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Trail Blazers

Paul is a Sun Certified Java Programmer working out of Seattle, Washington.

Paul had a web site dedicated to Java discussion that he started in November of 1998. He merged his site into JavaRanch when Kathy turned it over to him. His contributions include the Saloon, the Cattle Drive, most of the bunkhouse, some of the code barn, the coop, gramps and granny.

Paul is an organic farmer wannabe. He is a certified master gardener and a certified permaculture designer. He cares for a large garden and several fruit trees and hopes to someday live on a full size farm. Paul wrote a fairly popular article on lawn care in 1994 with an emphasis on reducing the use of toxic gick. He has since written similar articles on the use of cast iron and flea control and set up some permaculture forums

(these aren't dolls, they're action figures!)

For more info see BioPaulWheaton.

Email

Kathy is a Sun Certified Java Programmer and a Sun Certified Java Instructor.

She travels the globe spreading the word about Java by teaching a variety of Java courses through Sun Educational Services. When she's not traveling, she's preparing new courses on Enterprise Java and writing books and articles.

Kathy started Java Ranch in January, 1998 and turned the site over to Paul Wheaton in January, 2000. Since Paul didn't want to bear the title "cowgirl", Kathy kept that title for herself and gave Paul the title "trailboss".

Kathy's contributions to the ranch include the original Rules Roundup Game, some of the bunkhouse, the campfire stories and most of the code barn.

Email (Note that all that travel makes it tough to get to e-mail regularly.)

Sheriffs

"...These people have made enormous contributions to JavaRanch, mostly by writing thousands of helpful messages in the Big Moose Saloon. They are experts in using our messaging software and have been given "sheriff" access, otherwise known as administrator access."

Trailboss

Lasse is a software development geek, having a chronic addiction for interesting technologies. This addiction has led to learning a wide variety of technologies over the years ranging from Flash and PHP to XML and web services to Java and J2EE. Most recently, Lasse has picked up a new tool in the form of the Ruby programming language and the Ruby on Rails web framework. His interests have also moved more towards peopleware and methods, worrying more about team productivity rather than byte code efficiency.

Working for a Finnish software consulting company Reaktor Innovations, Lasse spends his copious spare time between traveling from one consulting engagement to another on writing a book. Time will tell whether that project finishes on time.

Lasse was made a Bartender in 2003, and has been a Sheriff since 2005. Email

Bear has been turning coffee into quality software since 1976 when he starting programming in BASIC on a Control Data Cyber.

He resides in Austin TX, and is currently a Technical Manager/Architect for one of the "big banks" (a result of the small dot-com he worked for being bought).

Having managed to wrestle two Electrical Engineering degrees from the University of Massachusetts, he taught in the Graduate Computer Engineering Program of that esteemed institution for a decade or so. He has also served stints with Digital Equipment Corporation, Lightbridge Inc., Dragon Systems, and a whole slew of other companies no one has ever heard of (or that he's ashamed to admit association with).

He also served military time as a platoon leader and infantry trainer, teaching infantry soldiers how to blow up tanks -- skills he brings to his sheriff duties on the Ranch.

When he should be tending to more pressing matters, Bear likes to ride his V-Star, dabble in digital photography and video editing, cook BIG food, and read voraciously (mostly Sci-Fi and techo-stuff). He's also nerdy enough to actually write web applications for fun (if not for profit, alas).

Bear is hopelessly addicted to caffeine and rationalizes it by calling himself a "coffee snob" and buying outrageously priced, but truly tasty, coffee beans that he insists on grinding himself.

Bear has co-authored three books: Ajax in Practice, Prototype and Scriptaculous in Action, and jQuery in Action.

Bear was made a Bartender in 2003, and has been a Sheriff since 2006. Email

BioBearBibeault

Ernest's long, strange trip from a humble Ph.D. in chemistry (MIT, '92) to his current position as a Principal Investigator in the Distributed Systems Research department at Sandia National Laboratories is the stuff of legend. When he's not developing desktop tools to help engineers run simulations on the world's fastest computers, he dabbles in rule-based software, and is the developer of Jess, the Programmer's Rule Engine.

Before all his spare time was dominated by Danielle (the little cowgirl in the picture) and Zachary, he used to teach Java, both for the University of California, as an independent consultant, and online. He reckons he's taught more than 3,000 students in all. Ernest has written several books; the latest is Jess in Action

Dr. Friedman-Hill has been known to occasionally -- just occasionally -- engage in leisure activities, which may or may not include cooking, drawing, woodworking, and reading. But mostly he's too busy.

