My name is Brian Lane and I am a software developer from Port Orchard, Washington. I write software for various platforms, do a little hardware design, and write technical articles in my spare time. I was an embedded systems/DSP programmer for Shine Micro, Inc. from 1985 to 2006, and I work on a variety of embedded and Linux related projectes in my spare time.

I started out with computers in 1980 or so with a TRS-80 Model I at the local highschool (I was in 6th grade at the time). My dad (being the far-sighted guy he is) bought our family a Timex/Sinclair ZX-81 with a 16k RAM module. After a few months the 16k module blew a smoke ring one morning, but I had learned a little programming with it even though its tiny keyboard made it hard to use for anything 'real'. We upgraded to the Atari 800, where I played copious amounts of games, and managed to teach myself Assembly Language programming, Basic, and Action! and have a couple of lame programs rejected by Antic magazine.

In high school (Eatonville, Class of 1987) I hung out with the nerd crowd, and in 1987 my team took first place in the Seattle Marathon of the Minds - a competition sponsored by the Interactive Fiction game company Infocom to see which high school team could finish their new Interactive Fiction game Hollywood Hijinx, which we finished in 16 hours). At school I spent alot of time in the computer room, teaching Pascal to other students and the teacher. I built a speech synthasizer for the Atari 800 using its 4 joystick ports as I/O ports to control the SP0256 chipset from Radio Shack. I wish I knew where the project dissapeared to, it was my first electronics project.

As a graduation present I upgraded to an Atari 1040STe and started learning 'C' programming using the Mark Williams 'C' compiler. I also ran a FidoNet BBS called Callahan's Place for a couple of years.

From 1985 until 2006 I was employed by Johnson Microsystems (Which changed its name to Shine Micro, Inc.) as the senior software developer. I also did occasional digital design and schematic capture. I have experience with a wide range of microprocessors, from Motorola HC05 series, TI MSP430 series to Texas Instruments TMS320C54xx DSPs. While at Shine Micro I wrote the majority of the software for the SEA Marine Radio line of products. I was also the developer on the SM2496 Handspring Visor MP3 player, the SL161R AIS receiver and SM162B Class-B AIS transponder. I have recent experience writing GMSK 9600bps modems, as well as 1200bps DSC modems.

In 2006 I started working for Etelos, Inc. who has created a web application platform that includes their own EASE language and easy to distribute web apps.

In 1992 (notice how I catalog my life by the computers I've owned?) I finally crossed over to the PC. Atari had taken too long to release the promised Falcon, and I lost a large sale of Falcon equipment so I decided I needed something new. After trying various operating systems on the PC, I discovered Linux when the only distribution was SLS with kernel v0.99pl14. For a year or so I swapped back and forth between Windows and Linux, finally settling on a 100% linux system. I have used, off-and-on, most of the major distributions. I always find myself returning to either rpm based ones (like Fedora Core which I currently have on 2 machines), Debian (which I have on a few others), or the new Debian derived Ubuntu which makes a nice desktop system.

In 2007 I made the switch to the Mac mini from Apple (thanks Ron!), OS X is the Unix desktop done right. For the most part things just work, and when they don't they are easy to fix. Under the hood is the same familiar tools from Linux/Unix, but the GUI is professional and consistent.

Most of my spare time is spent doing computer and electronics related projects or playing with my kids. I'm also a strong supporter of the 2nd Amendmant, and spend some of my time shooting my AR-15 at the local range - Kitsap Rifle and Revolver Club as well as doing some reading and writing. I enjoy SF, Mystery and Horror, and lately I've been reading mysteries by local Northwest authors like Earl Emerson, and Aaron Elkins.

I have had several articles published by Linux Journal I am also the former (1999-2000) and current (2006-2008) president of the Kitsap Peninsula Linux User Group. I am the author of a variety of Open Source programs and participate in various mailing lists related to Linux and embedded development.

Education