Training, Graphics and Networking

This is the website for Steve Jones, formerly trading as The Graphics Network Ltd. I've written software and trained others to do the same for more than 3 decades, mainly for Windows and the web. Although I'm practically retired I may still take training or development assignments if they're fun, interesting or both, and if they're easy to get to from Stroud. Stroud does have a mainline station with trains to London, Swindon, Cheltenham etc, and sometimes they even run on time.

I train and work with Python, C#, SQL and JavaScript. I might be persuaded to teach C, as I've been doing that since the 80s. As for C++, well it's complicated...

Some of the things I've got up to over the years

• I gave Europe's first hands-on training course for Windows developers. One student enjoyed it so much that we struggled to get him to go home when it was over. I considered getting the hoover out to clean round him.
• I presented the Windows 95 conference at Olympia, London, while totally deaf with an ear infection. For the question and answer section I had to run into the audience and get people to shout questions in my ear.
• I've given courses in C programming, while also telling them how to play C on the ukulele. I've sometimes sung my songs on courses, as a break from all the technical stuff.
• I have taught Windows programming to Microsoft. It was actually the first run of a new course after Windows NT came out, so I was hoping the first customer wouldn't be anyone important...
• I have taught Java programming to Sun (who invented it) and Oracle (who took over). Oracle's staff restaurant was reckoned to be the best in Dublin (I put on weight that week).
• I have written my own software which has sold thoughout the world. It didn't actually make much money, but did appear on the front of a PC magazine.
• I have trained all over the world, from Scandinavia to Australia. I've never actually given a course in Stroud, but there's still time...
• When some of my students graduated they were asked what their favourite bit of the course was. A few of them said it was the song I sang them in their first year. I was dead chuffed.
• I trained for QA at the time when we had our own castle.
• One of my first software assignments was for an x-ray spectrometer, which was about the size of a fridge. A couple of decades later I did another, which did the same things but would fit into your hand. Like a Star Trek tricorder.
• I designed the electronics and software for a haptic computer mouse, invented by a Norwegian company (a mouse that bit back). You could 'feel it' as you moved the mouse over window borders etc. Very impressive, but nobody really had a use for it!
• I once played flute at a mid-sized music festival, with a band whose name was on the back of the festival T-shirt. At another festival I tried to walk off the stage without unplugging my guitar. Nothing to do with work but I thought I'd mention it...

These are some of my Customers and comments