Biographical Details

Biographical details of the workshop speakers, workshop facilitators, workshop briefing facilitators, panelists and event organisers are given below.

Note that RSS feeds of the speakers and workshop facilitators are available.

Keynote Plenary Speakers

The first two mornings of the workshop were opened by keynote plenary presentations.

Derek Law is the Librarian and Head of Information Resources Directorate at the University of Strathclyde, Professor in the Department of Computing and Head of the Centre for Digital Library Research, University of Strathclyde.
He has worked in several British universities since 1970 and have published over 150 book chapters, articles and conference papers since then, some of them republished in seven other languages. Most of his work has been to do with the development of networked resources in higher education and with the creation of national information policy. Recently I have worked on the use of wireless technology in developing new methods of teaching and learning.
Derek was awarded the Barnard prize for contributions to Medical Informatics in 1993, Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1999 and was awarded an honorary degree by the Sorbonne in 2000.

Derek gave the opening keynote plenary talk.

Further information about Derek is available at <http://www.mis.strath.ac.uk/IS/staff/IRDDerek.htm>.

You can also access Derek Law's slides.

William G Nisen became Chief Executive of the E-Institute in 2001. Prior to assuming his duties at the E-Institute he co-founded South Fork International (an international management consultancy), and before that, he was President of McGraw-Hill Home Interactive, where he successfully launched the company's consumer retail business. Mr Nisen has a long association with Scotland. From 1987 through 1993 Mr Nisen was President and CEO of OWL International, a joint U.S./Scottish company, where he directed a turn-around of the company, managed its growth with sales exceeding $10MM, sold it and successfully transitioned all operations to Matsushita Electronics Industrial. Mr Nisen also has held management positions at Lotus Development Corp. and Harvard University's Computer Graphics Laboratory. Nisen also serves on the board of directors for several technology companies.

William gave the opening keynote plenary talk on day 2 on Knowledge Based Web Sites: A Preliminary Investigation.

You can also access Bill Nisen's slides.

Plenary Speakers

The plenary presentations provided case studies on work being carried out within the UK's higher and further education communities or provide an overview of national developments.

Andrew Aird is the Director of Web Services at King's College, London. Previously he ran the Web service at Goldsmiths College, University of London. He has written and lectured on various aspects of Web management, including ecommerce for higher education (see <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue26/e-commerce/>), Web strategy and designing parallel Web structures. His commercial experience stems from many years in the music and publishing industries, notably as managing director of an international music software company.

The title of Andrew's talk is "Virtually Everything Virtually Everywhere: Pursuing A Radical Web Strategy".

You can access Andrew Aird' slides.

Andrew can be contacted at <andrew.aird@kcl.ac.uk>.

Paul Browning is Information Strategy Co-ordinator at the University of Bristol (but was an earth scientist who ran a departmental network in a former life). He is a member of the institutional Web Team and is fed up using a bucket and spade to build and maintain the University Web; he has been on the lookout for a JCB and thinks he might have found one in the form of Zope. Paul is co-author of the JISC TechWatch Report on Content Management Systems. Most likely to say: "Can I have the keys to your information silo?" Least likely to say: "I think yet another portal is a smart idea."

Paul has been invited to give a talk on Portals and CMS - Why You Need Them Both following the cancellation on the talk on The My.Sunderland Portal: A Case Study. Paul also took part in a panel session on Avoiding Portal Wars.

Paul can be contacted at <Paul.Browning@bristol.ac.uk>.

You can also access Paul Browning's slides.

Mike McConnell is the Web Team Manager of the University of Aberdeen's Web Design Unit and currently manages a team of 5 staff who are responsible for the University's central Web presence, and the maintenance of certain departments and sections across the institution.
Mike has formerly worked at the Robert Gordon University as an Educational Development Officer, and as a researcher in Information Science. Prior to that he worked at the sharp end of IT user support in the oil services industry.
Mike has published on technology issues in education, Web usability and produced a number of educational Web applications.
Mike has an MA in English Literature and the History of Art, a Pg Dip in Information Analysis, an MSc in Information Science, a PgCert in Tertiary Level Teaching and is a member of CILIP.

Mike gave a joint presentation with Iain Middleton on "Centralised Control Or Departmental Freedom?".

