28/04/2006 by ramps.

Please add your comments of your best memories of being part of the Holdiay Autos Camberley experience.

A starter for 10 is who can remember Laurence Mottram shouting to Nick Glass "bend him over and buck **** the ****" to Clive Jacobs at a summer party.  Laurence you are a hero.

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28/04/2006 by ramps.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-6948922.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy

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28/04/2006 by ramps.

Another era finally draws to a close as after 5 years in the Camberley office it will be finally closed.  Today will be an emotional day.  Don’t get me wrong I am looking forward to the new office but it will take a little time to adjust.

John asked if I would give a little insite in to what an architect does.  To set the scene I will give a very brief career history.  My first experience with computers was when I was 12 when my parents bought a ZX Spectrum for me and my sister to share.   Now for some reason rather than just playing games I got interested in programming the machine as well.  Since then I have never really be far away from trying to make machines make my life easier.  I think my natural laziness made computers an ideal fit for me.

After completing my A Levels I went to Swansea University to study Computer Science.  Whilst I was doing my A levels I also did a BTEC in computers whilst also teaching GCSE computer science.  At University not only did I do my degree but throughout the 3 years I also worked with various companies providing IT solutions.  So by the time I graduated I have pretty much been working with computers for 10 years.

My first full time job outside of university was with Open Accounts where I learnt Progress.  I was only here for about 8 months as the IT market hotted up and I was persuaded rather navievely to move to New Malden and work for Interval International.   I was lucky as this turned out to be a very good move for me.   This is where I met both Alan Herbage and Jag Ram who were to had a big influence in my life going forward.

I spent a very happy 2 and half years at Interval before I was approached by Alan to move to holiday autos where he have moved to about a year before.  At the time it was an extremely difficult decesion to make as Interval were in the process of sorting a VISA out for me to go and live in Miami.    I had been very successful in architecting a framework for selling their product on the internet and they wanted me to continue with this.  I decided that actually I need a fresh challenge at this point and took the role at holiday autos.   I started there in April 2000.  My role was initially the UK transactional Internet site.

The first year we were extremely successful winning independent awards.  At the time the backend systems were being designed in Germany and so I could focus just on the internet which was perfect for me as this was the most exciting arena to be in. 

Unfortunately Dignos the company developing the infamous "Voyager" cars system failed to deliver a product that was going to work.   Holiday Autos had spent a lot of money and had no system to show for it.  I was pushed into the hot seat to make the UK internet system do what "Voyager" was supposed to do.  Cutting a long story short that is exactly what I did and this system is now 5 years mature and powers majority of holiday autos revenue.

Systems born out crisis are very rarely perfect and "Voyager" is no different.  As time goes by more features are added and stability is increased.   As the architect I am the person responsible for making sure the foundations of the system are sound and that the different components of the system talk to each other.

The projects I am currently working on are as follows:-

1)Convergence of the 3 remaining holiday autos systems into 1 super system.

To do this I need to a very low level understanding of the technologies and how they have been utilised for each system.  This will allow me to determine interfaces points.  In addition I need to have a very good functional understanding of what each system does.   This will allow me to produce a gap analysis and therefore create a technology roadmap for the convergence of the systems.

2)Integration of the holiday autos product in the GDS systems namely Sabre and Amadeus.

3)Stabilisation and capacity planning for the voyager system.

In addition to this I act as DBA and UNIX administration.

Hopefully I have not bored you all to much as the days go by I will give a little bit more detail of what I do on a daily basis.

End of era.  Thanks CJ.

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27/04/2006 by ramps.

Only put my flat on the market yesterday and have already had an offer which is just 2k short of the asking price.  So it looks as if my flat will sell pretty quickly which is good.  The weekend will be spent looking at places to more too.   It is a pretty emotional time for me.   Only 2 more days left in the Camberley office.  My partners mum is off to South Africa on Tuesday for 6 months.  I am going to Stockholm next week on business so I will be testing how well TFT works with my fear of flying.  My best friend has found a new job and is moving 100 miles away. 

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26/04/2006 by ramps.

