Brian Landau

Current

• Web Developer at Viget Labs

Past

• Web Developer at DesignHammer
• User Experience Design Intern at Motricity
• Technical Coordinator at ILSSA

• Research Assistant at UNC-Chapel Hill

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Education

• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Oberlin College

Recommended

4 people have recommended Brian

Connections

88 connections

Industry

Information Technology and Services

Websites

• My Blog
• ClaimID Profile

Brian Landau’s Summary

You'll find me to be a responsible and conscientious worker, and a quick learner. Most of the skills I've listed I've picked up in the past year working on personal projects that have not come to fruition yet. This makes me very adept at learning new skills easily and on my own without the supervision or direction of others. Both educationally and professionally I have worked individually and as a member of a larger group, and do well in both situations. You'll find that I'm someone who adapts quickly to any situation I find myself in.
As a masters student in UNC - Chapel Hill - School of Information and Library Science's Information Science program, my educational interests lie in web design, web based applications/services, usability, interface/interaction design, and user experience.
These are also my professional interests, but particularly I'd like to work on the interface and the user experience of web applications.

Brian Landau’s Specialties:

(X)HTML, CSS, JavaScript, SQL, XML, XSLT, Ruby, Ruby on Rails, PHP, Photoshop, BASH shell scripting, AppleScript, Usability Testing, Interface Design, Interaction Design, Interaction Modeling, Prototyping, Wireframe models, Database Design

Brian Landau’s Experience

• Web Developer

  Viget Labs

  (Information Technology and Services industry)

  May 2008 — Present (1 year 7 months)

  - Ruby on Rails Development

• Web Developer

  DesignHammer

  (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Internet industry)

  July 2007 — May 2008 (11 months)

  - Refactored a custom CMS system to be more OOP
  - Scripted XML conversions and imports.
  - Developed custom CMS back-end solutions
  - Developed Rails Web Application
  - Administrated a nginx/mongrel/rails server/stack
  - Managing an Amazon S3 account and using it as an asset and backup server.

• User Experience Design Intern

  Motricity

  (Privately Held; 201-500 employees; Internet industry)

  October 2006 — June 2007 (9 months)

  - Worked on redesign of CSS/HTML prototypes, mostly changing the structure to make the code more maintainable, and allowing for easier style changes in the future.
  - Testing of various CSS capabilities of Mobile Devices, and analysis of the result
  - Designing and executing a usability test of a sites redesign.
  - Analysis of the usability test results be evaluating both questionnaire results and screen captures.
  - Presentation of results to business owners, developers and other team members.

• Technical Coordinator

  ILSSA

  (Educational Institution; Information Technology and Services industry)

  January 2006 — December 2006 (1 year )

  ‣ Redesigned and maintained the organizations web site: http://ils.unc.edu/ilssa/
  ‣ Set up a Mediawiki Wiki, customized it, maintained it and administrated it
  ‣ Managed 2 email lists
  ‣ Designed, managed and administered a department wide web- based voting system for Student Organization Officer Elections
  ‣ Coordinated with other organizations on various projects and activities

• Research Assistant

  UNC-Chapel Hill

  (Educational Institution; 10,001 or more employees; Information Technology and Services industry)

  May 2006 — August 2006 (4 months)

  - Helped design experiment for testing an information retrieval interface.
  - Conducted research with participants
  - Made a web form participant sign-up system for the experiment
  - Made web forms for the usability questionnaires given during the experiment
  Publication:
  http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ipm.2007.02.007

Brian Landau’s Education

• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  MS , Information Science , 2005 — 2007

  Course Work:
  ‣ Systems Analysis
  ‣ XML
  ‣ Web Databases
  ‣ User Interface Design
  ‣ Internet Applications (XHTML & CSS)

  Activities and Societies:

  ILSSA, ASIST, ACM

• Oberlin College

  BA , Biopsychology w/ Concentration in the Cognitive Sciences , 1999 — 2003

Additional Information

Brian Landau’s Websites:

• My Blog
• ClaimID Profile

Brian Landau’s Interests:

Photography, Games, Hiking, Camping, Movies/Film, Puzzles, Evoloution Science Books, Politics, Gadgets

Brian Landau’s Groups:

ACM (SIGCHI, SIGGRAPH, SIGWEB), ASIS&T (SIGHCI, SIGIA, SIGSI), AIFIA, LISPr

•    Viget Labs
•    Raleigh Ruby Brigade (Raleigh.rb)
•    Radiant CMS Users and Developers
•    UNC SILS Alumni Association