when I was laid off involved web sites that were used by the government and/or the commercial segment.

I work a lot with Unix and C, as well as Microsoft. For web applications, I have used ASP and .Net, Java J2EE and JSP, HTML, CSS, AJAX, and PHP. I have extensive teaching experience and good communications skills, and as a result produce excellent documentation and training materials, in addition to excellent software. For more details, you can read my resume.

Before being assigned web applications, I worked on a weather display station software project called SkyVision™. This program displays current or past weather data similar to what you see on the Weather Channel. Unisys provides weather data for a number of large weather related companies. As part of this job, I also also supported weather displays at The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia and The Computer Museum in Boston.

Education

I have a Bachelor's degree from the University of Iowa, and obtained my Master's Degree from Penn State University, at the Great Valley Campus, near Philadelphia in 1999 with a 4.0 GPA. I used to teach classes at PSU, and my course notes and sample programs are still available from this web site.

My research interests include Genetic Programming, an extension to Genetic Algorithms. Here is a text version of a research paper on this topic.

Interests

RPG Games

I unwind by playing console-based Role Playing Games (RPGs) on Nintendo, PlayStation, and X-Box, especially anything by Square Soft, and have written a number of Video Game FAQs for some of the games I have played. These FAQs are available on GameFAQs, the best-known web site for such documents. My guides get between 200 and 600 hits per week the last time I checked.

Pottermore

My wife and I (and most of our family) are big Harry Potter fans. We have been enjoying Pottermore, a web site that J.K. Rowling had created about the Harry Potter world. If you love Harry Potter, read my pages on Pottermore, including how to earn points brewing potions. Another great site is is GriffinRoar.

Folk Music

I am interested in music (with a wide variety of music styles). I have written two music related programs which are available from my download page. These programs were written long before things like iTunes and Nero, but if you are interested in seeing how these kinds of programs work, you are welcome to check them out.

albums: albums is a CD database program. The data files are plain ASCII text files. The program can retreive entries by artist, title, as well as by time.
pscover: pscover is a program that prints covers for cassette tapes. The output file is formatted for a PostScript printer. This program can read files created by albums

I used to do a lot of folk dancing when I was younger, and have come to love music from many different countries. I especially like Balkan Music, and describe the interesting rhythms they employ. I have folk music CDs from a number of countries, and will probably create a page for those, similar to the Balkan page.

I am a software engineer, and enjoy writing programs to do a wide variety of things. I have written a number of programs that are available from my download page, including the following:

Web Tools

Web Tools: This package was used to develop this web site, as well as the Cheryl Wheeler web site. This page was created using that tool as well.
MyTelly and MyMovies: MyTelly is a nice open source program that will let you see the television schedule based on your cable provider. The program allows you to build searches and construct a personal viewing / recording schedule. I wrote a user manual for MyTelly.; This program didn't do what I wanted, which was to compare TV listings against a list of movies, so I wrote my own program, mymovies. I am currently using this program, and would be glad to share copies with anyone who might be interested.

Misc

I am interested in archaeology, especially Biblical Archaeology. I also enjoy studying scriptures. I am active in the Mormon Church, and have written a number of computer programs to make it easier for me while in several callings within the church.

I am happily married with four children and five grandchildren. (Two live near, but three in England.) My daughter in England has started her own company providing administrative services, especially wardening services for Quakers at: http://mindfulbusinessservices.com/.

I have recently been very active in family history. In addition to a list of my ancestors, there are also an autobiography of my Dad and other related family information.