Mike can be contacted at <m.mcconnell@abdn.ac.uk>.

You can also access Mike and Iain's slides.

Iain Middleton is based in the Learning Technology Unit at the University of Aberdeen where he is currently working on a 3-year JISC-funded project to develop Web teaching and learning packages around the Museums and Special Collections, having previously been Web Editor at The Robert Gordon University where he played a leading role in the comprehensive redevelopment of the institution's Web presence. He holds a degree in Human Computer Interaction from Heriot-Watt University and a Masters in Information Analysis (Distinction) from The Robert Gordon University where he also spent 5 years in research at the School of Information and Media, specialising in help desks, online user support systems and communication on the World Wide Web.
He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) and maintains his research interest in the co-ordination of Web sites and help desks in user support, and the role of the Web in Higher Education.

Iain gave a joint presentation with Mike McConnell on "Centralised Control Or Departmental Freedom?".

You can also access Iain and Mike's slides.

Iain can be contacted using his Web form.

Lawrie Phipps is an environmental science graduate turned learning technologist. He worked on the development of Web-based resources, computer simulations and 'virtual' fieldwork for several years before running the JISC-funded TechDis Service, which looks at all aspects of Technology and Disabilities in the further and higher education sectors. Lawrie maintains a research interest in virtual lab and fieldwork in the sciences.

The title of Lawrie's talk is "Legislation, Disabilities and Educational Web Sites".

You can also access Lawrie Phipps's slides.

Lawrie can be contacted at <lawrie@techdis.ac.uk>.

Mark Simpson has been working as the User Issues researcher on the De Montfort University, MLE project, since October 2001. Previously, he has worked on the following: aircrew operational issues of flying in icing weather, funded by the CAA and European Community; training and human factors issues for real-time, full motion simulators; the design of photocopier manuals and control panel information; and the design of process plant control rooms. He has a BSc in Ergonomics, a Postgraduate diploma in Computing and a MA in Industrial Design.

The title of Mark's talk is "Designing For Usability".

You can also access Mark Simpson's slides.

Mark can be contacted at <mpsimpson@dmu.ac.uk>.

Stephen Tanner is Head of IT Services at Colchester Institute in North Essex, a large mainly FE college but with some HE provision. Previously involved in integrated systems initiatives in the NHS, since 1998 he's been pursuing a standardised and integrated IT & MIS strategy college wide with particular emphasis on Web based applications, through partnerships with commercial suppliers. He likes to think he might eventually be getting somewhere....

The title of Stephen's talk is "The Lecturer's MIS Menu: Why Silver Service Is Off And Drive Thru's In".

You can also access Stephen Tanner's slides.

Stephen can be contacted at <Stephen.Tanner@colch-inst.ac.uk>.

Workshop Facilitators

The workshops were held in three parallel sessions. The workshops are intended to provide an opportunity for participants to make an active contribution. One of the roles of the workshop facilitiators is to ensure that this happens.

John Byrne is Head of Web Services at the University of York Computing Service. He coordinates the provision of Web services provided by the Computing Service. He has been involved in a number of projects including chairing the development of the University's YorkWeb Service. His group provides a hosting service for about 200 Web sites representing 30 departments and specialist centres, and dozens of administrative offices.

John can be contacted at <jcb1@york.ac.uk>.

John co-facilitated the parallel session on Right People, Right Stuff, Right Pain? with James Currall and Colin Farrow.

Colin Farrow has worked with computer systems in earth sciences for more years than he cares to remember. Currently he is a Web developer in the Computing Service at the University of Glasgow where he creates custom solutions for the developing intranet and was a member of the Scottish Middleware Project team (see http://www.gla.ac.uk/scotmid). Drawing on experiences with the Glasgow Permissions Database he hopes to be able to provide some sedatives in the session "Right People, Right Stuff, Right Pain?" which he co-facilitated with James Currall and John Byrne.

Colin can be contacted at <c.farrow@compserv.gla.ac.uk>.

Graeme Fleming is the Senior Photographer at the University of Strathclyde. He is heavily involved in the development of photographically rich Web content and particularly with the Pioneer Project hosted by Education Scotland (formerly SCET- Scottish Council for Education Technology).