Ernest was made a Bartender in 2003, and has been a Sheriff since 2004. Email

Jeanne Boyarsky is a 2002 graduate of Queens College with a degree in Computer Science and completed her Master's degree in Computer Information Technology at Regis University in 2005.

Jeanne is Brainbench certified in the Java Programmer and Web Developer roles. She works as a Java Developer for a bank in New York City. Her development interests include databases, web programming and testing. In her free time, she enjoys playing tennis, reading and nature.

Jeanne was made a Bartender in 2004, and has been a Sheriff since 2007. Email

For more info see BioJeanneBoyarsky

Valentin Crettaz received his MS degree in information and computer science from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) where he graduated.

In 2001, he visited SRI International (Menlo Park, CA) where he worked as a software engineer. In summer 2002, he joined the Software Engineering Laboratory of EPFL as principal engineer. At the end of 2002, Valentin co-founded Condris Technologies, an aspect-oriented software development company that strongly focuses on software architecture. His research and development interests include aspect-oriented technologies, design and architectural patterns, web services, and software architecture. During his spare-time, Valentin moderates the Sun Certified Java Programmer Forum at Javaranch.com. He is a Sun Certified Java Programmer and Developer for the Java 2 Platform.

Valentin has been a Sheriff since 2003. Email

Mark is a SCJP, SCJD, SCWCD, SCBCD, SCMAD, and was also a member of the SCJP 5.0 exam creation team. He was a technical editor on Head First Design Patterns, Head First Object Oriented Analysis and Design, and the K&B SCJP 5.0 Exam book.

He graduated from USC in 1990 with a BA in Communications. So he can now talk to people.

He is currently a Middleware Trainer for JBoss, a division of Red Hat, and travels around the country giving training classes in JBoss Administration, Hibernate, Web Developer and many more great JBoss learning classes.

While Mark is not on the road, he would be at home with the best wife in the whole world Franziska or playing Golf, or rehearsing with his Rush Cover Band.

Mark was made a Bartender in 2001, and has been a Sheriff since 2005. Email

Frank is a Sun Certified Java Programmer.

He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Warwick and a Postgraduate Certificate of Education from the University of East Anglia, and is working on a Master's degree with the Open University.

Frank runs a consultancy company Efficacy Solutions Limited which specializes in Server-side Java, but is currently employed by iO Global Ltd - a start-up company located at British Telecom's Adastral Park research site.

Frank has been a Sheriff since 1999. Email

David is not a Sun Certified anything in particular, but he has a few certs that are no longer valid.

He has a Bachelor of Computer Science from the University of Western Australia with a background in Mathematics and Engineering.

He currently works at a small company in Perth, West Oz that writes software for golf clubs. Dave prefers writing golf software to playing golf. He used to work for a company that would fly him around the world to work, and that was fun for a while too.

When he isn't working he pursues interests in programming, reading, computer games and moderating various Ranch forums. That is, he would if a wife and two sons allowed him any spare time. He also likes swimming, walking, cycling and has a gsoh.

David was made a Bartender in 2001, and has been a Sheriff since 2006. Email

Ilja is an impassionate programmer since secondary school. Starting with BASIC, he migrated to Pascal, C and C++. After some meandering, he finally started studying computer science, putting some more languages into his bag of tricks. For a couple of years he is now concentrating on Java, but also keeping an eye on the uprising of dynamically typed languages. At the moment his skills are utilized by an employer in Karlsruhe, Germany.

Currently he is mostly interested in the social aspects of software development. Especially the agile movement appeals to him, particularly the Extreme Programming process.

Ilja was made a Bartender in 2002, and has been a Sheriff since 2005. Email

Eric Pascarello is the co-author of the 2006 Best Seller Ajax In Action (Manning) and also the author of JavaScript: Your Visual Blueprint for Building Dynamic Web Pages 2ed. (Wiley). Eric graduated from Penn State University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 2002 and somehow ended up as a programmer.

Eric specializes in (X)HTML, CSS, JavaScript, DHTML, and Ajax on the Ranch. He also has interests in the following areas of programming: C#, AI, Security, and Site Usability. Note that Eric is not a Java guy, but lives on the dark side!

Eric spends his free time with his pets (more like a small zoo) which includes a dog named Ajax, a school of fish (all fresh water - 55 gallon tank, 45 gallon tank, ad a 150 gallon pond), a painted turtle named turtle, six parakeets (Weezer, Shaggy, Ice, YOOHOO, Digger, & Dot), a cockatiel named Baby, and a leopard frog. Eric would rather be outside hiking in the woods then sitting behind the desk any day, but will probably have his laptop attached to his side with a long extension cord!

The picture is an old picture of Eric and his wife in Red Rock Canyon, Las Vegas, Nevada.