My life is back in over drive mode.   Lots of stuff going at work and I am trying to move as well.  In addition the flat season is really looking to look tasty and I should soon be back on it with selections.  I won’t apologise for the lack of selections because it is easy to give selections out.  It more difficult not to.  The only thing that matters is profit and when I think I am in position to make good selections again I will.   The system did very well yesterday so it won’t be long unless the weather ruins things.  7 months of the flat season to go.

Only 2 and bit more days of the Camberley office.  Long live HA and long live Clive Jacobs.   We just had a pizza party in his old office and the memories came flooding back.   I have so much time for Clive he made the difficult decesions and made sure they worked out in long run.   Yes I know it will be a new beggining in Woking but I think it is always good to remember a good things about a part of your life that is closing.

Come Tuesday morning I will be know as Desk 77.   Oh yes we are packed in like animals and I have a person either side of me with another behind me.   So I am sure the word excuse me will be one I will be using more often.

I am really looking forward to the challenge of promoting a different type of dynamics in Woking.   It is always interesting to observe how different people react and adapt to change it is the essence of life.  as many of you know I am not one who like to stay still although so would argue I have.  Been doing virtually the same job for 6 years but in different guises might I add.

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25/04/2006 by ramps.

The presentation went really well which was really good.  Although due tech issues and various works streams it was only a small group who were given the opportunity to experience an alternative treatments to things that happen in life.   No doubt I was the person who benefited the most as I did something that I find incredibly hard and that is public speaking on a subject matter other than gambling and horse racing.

The house moving is full swing.  The estate agents will be coming around tonight to value my flat again.  Both Clare and I have been trawling the internet looking for our next place.   We may even sell our flat on the internet too.  No doors are closed yet.  Clare’s job continues to go well and she is so relieved that she left lastminute.  For me the adventure at lastminute continues and I have no idea when the joruney will end if ever?    Brent has now stepped into a role which more fits his new talents and Ian into one that will hopefully ensure the company starts hitting both its top and bottom end numbers.  All I know is with ever change there are opportunities.

The weather has played a bit today which is a shame as the racing system has been hitting good form and I was looking to get involved today. 

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23/04/2006 by ramps.

Great result by Tottenham Hotspur yesterday and a great result for Liverpool.  So happy days.  Racing is still in and out but any day now the winners will kick and the money will go in.  For now I just keep monitoring and waiting for the job to settle.

I have finally decided that I am going to move from a flat to house and ensure that I can get sky. Ntl is simple not compariable and is in my opinion getting worse rather than better.   Really starting to get nervous about my thought field therapy talk tomorrow.  It would o.k. if I didn’t have such a hectic time at work but I do currently although next week is a week to control this. 

This week I am in London on Monday and then will be spending my final 4 days in the Camberley office which will shut the following weekend.  This will be a very sad moment and the end of yet another era.   Will I survive the next round of cuts who knows.  I will as always embrace change and get every single benefit possible from it.   The dynamics of the work place will change.

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21/04/2006 by ramps.

Work finished for me at about 3am last night which was that bad and I started at about 8am this morning.  It is Friday and I lobe Friday’s.  Evening racing starts today which means lots more racing in the next few months and things will start to hot up again.  A nice winner for me yesterday so confidence is coming back.  In addition the website and database are getting better by the day.  So apart form a lack of sleep everything is rosy in BC’s garden.

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20/04/2006 by ramps.

Well I started work at 7am and yes I am still at home but working.   Probably going to be a few yet before I finish oh the joys of working in a techincal department.  I need some sleep soon though .

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20/04/2006 by ramps.

Yesterday I managed to twist my ankle whilst in London and seemed to gain lots of work that has to be done in a short period of time oh what joy.  Been a lit quite on the gambling front as I am waiting for the winners to start kicking in on the flat and this will need the weather to settle down a little more.   There is so much racing to come I am quite enjoying this lull period.

Arsenal won last night with is another dent for Spurs champions league ambitions but hopefully we can get a results against them at the weekend.  Must dash as the lastminute task masters will lynch me.

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