Graeme can be contacted at <gr.fleming@strath.ac.uk>.

Graeme co-facilitated the parallel session on Providing 360° Panoramic Scenes on the Web with Jim Whyte.

Grace de la Flor works for the Institute for Learning and Research Technology (ILRT), University of Bristol. She has written Web site, usability reviews and functional specifications for clients ranging from the UK National Health Service (NHS), Learning and Teaching Support Network (LTSN), The Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) as well as for internal University of Bristol Web-based initiatives. Her most recent project involves analysing search behaviors and providing recommendations regarding keyword taxonomies based on user input for the Environment Agency.

Grace facilitated the parallel session on "Testing Web Site Accessibility".

Grace can be contacted at <Grace.De-La-Flor@bristol.ac.uk>.

John Kelly is the Legal Information Officer with the JISC Legal Information Service. He is based in Learning Services at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. A qualified lawyer with a background in legal publishing John's interests include data protection compliance in universities and colleges web publishing.

John facilitated the parallel session on "Your Institution's Web Site Legal?: A Guide To Keeping Your Web Site Compliant With Recent Legislation".

John can be contacted at <john.kelly@strath.ac.uk>.

Bob Kemp is Information Officer for the Digital Information Office, an initiative of Strathclyde's Centre for Digital Library Research providing support for professionalising information management in the academic environment. He previously worked on the GAELS Project at Strathclyde, producing information skills training for post-graduate students. He is interested in hypertext and Web design issues and in academic knowledge and information management.

Bob facilitated the parallel session on "Exploiting Locally-Created E-resources: OAI and Eprints".

Bob can be contacted at <robert.kemp@strath.ac.uk>.

Mike McConnell co-facilitated the parallel session on "Departmental Freedom vs. Centralised Control" with Iain Middleton.

Mike's biographical details are available elsewhere.

Iain Middleton co-facilitated the parallel session on "Departmental Freedom vs. Centralised Control" with Mike McConnell.

Iain's biographical details are available elsewhere.

Trish Murray is a Netskills Trainer at the University of Newcastle. Netskills offer Internet Training, predominantly to the Higher and Further Education communities. Trish does training in a variety of technologies from HTML via ASP and JavaScript to XML. Trish has been at Netskills for two years, and previously worked as a research consultant in coastal management. Trish facilitated the parallel session on "Dynamic Web Interfaces and Browser Compatibility".

Trish can be contacted at <p.b.murray@newcastle.ac.uk>.

Marieke Napier is the QA Focus/NOF-digitise Advisor in UKOLN. In her QA Focus role her aim is to support JISC's DNER (Distributed National Electronic Resource) programme by ensuring that projects implement appropriate quality assurance procedures, comply with standards and recommendations and make use of best practices. In her NOF role she co-ordinates technical support and advisory services provided by UKOLN and the Arts and Humanities Data Service to the NOF (New Opportunities Fund) national digitisation programme. Marieke has worked for UKOLN for 2 years now. Initially Marieke was the editor on the Cultivate Interactive and Exploit Interactive online publications. She has given a number of presentations and workshops on the development and publishing of online publications, benchmarking and Web site QA and had articles published in both online and print publications.

Marieke developed materials for the workshop session on "QA For Web Sites" but she was not able to attend the workshop itself.

Marieke can be contacted at <M.Napier@ukoln.ac.uk>.

Dennis Nicholson is Director of the Centre for Digital Library Research at Strathclyde University and Director of Research in Strathclyde University's Information Resources Directorate. Since 1991, he has managed a range of funded projects, either directly or in his role as CDLR manager. Included amongst these are the Scottish Portals Initiative (2001-), the Victorian Times NOF Digitisation Project (2001-), the HILT, High Level Thesaurus Project (2000-), the SCONE, Scottish Collections Network Extension Project (1999-), the CAIRNS, Co-operative Academic Information Retrieval Network for Scotland project (1998-2000), the CATRIONA II, University Management of Electronic Resources project (1996-98), the CATRIONA, Cataloguing and Retrieval of Information Over Networks Applications project (1994-95), and the BUBL Information Service(1991-). Further information about most of these projects can be found at <http://cdlr.strath.ac.uk/projects/projects.htm>.