Eric was made a Bartender in 2003, and has been a Sheriff since 2007. Email

Ajith is a Sun Certified Enterprise Architect and holds several other certifications from Sun and IBM. He is proud to be one of the oldies at the Ranch and enjoys brushing shoulders with several wise men of the Java world.

Ajith received his Bachelors degree in Computer Science from Bangalore University and a Post Graduate degree in Software Engineering from Harvard Extension school.

Ajith has worked over a decade in developing high-availability fault-tolerant enterprise systems, object-oriented frameworks, and solutions based on heuristics. He worked extensively with COM and DCOM technologies before becoming a Java fanatic. He lives in Atlanta with his wife and works as a senior architect for CDC's NEDSS initiative.

When not sipping Java, Ajith spends reading books, playing flute, gazing stars, hiking, and camping.

Ajith is co-author of Mike Meyers' Java 2 Certification Passport.

Ajith has been a Sheriff since 2000. Email

Ulf got a degree in Computer Science after attending the University of Hamburg and Syracuse University. After stints in a variety of industries in everything from tiny startup to very-blue-chip company, he now is an independent IT consultant specializing in J2EE projects. His first computer had 1424 bytes of memory, he got his first email address in 1991, learned Fortran when it was way beyond its sell-by-date, and has been using Java professionally since 1998.

Ulf was made a Bartender in 2005, and has been a Sheriff since 2007. More about him can be found at UlfDittmer and at his web page http://www.ulfdittmer.com/. Email

Jason lives in Maryland where he is employed developing software on behalf of an international information technology products and services corporation.

He holds a Bachelors of Science degree in Computer Science from the University of Maryland Baltimore County. When Jason isn't working or arguing with somebody in Meaningless Drivel, he spends his free time working in his community where he actively volunteers as a firefighter / emergency medical technician, playing the occasional bit of guitar, indulging his bizarre taste in movies, inciting his two cats into psychotic frenzies, and seasonably disturbing the neighbors while expanding their vocabulary with his loud and creative use of the English language during televised New England Patriots games.

Jason was made a Bartender in 2003, and has been a Sheriff since 2006. Email

Michael fled doctoral studies in literature only to wind up in a Unix/C refugee camp shortly thereafter. Along came a magazine showing four little Goslings grinning about something called "Java". Two pieces of demo code later, the hook was set.

Michael now runs Inkling Research, a clutch of instructors who teach Java, C, Perl, Unix administration, and enterprise systems management. He is co-author of The Complete Java 2 Certification Study Guide, affectionately referred to as RHE on JavaRanch.

He also teaches and speaks on Java and Solaris topics, but maintains ignorance on hyper-trendy subjects like EJBs, XML, and code-aversion techniques like UML.

Michael was made a Bartender in 2001, and has been a Sheriff since 2002. Email

Marilyn is a Sun Certified Java Programmer. She is a contractor based in Denver, Colorado.

After taking the CattleDrive Java course, she was so impressed with the results that she volunteered to be in charge of the Cattle Drive. The course has expanded quite a bit since that time and keeps her busy. She also maintains the Java Programming Style Guide. In her spare time she plays principal viola in the Niwot Timberline Symphony Orchestra as well as playing for weddings and other special events with the Ptarmigan String Quartet.

Marilyn was made a Bartender in 2000, and has has been a Sheriff since 2001. Email

For more info see BioMarilynDeQueiroz

Andrew is the senior engineer of one of many amazon.com teams, and is looking for more people to join his team (see http://wap-jobs.amazon.com for more details). He is currently living in Seattle, WA, USA and has been waiting for summer to arrive for several years now.

Andrew has currently passed SCJP 1.2, SCJP 1.4, SCJD, SCWCD, SCBCD, and part I of SCEA. Andrew has been working with computers for too long (his first program was written on mark-sense cards (similar to punch cards)) and his experience spans a good number of different types of hardware, operating systems, and network protocols.

When he was living in Sydney, Andrew liked to go to the nearby beaches to go swimming or snorkeling, go on bush walks, go bike riding, or go horse riding or roller blading. Some of those are still possible, but the water in Seattle is too cold for most of the beach activities.

Andrew was made a Bartender in 2003, and has been a Sheriff since 2006. Email

For more info see BioAndrewMonkhouse

Jess is a software developer at JBoss, a Division of Red Hat on the JBoss Operations Network team. She has a Bachelor's in Computer Engineering from Villanova University, a Master's in Software Engineering from Drexel University as well as her SCPJ 1.4 and SCWCD certifications. Thanks to JavaRanch, Jess got to speak at a Birds of a Feather Session at JavaOne 2003 with Michael Ernest and she was a technical editor (along with Val Crettaz) on Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates book, Head First Java

Now that Jess is done with school (for now) her spare time is taken up with rock climbing (top roping, lead climbing and bouldering), both for fun and for competition. To offset the climbing and programming, Jess is an avid knitter.

