Hello there! My name's Michael, and I like to make things. I'm also terible for writing far too much, so here's me in a nutshell:
21 year old student at Leeds Metropolitan University. Programmer, PHP (Procedural, OOP, Codeigniter), Javascript (Raw, jQuery), mySQL and a whole host of other mini-experiences (Python, Perl, Java). Internet addict, barcamp attendee and Left4Dead affectionado.
If you want to know more, keep on reading.
Life Story
I was born in Blackburn in 1989 and spent the first dozen or so years of my life playing sports, games and generally just being a kid. Then when I was about 11 or 12, I discovered the internet. Back then I was only allowed 10 minutes a day online on our 56K connection, but I was hooked. The idea that everyone in the world could access the same thing at the same time was fascinating.
Let's fast forward a few years until I was 14. Broadband had hit, eBay had just made it big and a lot of people were selling things online. My mum was an antiques dealer at the time and sold quite a lot on eBay. She used this thing called HTML to make the product descriptions look better. Being a teenager I believed that anything my parents could do, I could do better! So off I went and learnt HTML.
My first website went live on GeoCities in 2003. It used textured backgrounds, framesets and a table-based layout. I like to think I've improved since then, I use iframes too! [But seriously now, I do keep up with emerging technologies and make standards-based websites]. While HTML was cool, it was a bit boring. Once the site was made, it was static. Enter Javascript. I started out with copy and paste snippets, slowly changing bits and learning what it did. It was at this point I realised that it'd be nice for data to persist after you close the window, and I started looking online for a way to do it.
This is when I met PHP, my current lover. It took me a year or so to get to grips with PHP and mySQL, but I was hooked. I spent a year learning PHP, then a year forgetting everything I had learnt and got to grips with OOP. It was around this time I jokingly asked if anyone would give me a job in an IRC channel for an online game I used to play. Strangely enough, someone I knew relatively well told me he knew a guy in my area and put me in contact. Long story short, 2 months later I was working part time for Versatilia in Burnley, Lancashire. I've been there for 3 years now, working full time during my academic holidays - and I love it.
At Versatilia, I met Rob O'Rourke who introduced me to jQuery. I'd been working with Javascript for quite a while by this point, writing some fair substantial Greasemonkey scripts (My longest was about 1800 lines!) and was fairly confident with it. However, jQuery was a breath of fresh air. It just worked. I used it at work, on my own projects, anything I could get my hands on. I even went into building Adobe AIR apps using html and jQuery. Because I loved it so much, it became my standard barcamp talk, "jQuery: Why it's your new best friend".
I ran my session at UnSheffield in 2009 and received some very encouraging feedback. I kept at jQuery and a few months later, Lorna Mitchell emailed me asking if I'd run a session at #PHPNW09. She'd been sent my way by Jag Gill, one of the UnSheffield organisers. #PHPNW09 was a great weekend, and my presentation went ok. Looking back I'd do a lot differently, but it was my first real speaking gig and it's a learning experience.
So here we are, 8 years after it all started. I'm as addicted as ever to the internet and spend my time either playing games (I'm lvtrii on Steam) or working on websites. I do take on projects for clients with small budgets to supplement my studies and stay involved, so let me know if you have a project you think I may be able to help with.