Dennis facilitated the parallel session on "The Value of Metadata and How to Realise it".

Dennis can be contacted at <d.m.nicholson@strath.ac.uk>.

Sebastian Rahtz is Information Manager for Oxford University Computing Services, running what is now an almost 100% XML Web site. He has degrees in classics and archaeology; and has worked teaching computer science, and practising typesetting and publishing. He has published widely on TeX, and is an accredited bigot about a TeX, XML, XSLT and open source software. He is also a director of the Text Encoding Initiative Consortium and is now working on schema versions of the TEI.

Sebastian facilitated the parallel session on "Delivering XML in an Apache Environment".

Sebastian can be contacted at <sebastian.rahtz@oucs.ox.ac.uk>.

Clare Rogers works for JISC ASSIST.

Clare can be contacted at <Clare.Rogers@bristol.ac.uk>.

Andrew Savory is the managing director of Luminas Limited, an Internet application company, and was a university Webmaster for a number of years. Andrew facilitated the workshop session on "<XML Everywhere />".

Andrew can be contacted at <andrew@luminas.co.uk>.

David Sloan is Project Lead of the Digital Media Access Group, a Web accessibility research and consultancy group based in the Division of Applied Computing at the University of Dundee. The group have provided Web accessibility audits and advice to a number of clients in the HE, commercial and public sectors. David previously worked with the Disability and Information Systems in Higher Education project (DISinHE), the predecessor to TechDIS.
David was originally a cartographer, having graduated BSc in Topographic Science, before an MSc in Applied Computing led him to an interest in Web design and content, and specifically usability and accessibility issues.

David facilitated the parallel session on "Usable Design and Accessible Web Sites". Note that this session was held after the session on "Testing Web Site Accessibility". These two sessions cover related topics but are independent of each other.

David can be contacted at <dsloan@computing.dundee.ac.uk>.

Duncan Smeed is facilitating the parallel sessions on "Weblogs and Blogs: What Are They? What Can They Be Used For?" and "Computer Scientists - A Help Or A Hindrance ;-)!".

Duncan's details are available elsewhere.

Tracey Stanley is the Head of E-Strategy and Development at the Library, University of Leeds. She is responsible for the development of Library strategy for electronic services and electronic resources. She currently chairs the Steering Group for the Library's Hybrid Library Project, and sits on a University steering group for the development of C&IT in the curriculum. She has also spearheaded a number of Library initiatives in using virtual learning environments for the delivery of e-learning support activities. Tracey was project manager for Library aspects of the University merger with Bretton Hall College in 2001, and as such has experience of site rationalisation and re-organisation. Tracey has produced a series of articles for the Ariadne electronic journal, and has undertaken consultancy work for Netskills, and for other UK universities.

Previous posts held by Tracey include Faculty Team Leader, Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences Team (December 1998 - December 2001) and Networked Information Officer (March 1995 - December 1998), both at Leeds University Library.

The title of Tracey's workshop session is "How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The E-Strategy". Tracey also took part in the panel session on "Avoiding Portal Wars".

Tracey can be contacted at <T.S.Stanley@leeds.ac.uk>.

Julie Stuckes is the Subject Portals Project Manager, based at UKOLN.
Prior to working at UKOLN, Julie was the UK Operations Manager for The Future Network, running the internet division of consumer magazine publisher Future Publishing. This entailed managing the design, development, marketing and advertising across over fifty Web sites which together made up the 'portal' at <http://www.futurenet.com/>. Julie has a BA Hons in Graphic Designer and began her career as a designer in an advertising agency in Bermuda. In the early 1990's she moved into magazine design and then on into Web design and management several years ago.

The title of Julie's workshop session is The Perfect Portal ... is a Popular Portal. Julie also took part in the panel session on "Avoiding Portal Wars".

Julie can be contacted at <J.Stuckes@ukoln.ac.uk>.

Claire Surridge is currently project manager of EVINCE - a HEFCE Development of Good Management Practice Fund project evaluating social and cultural aspects of IT-related change. EVINCE is using ethnographic (participant observation) techniques to study three case studies across two institutions (the Universities of Reading and Southampton).
Prior to the current secondment Claire was ITS User Services manager at Reading. She has also worked in computing services at UCL and Brunel University, and was also a sociologist in a previous life.