She is originally from Utah (no, she's not Mormon... yes, you were too going to ask) and is currently living near Philadelphia (so if you were looking for some girl named Jessica Bradley from Sandy, UT... you found her).

Jess was made a Bartender in 2002, and has been a Sheriff since 2003. Email

Mark Herschberg (the one not in the dress :-) has received both a bachelors and masters degree in EE/CS from MIT. His masters thesis was the world's first secure electronic voting implementation (done using Java, of course).

Currently, Mark is the VP of Engineering at Trafficmac in NYC. Throughout his career Mark has worked in numerous industries (development of the Curl language, enterprise JOLAP systems, financial modeling and simulations, wireless EAI) as well as academia (MIT, HBS). Starting with Java in 1996, he has worked with J2ME, J2SE, and J2EE applications, and sat on Sun's JSR-75 (J2ME PDA Profile). Mark has done numerous speaking engagements and guest lecture throughout the US and often speaks at JavaOne. He also is on MIT's UPOP steering committee, and teaches annually at the program.

Mark was made a Bartender in 2001, and has been a Sheriff since 2006. Email

Tony is a Sun Certified Java Programmer and Sun Certified Web Component Developer.

He's currently working as an e-commerce Java Developer at a major international "clicks and mortar" retailer.

Before discovering the beauty of Java, Tony put his BSc in physics to work on assembly language, FORTRAN and C programming.

Everybody having further interest in either Tony or Java, please visit Tony's Java Page.

Tony has been a Sheriff since 2000. Email

Bartenders

"...These people have selflessly volunteered their valuable time to help others learn Java here on JavaRanch. Each person has also taken on the responsibility of moderating one of the forums in the Big Moose Saloon, so they bear the title of "bartender"."

Trailboss

Ben is a Sr Java developer working Massachusetts. He's been developing software professionally for 10 years. In another life he managed shipping companies.

Besides programming he enjoys messing about in old boats, large format photography, and guitar.

Ben has been Bartender since 2005. Email

BioBenSouther

London born Barry Gaunt has been administrating and programming computer systems since 1969. Barry graduated in 1971 at the City University, London with an honours degree in Mathematics, much to the shock and surprise of his earlier school teachers.

He has worked in such diverse fields as Telecommunications, Insurance, Ship Design, Electric Power Systems (SCADA), Office Automation, Financial Options Trading, and Electronic Stock Exchanges. Barry has programmed in languages as varied as Assembler, Fortran, Algol, Pascal, C, C++, Python and now Java. For the last 23 years he has been working and living near Zurich, Switzerland and now holds both British and Swiss nationality. Barry is married and has two sons still at school.

Barry has been Bartender since 2003. Email

Bert is an SCJP 1.4, wrote his first FORTRAN program in 1974 (he was very young), and has been developing software ever since. Bert is co-author of 'Sun Certified Programmer & Developer for Java 2 Study Guide' ( K&B ), and 'Head First Java'. He is also the co-author of 'Head First EJB' and a little later 'Head First SCWCD', which is why he is tired. He has written in Java, C, TIRS, FORTRAN, COBOL, Basic, RPG, Smalltalk, etc.

Bert is an avid Go player, skier, hiker, back-packer, and soon to be Airstream owner. He hopes to soon be making his posts to JavaRanch from his hi-tech, satellite equipped, 28' CCD. With any luck these posts will issue from the Yukon, Denali, Homer, Wells Grey, Jasper, Kalispell, Bend, Telluride, Santa Fe, Ojai, Brice, Sedona, Sioux Lookout, or Victoria. Regardless of the location, Bert will be reading science fiction, astronomy, quantum physics, or learning theory books with his wife Kathy.

Bert has been Bartender since 2003. Email

Marc is a Sun Certified Java Programmer.

Being indigenous to the frozen tundra of Minneapolis, Marc is addicted to lowercase java (the steamy beverage). He does his best work in coffee shops, and readily admits this is part of the reason he picked uppercase Java as a language.

Marc was exposed briefly to BASIC in the early 1980's, but the programming bug remained latent for many years. He pursued other interests, including guitar, karate, art, journalism, and stand-up comedy. Eventually, he majored in Mathematics at Augsburg College, minoring in Chemistry and Studio Art. Since the mid-1990's, he has been employed in the financial services industry working with Lotus Notes.

Current addictions (other than java and Java) include writing experimental fiction, seeking out abstract films and music, buying shoes, and running.

