SELF INTRODUCTION

Hello fellow BI-ers! 

My name is Alan and I started the MIS program last year. So far it's been interesting and I've had the chance to meet a lot of great people.

A little about me... I moved to the US from Canada back in 1991 to go to grad school (in Los Angeles) and then 10 years ago I moved to Tucson so I haven't had to deal with winter for almost 23 years! Nothing is more satisfying than looking at the forecast for Edmonton and seeing -30 degrees! 

I got my degree in Cognitive Psychology (neural networks) back in 1995 and then jumped on the Internet bandwagon by developing web sites and systems for customers in many different areas. I've been self employed as well as worked for the "man" - Sun, Oracle. Pretty much my entire career has been involved in generating and analyzing data of various sorts. These days I'm working as a consultant for Perforce where our customers manage historical data with our product.

I'm looking forward to this class. I enjoyed the Data Warehousing class last summer and it really piqued my interest in the Big Data. I also attended the symposium that Eller hosted last year, and it was interesting to learn how different companies and industries are using big data.

On a personal note, I just adopted a kitten (well, he's 10 months old!) who doesn't like it when I'm working rather than playing. He isn't shy about letting me know (usually by hitting me in the head and then running away).