Claire facilitated the parallel session on "Information Strategies - An Essential Navigational Tool?".

Claire can be contacted at <c.a.surridge@reading.ac.uk>.

Ralph Weedon is the Internet Copyright Officer for the University of Strathclyde. Following a successful bid to JISC in 2000 he is also Project Director for the JISC Legal Information Service. This focuses on those working in Information Services in the widest sense. The service is based at Strathclyde and has two other partners, the UK Centre for Legal Education at the University of Warwick and MacRoberts, Solicitors. Areas of law covered by the service include data protection, liability and monitoring. In future it hopes to look at new issues such as e-commerce in FE/HE.
Ralph has recently completed work on two other JISC funded projects. He was Project Officer for 'Policy Approaches to Copyright in HEIs' for JCALT, which investigated issues such as ownership and control of material produced by academic staff particularly, that put up on the Web. This included reference to the 1988 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, relevant EU, international legislation and treaties - see <http://www.strath.ac.uk/ces/projects/jiscipr/>. He also worked with Project Manager Diane MacDonald on 'A Study into Advertising on JANET'.
In his role as Internet Copyright Officer, Ralph writes guidelines on electronic copyright, conducts multi-media copyright clearance and drafts copyright licences for institutions, authors and users. He has close links with the university Law School.

Ralph co-facilitated the parallel session on Advertising On Web Sites with Kriss Fearon.

Ralph can be contacted at <ralph.weedon@strath.ac.uk>.

Jim Whyte is the Computer Systems Manager at Learning Services in the University of Strathclyde. He has been involved with computers for more than 30 years and has been involved in Web issues for the last 10. Much of his recent work has been concerned with investigating novel modes of delivering Web content.

Jim co-facilitated the parallel session on Providing 360° Panoramic Scenes on the Web with Graeme Fleming.

Jim can be contacted at <j.m.whyte@strath.ac.uk>.

Colin K. Work is currently the Information Resources Manager at Southampton University Computing Services. He has been involved in online information services since the days of the JANET colour books, and still hasn't got bored with it.

The title of Colin's workshop session is "Will The Real Mr Homepage Please Stand Up?".

Colin can be contacted at <C.K.Work@soton.ac.uk>.

Workshop Briefings Facilitators

Niall Sclater is Manager of Educational Systems at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland. He has been involved in implementing technology in Higher Education since 1990, initially coordinating the development of multimedia courseware to teach modern languages at the University of Glasgow. Since 1995 he has been promoting learning technology across all subject areas at the University of Strathclyde, advising staff in the effective use of new technologies for learning, communication and assessment.

Niall co-founded and manages Clyde Virtual University, set up in 1995 as Europe's first virtual university. His advice has been sought in the development of online learning abroad and he was involved in creating the Virtual Open University in Helsinki, Finland. He is currently managing the Web-Supported Learning initiative of the European Consortium of Innovative Universities and recently co-wrote a proposal to set up a collaborative European Virtual University which has just been received funding of 500,000 Euros from the European Commission. More locally, Niall is currently heavily involved with Scottish Enterprise Glasgow in "Real", a city-wide initiative to create a learning city, where all citizens can gain access to high quality learning materials via the Internet.

One of Niall's main interests is in computer assisted assessment. He co-specified and managed the development of the Miranda assessment engine, a Web-based system in use at institutions across the UK. He led the Scottish Computer Assisted Assessment Network in collaboration with Dr Roger Sutcliffe of Glasgow University and Dr Roger Rist of Heriot-Watt University. The Network was funded by the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council to promote the use of computers for assessing university students across the country. A major part of this initiative was in the field of standards for the definition of question types. He now manages the CETIS Assessment Special Interest Group, funded by JISC to promote interoperability in the area of online assessment across UK FE and HE. He sits on the panel which is developing BS7988: 'A Code of Practice for the use of Information Technology in the Delivery of Assessments' and is on the IMS Question and Test Interoperability Working Group.

Niall co-facilitated the briefing session on "Interoperability and Learning Standards Briefing" with Lorna Campbell.

Niall can be contacted at <n.Sclater@strath.ac.uk>.