Marc uses Mac computers. His cat, Milton, does not program.

Marc has been Bartender since 2005. Email

marc weber is the inventor of the weber grill. when he's not grilling, barbequeing, marinating or roasting, he likes to code. marc only uses lower case letters and only under duress will he use his [shift] key in order to utilize the occasional double quote or angled bracket. marc dreams of the day that he'll be the only marc of any significance on javaranch, but unfortunately for him, and fortunately for the rest of us... there are already 3 others (2 with a 'k' and 1 with a 'c'). marc has already learned that any sheriff on the javaranch can, and will, without provocation mess with his javaranch account. this is just another example of that.

Christophe Verré was introduced to computers by a friend who owned an Amstrad CPC 464 (yes, with tapes). He received an Amstrad 6128 (yes, with floppy disks!) and started programming in BASIC. He graduated in Computer Science at the I.U.T. of Nantes (France), and Bsc(Hnrs) Computer Studies at N.E.W.I (Wrexham, Wales). He worked for a year and a half in France, before moving to Japan in 2001, and is now working in Tokyo. He owns SCJP, SCWCD and SCBCD certificates, as well as various certifications in English, Japanese and Chinese. His main pastime is playing Shamisen, a Japanese music instrument, and learning foreign languages.

Christophe has been Bartender since 2007. Email. BioChristopheVerre

Marc Peabody started college as a music major but put his rock star dreams on hold to pursue a career in programming. Why? Chicks dig a guy who understands abstraction. He hangs out at the Ranch because he loves helping others become better programmers while learning a ton along the way.

Marc has a passion for learning theory, Dance Dance Revolution, 80s video games, Sudoku, and Ultimate. He's insanely addicted to disc golf. He collects musical instruments and plays them when his other hobbies don't flood his free time. If he stays up late, it's to play piano or guitar... or to geek out on something neato like JavaFX.

Marc's wife, Robin, says he won't ever retire. So true. He wants to be a grumpy old college professor... who plays disc golf all summer.

Marc has been Bartender since 2005. Email BioMarcPeabody

Paul works as a senior software engineer near Edinburgh, building various Java based systems. He was told to learn Java many years ago (despite originally spending most of his time using Microsoft technologies) and hasn't looked back. He managed to sneak out of the University of Glasgow in 1998 with a Masters in Information Technology stuffed up his sweater. Over the years he's worked with pretty much all the buzz word technologies, but tends to live in a J2EE world these days.

He has an unhealthy obsession with mountains, and a much of his spare time as is possible is spent charging around the Highlands, variously mountaineering, rock climbing, mountain biking or skiing.

He has very parochial views on football (the version where you really use your feet),! and believes the only truly beautiful game is played in Tannadice Park, Dundee. Don't talk to him about it, he will bore you to tears.

Paul has been Bartender since 2005.

Henry Wong is a senior developer, based in New York City, involved in many Java related projects. Henry earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from The Cooper Union in 1987. In 1994, while working for Sun Microsystems, he learned a new (then unnamed) programming language, to create demos for a financial trade show. Little did he know that this language would become the powerhouse that it is today.

When not in front of a computer, Henry is an instrument rated private pilot, who also likes to dabble in archery, cooking, Scuba diving, and traveling to different places with his wife, Nini.

Henry has been Bartender since 2006.

Nathan is a Sun Certified Java Programmer.

He graduated in 1999 with a BS in Computer Science from Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah, Georgia. His first exposure to Java was in a comparative languages class there. His experiences in this course led him to take an optional course in Java the next summer. It's been all been downhill from there...

He is currently working at ZelTech, and has also worked with Raytheon and General Dynamics in the past. Yep, defense contracting... If I told you any more I'd have to kill you...

When he is not working, he entertains fantasies of being a game developer, reads (voraciously), and keeps his wife busy (trying to stay sane).

Nathan has been Bartender since 2001. Email

Tim got involved in computers because his scientific interests required more arithmetic abilities than he possessed and 4-function pocket calculators hadn't been invented yet.

He might hold all sorts of impressive certifications except that by the time they make up the exams, he's off learning the next generation of technology.

He started off doing systems programming for mainframes and minicomputers, detoured into embedded systems, and helped pioneer object-oriented programming by producing one of the first commercial C++ implementations for a personal computer platform.

He lives in Florida because any place further north would be too cold in the winter!

Tim has been Bartender since 2003.

Joe Ess is a Sun Certified Java Developer and holds two bachelor's degrees: Literature and Computer Science. After an ignoble start to his career, he wrote code for 5 years for 3 different employers before finally writing something someone actually used, he has settled into a comfortable position maintaining a website where he actively tries to incorporate as many technologies as possible ("This week I'm going to post user comments to Bugzilla via XMLRPC. Why? Because I can.").

