Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)

Systems Software Developer

Dallas/Fort Worth Area

Past
  • Software Engineer / Researcher at Rampart-iD Systems
  • Software Engineer (Contract) at Ewave, Inc. <http://www.electrowave.com>
  • Software Engineer (Contract) at WebGain, Inc.

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11 more...

Education
  • Oregon State University
Recommended
Mark N. has 1 recommendation(s) 1 person has recommended Mark N.
Connections
31 connections
Industry
Computer Software
Websites

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Summary

15 years experience developing software -- as lead of 5 person team and independent contractor -- in C, C++, assembly, Matlab, VC & VB, for embedded, Win32 & Windows-kernel environments.

Long-term:
- Thinking of moving to Portland, Oregon or back to SF Bay Area.

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Specialties:

- Wireless protocols.
- Embedded programming in C, assembly.
- Past expert in NT file-system internals, NFS, & SunRPC client/server systems.

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Experience

  • Software Engineer / Researcher

    Rampart-iD Systems

    (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Computer & Network Security industry)

    January 2003 — May 2004 (1 year 5 months)

    Primarily responsible for researching & designing portions of company's core technology, a "contactless smartcard" (credit card) featuring an on-card fingerprint sensor and matching engine. Researched fingerprint matching theory, algorithms and architectures with emphasis on ones suitable for low-power, parallel hardware implemention. Determined appropriate means for evaluating biometric systems. Presented research findings to investors and partners. Created matching algorithm suitable for custom chip implemention and simulated in Matlab to evaluate accuracy (FAR/FRR). Researched "contactless" smartcard protocols (ISO 14443, 15693) and software architectures (Javacard, JC/OP) for financial applications (Visa, Mastercard) and security applications (PKI); made recommendations for ones company should support. Created a software "base-station" implementing ISO 7816-4 and 14443 to debug & demonstrate company's prototype contactless smartcards.

  • Software Engineer (Contract)

    Ewave, Inc. <http://www.electrowave.com>

    (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing industry)

    September 1999 — November 2001 (2 years 3 months)

    Developed over-the-air protocol and firmware (in C, for Microchip PIC µC) for the "StudyBuddy" handheld wireless terminal. Protocol ran atop an unreliable datagram service and provided reliable, 1-to-many transfers of variable-sized objects between central controller and multiple (~30) handsets over company's proprietary radio modules. Developed several utilities in VC++ and VB for use in-house and by company's customers: Manufacturing test/diagnostic software for Ewave's radio modems which guided an unskilled technician through all phases of radio-modem testing and calibration; a radio-modem configuration utility for customers; tools to test, monitor and debug the Radio-Control System designed by Ewave for the FIRST Robotics Competition; and a system monitoring utility used by hundreds of teams in the Competition. Created company website, product brochures and technical manuals.

  • Software Engineer (Contract)

    WebGain, Inc.

    (Public Company; 51-200 employees; Computer Software industry)

    May 2000 — July 2000 (3 months)

    Joined WebGain SQA team to help resolve back-log of high-priority bugs related to cross-platform Java debugging in VisualCafe prior to product's first release. Developed SQA tools for automatic installation and testing of WebGain's VisualCafe product on a collection of Sun, HP, AIX and NT servers.

  • Software Engineer (Contract)

    Digital Convergence Corporation

    (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Marketing and Advertising industry)

    June 1998 — December 1998 (7 months)

    Designed & implemented software that became a significant part of company's core technology and was demonstrated during a broadcast of the NetTalk Live TV show. This software allowed URLs or ID numbers to be encoded in and decoded from the audio channel of TV, radio or Internet broadcasts. With another engineer, experimented to find best modulation methods for TV, VHS and Beta tape and Internet-audio. Created software that could insert itself on-the-fly between popular Internet audio players (RealAudio, NetShow & Winamp) and PC's sound-card to capture and filter decompressed audio (20k lines VC++). Prototyped "Ad Lookup Server" in Perl/CGI & C.

  • Software Engineer (Contract)

    Wireless-Computing, Inc.