Lorna M. Campbell is the Assistant Director of the Centre for Educational Technology Interoperability Standards (CETIS). She is based at the Centre for Academic Practice at the University of Strathclyde. Lorna has worked in Higher Education since 1990 and has been active in the field of e-learning since 1996. She has been involved in a wide portfolio of projects focusing on the development and reuse of online learning resources, these include Clyde Virtual University, The Scottish electronic Staff Development Library (SeSDL), the DNER and Learning Objects Project and the CETIS Educational Content Special Interest Group. In addition, Lorna actively participates in a number of international standards bodies. She attends a variety of IMS working group meetings and participates in the CEN/ISSS WSLT Taxonomies and Vocabularies Project Team as an independent expert. Lorna's particular areas of interest are the use of learning object metadata, the development of educational vocabularies and classification systems and the sharing and reuse of educational content. She regularly advises colleagues throughout the UK FE/HE sector on issues relating to uptake and implementation of interoperability standards and specifications.

Lorna co-facilitated the briefing session on "Interoperability and Learning Standards Briefing" with Niall Sclater.

Lorna can be contacted at <lmc@strath.ac.uk>.

Brian Kelly gave a briefing session on Web Standards. Brian's biographical details are given elsewhere.

Betty Willder has a background in law and is a qualified Scottish solicitor. She has previously worked in private practice, the insurance industry and also in the commercial department of an IT consultancy. She is currently completing a masters degree in IT and Telecommunications Law.

Betty facilitated the briefing session on "Web Sites and Legislation Briefing".

Betty can be contacted at <b.willder@strath.ac.uk>.

Panelists

The panelists gave brief presentations on their involvement in the development of portals. The aim pf the panel session is to explore the different approaches and identify potential problem areas.

Paul Browning facilitated the panel session. Paul's biographical details are available elsewhere.

Tracey Stanley also took part in the panel. Tracey's biographical details are available elsewhere.

Julie Stuckes also took part in the panel. Julie's biographical details are available elsewhere.

Tony Shaw's career has included spells in a research institute, academia, consultancy, commercial information systems product design and implementation and currently, as Director of Network and Information Systems Management, IT and IS services strategy, planning and delivery. Following on from the JTAP funded project, Developing secure, manageable, scaleable network services through the use of commercial products and services (see http://nism.paisley.ac.uk/jtap562/), he continues to work with others in seeking solutions to requirements that draw lessons from the world outside education organizations.

Tony can be contacted at <tony.shaw@paisley.ac.uk>.

Event Organisers

Brian Kelly is UK Web Focus - a JISC-funded post which provides advice and support to the UK Higher and Further Education communities on Web issues. Brian has been chair of the organising committees for the Institutional Web Management Workshop series since he established the event in 1997.

As well as organising the event Brian also gave a briefing session on "Web Standards".

Brian can be contacted at <B.Kelly@ukoln.ac.uk>.

Diane McDonald is a senior member of the Information Resources Directorate of the University of Strathclyde. Her current major interest is in the use of technology to enhance the effectiveness of the University, and organisations or communities in general.
As part of this Diane is responsible for a number of projects ranging from Knowledge Management to the design and develop an intelligence-enabled infrastructure of networked services for supporting the citizen of the future.
Previously she was the Network and Security Manager for the University and was responsible for the development of the University's networking infrastructure & services, including the installation of one of the first gigabit campus backbones within Europe. She was a member of the technical group responsible for the design and procurement of ClydeNET, the West of Scotland HE MAN and a member of the SHEFC subgroup that investigated MAN resilience.
She is a member of the `PREDICT' framework within the Information Resources Directorate (IRD). 'PReDICT' represents the leading edge work of the ICT part of the IRD. It comprises a federation of technology based initiatives, many of which are collaborative, both internally and externally, designed individually and collectively to further enhance the University's capabilities in decision taking, progress and performance evaluation, and the development of advanced techniques enabled by technology, for the prosecution of its activities.

Diane can be contacted at <D.McDonald@strath.ac.uk>.

James Currall joined the University of Glasgow as a statistical computing consultant in 1989 and has contributed to the research work of over 30 departments in the University. He comes from a background of biology and statistics. Since 1994 he has been the manager of the User Service Team in the University Computing Service, with overall responsibility for training, documentation, Web development, software support and advisory services. He was also deputy director of a UK-wide support centre for computers in the teaching of statistics.