BioJoeEss

Joe has been Bartender since 2004.

Simon is a technical architect with Detica (Financial Services) and still likes to get his hands dirty with the code where he can. Simon has been involved in projects ranging from desktop clients to highly scalable distributed systems, where his specialist technology is Java. As a part of his day job, Simon helps mentor aspiring architects and strongly believes that the role of an architect isn't purely technical.

Simon founded thepragmaticarchitect.com in an aim to bring together content that reflects this view of what an architect's role entails. Additionally, Simon has written and contributed to a number of books about Java EE web technologies and is a frequent speaker on such topics. Simon's personal blog can be found at http://www.simongbrown.com/blog/.

Simon has been Bartender since 2002. Email

Pauline hangs out mostly at the Cattle Drive. It only took a few years, but she finally got through all the assignments and she's even been nitpicking other Cattle Drivers' code for a while now too.

A long time ago, like around Web -3.0, Pauline wrangled a Bachelor's degree in Human Biology from Stanford. Around the turn of the century she got a Masters in Geography from Fribourg University in Switzerland, polishing her French skills and picking up German along the way. Her biggest disappointment was dropping her only programming course, which, after finding refuge at JavaRanch, turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

Pauline thinks that her official title, "scientific collaborator" for university eLearning programs, sounds kind of weird (it's a language thing). She really likes that learning is a job requirement, and that on any given day she gets to be a programmer, a teacher, an organiser, a dedicated cappuccino drinker (yes, that's every day).

She's been living with her partner in Switzerland since 1992. Once upon a time she was a serious athlete - now she manages to just barely stay in shape, mostly by biking to work, walking up the stairs, and running for the bus.

Pauline has been Bartender since 2001. Email

Balaji is currently working in Geneva for an international organization. He holds a Master degree from Australia in IT, and has earned IT experience in Australia, Singapore & India. He is currently working on a project involving data modeling, web services, XML, J2EE and .NET.

Balaji spends at least 4 days per week in bars and pubs, but is still not putting on any weight. He loves nature, forests, and country side driving with mild music. He also plays badminton weekly and is learning French. He recently started eating beef, veal, pork, frog, octopus & oyster. He is currently moderating Webservices and XML forum during his free time.

Balaji has been Bartender since 2004. Email

Merrill works as a senior consultant for Sima Solutions, which is a small but spunky consulting company specializing in IBM WebSphere solutions.

He's one of those people who got into IT in the 80's without any formal training. However, since then he's passed the SJCP and obtained a number of IBM WebSphere certifications. He has a Bachelors Degree from Brigham Young University in Music Education and a Masters Degree in Choral Conducting from the University of Utah.

Merrill claims that music is still his first love, but now makes music a hobby rather than a profession. He has sung for many years with the Pacific Chorale although recently travel for consulting gigs has put an end to singing with them. He also plays the piano for his own enjoyment and for church groups.

Merrill is also an avid cyclist, and enjoys tooling around Southern California on his road bike. He can also be found enjoying Southern California's beaches on most weekends.

Merrill has been Bartender since 2006.

Fred graduated from Washington University in St. Louis in 1990, with a degree in Theatre. After spending a few years as a bookstore clerk, a high school math teacher, and an airline reservation agent, he finally settled in as a programmer in 1999, and earned his SCJP certificate a few years later.

Fred lives in a small suburb in St. Louis County, Missouri with his wife Stacey, and his daughter Olivia, whom was adopted from China in 2005. Fred is probably the only person who can directly thank the JavaRanch for his having a child - you can read about much of his adoption journey here.

He is, however, still learning to use the shift key in his posts.

Fred has been Bartender since 2005. Email

Paul Clapham has been in the commercial computing business since 1974, when men were men and computers had 32K bytes of memory. Currently he is living in Vancouver, Canada, working for a company that runs its business on IBM iSeries computers, whose primary programming language is RPG. (No, that's not Role Playing Game or Rocket Propelled Grenade!) So when IBM announced Java as its "strategic direction" for the system back in 1999, he was assigned to figure out what that meant.

He learned Java by reading questions on online forums and finding out and posting the answers. Most of the time this worked out quite well.

Paul has two adult children and spends his holiday time in distant countries with his wife Rosemary, birding and hiking and visiting local craft markets.

Paul has been Bartender since 2006.

Jesper's interest in computers started when he was about 10 years old, when he saw a friend typing in hexadecimal codes on a home computer which impressed him so much that he still remembers it. He got his own Commodore 64 when he was 13 on which he started programming in BASIC and assembly language and he has been a computer wizard ever since.