    (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Computer Hardware industry)

    April 1998 — July 1998 (4 months)

    Developed all firmware for the "RF-25 Wireless Surfboard", a wireless "keyboard-mouse-and-joystick" and corresponding "base-station". Featured software generation & demodulation of radio waveform while scanning keyboard, sampling touchpad and joystick, handling RF communication protocol and managing battery power (8k lines PIC asm).

  • Architect of NFS Client/Server Products

    NetManage, Inc.

    (Public Company; 51-200 employees; NETM; Computer Software industry)

    January 1996 — May 1998 (2 years 5 months)

    Defined, designed & implemented advanced NFS network file system driver as Win95 VxD featuring modular "plug-in" scheme similar to Unix' VFS, multithreading, caching, "automount" support, cross-server symlinks, auto-optimization by server-type and unified source-base across platforms (NT, 95, Win16). Personally did all coding for core modules while coordinating two other engineers on peripheral modules, doing builds and coordinating QA-testing. Extended company's Build System to allow a "single-command" build for all platforms. Trained NetManage engineers in NT filesystems & NFS client internals. Wrote plans, schedules; organized code-reviews.

  • Team & Technical Lead of NFS Client/Server Group

    NetManage, Inc.

    (Public Company; 51-200 employees; NETM; Computer Software industry)

    January 1995 — January 1996 (1 year 1 month)

    Responsible for planning & scheduling projects, supervising team of five developers, final build integration, code-reviews and general technical consulting on NT and 95 system-software problems. Shipped first release of NFS product for Win95.

  • Software Engineer

    NetManage, Inc.

    (Public Company; 51-200 employees; NETM; Computer Software industry)

    May 1993 — May 1995 (2 years 1 month)

    Developed *first* production shipping NFS client for NT in 7 months; shipped before Sun's product. 'Ported and QA'd first three releases of NetManage's Chameleon32NFS product suite from Win16 to Win32 on NT-Intel, -Alpha, and -MIPS, working with one other engineer. (70k lines C).

  • Software Engineer

    Digital Equipment Corporation

    (Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; dec; Computer Hardware industry)

    March 1991 — January 1993 (1 year 11 months)

    Part of 8-person team adapting Windows NT to MIPS R3000 DECstations. Coded ARC firmware, NT HALs and drivers for system baseboard H/W, serial and video-controllers.

  • Software Engineer

    DEC Palo Alto

    (Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; DEC; Computer Hardware industry)

    July 1990 — March 1991 (9 months)

    Developed the ACCESS.bus with two other engineers. ACCESS.bus is a 100kbps, serial bus for desktop peripherals (a predecessor to USB). Implemented ACCESS.bus I/O Controller in hand-tuned assembly for 87C751 I2C microcontroller. Developed Ultrix drivers/diagnostics and contributed to ACCESS.bus protocol design. (4k lines asm).

  • Summer Intern

    Mentor Graphics

    (Public Company; 1001-5000 employees; MENT; Computer Software industry)

    June 1989 — September 1989 (4 months)

  • Summer Intern

    Mentor Graphics

    (Public Company; 1001-5000 employees; MENT; Computer Software industry)

    June 1988 — September 1988 (4 months)

  • Summer Hire

    Hewlett-Packard Company

    (Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; HPQ; Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing industry)

    June 1987 — September 1987 (4 months)

  • Summer Hire

    Hewlett-Packard Company

    (Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; HPQ; Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing industry)

    June 1986 — September 1986 (4 months)

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Education

  • Oregon State University

    BSCpE with high scholarship , Computer Engineering , 1985 — 1990

    Activities and Societies:
    Eta Kappa Nu

Additional Information

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Websites:

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Interests:

happiness, health, yoga, life-extension, "aliveness", mentoring, coaching, agile development, reading, history, recumbent bicycles, kayaking, travel, hiking, driving, sailing, tiny embedded gadgets.

Mark N. Shepard (mns@pobox.com)’s Groups:

IEEE

  •    WSE Alumni

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