After studying electrical engineering at the Delft Technical University (in The Netherlands), he started his career as a software developer. He has been working with Java since 2000. He has done (and is doing) projects for many different clients using Java, from large Swing applications and web applications to enterprise middleware systems.

Jesper is SCJP and SCWCD certified since 2001 and 2002 respectively.

Jesper has been Bartender since 2007. BioJesperYoung

Keith has been Bartender since 2007. Email

Joel is a Sun-Certified Java Programmer who has been working with Java for approximately four years. He first heard of Java while he was an undergrad at Swarthmore College, where he was studying for a Religion major and Computer Science minor. First believing that it was no more than a fad language, he stayed away from it for years. Then, after learning and loving the Objective-C language, he discovered that Java, while it looked and sounded like C++, shared the same semantic origins (Smalltalk) as did Objective-C. Since then, he has come to embrace and love the language.

Joel is currently working as a consultant in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area, although he will tell anybody that his allegiance still lies with the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area, where he grew up. His hobbies are too many to list, although they include board games (particularly German ones), English Country Dance, round-singing, Legos, and magic. Joel is married to his wife Sarah and has two children, Michael and Brian.

Joel has been Bartender since 2003. Email

Jaikiran is NOT a Sun Certified Java Programmer and neither does he have any other certificates :-)

He has a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Vishweshwaraiah Technological University in India. He completed his engineering course in 2004 from SDM College of Engineering in Dharwad, India.

He's been working in a software company in Pune since 2004. He's been mainly working in Java and J2EE ever since he joined the company. In his spare time, he likes to hang out with his friends and play Cricket.

Jaikiran has been Bartender since 2007. Email

In 1980 Peer made the fateful decision that he wouldn't let those perishing computers intimidate him. During the somewhat obsessive pursuit of that goal he obtained an H.B.Sc. (Computing and Computer Electronics) at WLU and an M.A.Sc. at University of Waterloo . More recently, to attain just a small modicum of credibility when complaining about these technologies, he also became certified as a MCSD.Net 1.0, SCJP 1.4, SCWCD 1.4, SCBCD 1.3 and SCDJWS 1.4. To further master his craft he is currently focusing his investigations on recent developments in object-orientation/patterns (and beyond), agile practices and the use and abuse of web services. This also serves as a perfect cover to feed the addiction of a bookaholic.

Peer currently works as an independent software development consultant.

Peer has been Bartender since 2006.

Scott is a Sun Certified Java Programmer whose specialties include Java/J2EE web-based systems, database-driven applications, PHP middler-tier development, and about everything else under the Sun. Currently, he is working on his PhD at Rutgers University where he is studying combinations of machine learning and human computer interaction in order to build smarter, more human-oriented systems.

Scott lives in the best state in the nation, New Jersey, and spends his time swing dancing, playing the violin, and maintaining a number of websites for friends and family. When Scott came to Philadelphia a few years back, he had no idea he'd work with a rancher, and all around vagabond, by the name of Joel McNary. Scott would often ask Joel (usually by way of throwing a bouncy ball) Java questions and Joel eventually convinced Scott to become a member of the JavaRanch. Although Scott still likes to bother Joel with a random question from time to time, Scott's dedication to instructing beginnings (on what not to do) earned him the title of JavaRanch Bartender.

Scott is also the founder of Selikoff Solutions, a software consulting company located in central New Jersey. Selikoff Solutions specializes in providing J2EE software development services to corporate customers in the Tri-State area.

Scott has been Bartender since 2006. Email

Carol has a background in the arts, and used to be a professional dancer. Although she spent a few years working as a show girl in Vegas and Reno, the bulk of her dancing career was devoted to Classical Ballet, in which she holds a Masters Degree from United States International University in San Diego, California.

Since retiring from the stage, Carol has held a number of weird jobs, ranging from directing amateur dance companies to outfitting the commercial salmon fleet in Northern California.

A former technophobe, Carol was dragged kicking and screaming into the world of computers when she was acting as an educational facilitator for distance learning at a Charter School in California. The job required a computer with internet access, the idea being that most communication with the students and the school would be done via the internet, and a good part of the curriculum would be delivered on the net. The job didn't last very long, but Carol's interest in computers did. Wanting to learn how to communicate with these fascinating machines became an obsession.

While wandering around on the net, Carol happened to stumble on to JavaRanch. It was a defining moment in her life.

Carol currently works as a pharmacy technician and substitute teacher in Half Moon Bay, California. She is married and has a son who is in high school, 4 cats, 2 ducks, and 23 rabbits. (She started with just 2.)

Carol has been Bartender since 2003.

Peter has been Bartender since 2007.

Katrina had a really hard time figuring out what she wanted to be when she grew up. She got accepted into two degree programs simultaneously: Aerospace Engineering, and Molecular Biology. Since she had spent a lot of time reading about the human brain as a child and youth, she figured biology must be the thing to do (even though aircraft, spacecraft, and satellites are way cool). After commencing her studies, she discovered that she likes programming more than cloning, and spent more and more of her spare time learning to code. She completed her Bachelors Degree in Genetics at the University of Oslo, and then promptly left Norway for sunny California.

In 2007, about a week after she quit bartending at a pub, she was asked to join bartenderdom at JavaRanch. Email

For more information see BioKatrinaOwen

After cruising through high school without much effort, Rob first decided to ignore everybody's good advice and joined the Dutch army. Fortunately for him, he soon found out what a bad choice that was so he attended the Technical University of Eindhoven, The Netherlands, where he earned his Master's degree in 2004. He has since worked as a programmer and database administrator at a small company near where he lives, all the while improving his programming skills.

Rob is SCJP 1.4 since 2006 with an impressing 100% score and SCJP 6 since 2008, disappointing everybody around him with a mere 91%

Rob has been Bartender since 2008.

Campbell has been Bartender since 2008.

Other Staff

"...These are people that have made large contributions to JavaRanch outside of the Big Moose Saloon. Yes! There is more to the ranch than the saloon."

Trailboss

Paul is the guy behind Evolution Hosting who has been keeping JavaRanch running for years.

David's background includes programming, systems and network management, and web development. He currently works as a contract web application developer. By night he plays drums with other jazz, rock, fusion and reggae players. Although David's contribution to Javaranch was fairly small, Paul insisted on a bio and pic because of their long standing friendship; he also threatened to supply his own - completely fictional - bio if David didn't get busy and come up with something.

Java Community

"...Major contributors to the Java Community who can often be found here (one of whom begged and pleaded to have his picture shown too)."

Trailboss

Marcus is a Sun Certified Java Programmer.

Marcus runs the most popular site on the internet for Java Certification. His hit count is always about 30% ahead of JavaRanch. His motto is "Content Before Cows".

You can find the famous "Marcus Green Site" at http://www.jchq.net/.

But don't bring up the fact that the JavaRanch forums are more popular than his; it's a sensitive topic. :)

Roseanne is a Sun Certified Java Programmer, Sun Certified Java Web Component Developer and IBM Certified Developer on XML Technologies. She also teaches physics in a community college.

She is a contract senior software developer in many different industries, from telecoms to revenue management, from airplane dogfight cellphone games to real Navy airplane avionics, programming in different languages too (Java, C/C++, Ruby, XSLT, VB, etc).

Roseanne used to be a physicist and a long time teacher, and she still is. She once worked in a lab with a sign "Danger (a skull icon): power CO2 laser, strong magnetic field, and extremely poor physics graduate students."

Roseanne finally figured out a way to continue her beloved teaching career without the worry of being fired, or waiting for the next pay check. She created her not-so-personal website JavaChina for education purposes. You can visit it for C/C++, Java, XSLT, ANT FAQs. Roseanne served as a moderator at the famous Marcus Green website since 1999. With some other people, she started the "Dallas SCJD Study Group" in 2001, which is no longer active. Roseanne is also a jGuru forum/FAQ manager since 2002. Roseanne is a bartender in JavaRanch since 2005. Java started a second life for her.

Tony Alicea	Bert Bates	Bear Bibeault	Jeanne Boyarsky
Simon Brown	Frank Carver	Peter Chase	Paul Clapham
Valentin Crettaz	Ulf Dittmer	Michael Ernest	Joe Ess
Ernest Friedman-Hill	Barry Gaunt	Marcus Green	Mark Herschberg
Merrill Higginson	Tim Holloway	Ajith Kallambella	Lasse Koskela
Paul Little	Balaji Loganathan	Keith Lynn	Pauline McNamara
Joel McNary	Jason Menard	Andrew Monkhouse	Carol Murphy
David O'Meara	Katrina Owen	Jaikiran Pai	Eric Pascarello
Marc Peabody	Ilja Preuss	Rob Prime	Nathan Pruett
Marilyn de Queiroz	Peer Reynders	Campbell Ritchie	David Rizzi
Fred Rosenberger	Jessica Sant	Scott Selikoff	Kathy Sierra
Ben Souther	Mark Spritzler	Paul Sturrock	Christophe Verre
Marc Weber	Weber, Marc	Paul Wheaton	Henry Wong
Jesper Young	Roseanne Zhang