In 1997 he broadened his interests into areas of information beyond numbers, when he jointly put together the University's Information Strategy framework with Michael Moss and subsequently he was made Information Strategy Co-ordinator. From 1997-2000 he co-lead (with Michael Moss) the Effective Records Management project funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) Technology Application Programme (JTAP), which carried out fundamental research on management of organisational records in digital form.

The information strategy developments have lead on to Intranet and security work and James has just finished a project looking at the use of Middleware technologies (particularly with respect to authentication and other security) to permit people to publish information in a secure environment without the need for them to have detailed technical knowledge. During 2000/1 he was also involved in a project, with South Bank University, investigating Information Security Culture.

For the last year, James has been a Senior Research Fellow of the Humanities Advanced Technology and Information Institute, where he is developing research into information access drawing on his Computing Service work. In the last few years he has worked on and given talks on a wide variety of topics concerned with the use and potential of technology in teaching, statistics, information, security and various combinations of these.

As well as being a member of the programme committee James co-facilitated a parallel session on "Right People, Right Stuff: Right Pain?".

James can be contacted at <J.Currall@compserv.gla.ac.uk>.

Kriss Fearon has been Web Coordinator at the University of York for 6 years. Initially graduating in Greek Studies and Philosophy, she has a publishing background and an MPhil in Publishing Studies from the University of Stirling. She is responsible for advice and implementation of non-technical Web issues mainly based around project work such as legal liability, design revisions, and other issues common to many HE institutions. Her particular interest is in effective departmental outreach in decentralised institutions and professionalisation of Web staff.

As well as being a member of the programme committee Kriss co-facilitated the parallel session on "Advertising on Web Sites".

Kriss can be contacted at <kf7@york.ac.uk>.

Duncan Smeed is a member of academic staff in the Department of Computer and Information Sciences at the University of Strathclyde. A brief biography is available at <http://www.cis.strath.ac.uk/people/biography/dunc/>.

He is committed user of Web/internet technologies to support and inform his teaching and research. His teaching interests in computer science are concentrated at the hardware end of the spectrum. His research interests revolve around the use of the Web/Internet to facilitate collaboration and knowledge transfer.

As an early adopter of Web technologies, Duncan has almost a decade of experience in using such technologies to deliver teaching material and to coordinate students' project work. He has been a member of his Faculty's IT committee - for far too long! - and has recently been serving as a member of his University's Information Strategy Advisory Group and Information Technology Advisory Group committees at which he takes pains to represent the interests of the academic community of the institution.

Duncan has been a member of the British Computer Society for over 20 years and is a past Chairman of the Glasgow Branch Committee.

Duncan's first (and, so far, only) attendance at an IWMW was in Bath at the IWMW 2000 event. At a show of hands at a plenary session there, he appeared to be one of only a handful of academic teaching staff in attendance ;-) Nevertheless, he thoroughly enjoyed the event and is pleased to be a member of the Programme Committee for IWMW 2002. He will be hosting a 'Weblogging and Personal Content Management' workshop. To support the workshop he will use the technology he is most familiar with - Conversant - to create and maintain a workshop specific site: <http://www.free-conversant.com/iwmw-2002/> and will use this to demonstrate some of the concepts in this approach to (personal) Web site management.

The extent to which Duncan is committed to the use of these technologies is (sadly?) reflected in the fact that a Google search for 'duncan' (at the time of writing) has him as hit number 1!

As well as being a member of the programme committee Duncan facilitated the parallel sessions on "Weblogs and Blogs: What Are They? What Can They Be Used For?" and "Computer Scientists - A Help Or A Hindrance ;-)!".

Duncan can be contacted at <duncan.smeed@cis.strath.ac.uk>.

Vendor Slot Presenters

Jeff Stephenson, Project Manager for the IPP development at SITS will give the talk on SITS' IPP (Institution Programme Publishing) product. Jeff has previously worked in FE Colleges in England and Scotland.

Peter McCudden, Under Peter's leadership, Mediasurface Scotland and Ireland continues to achieve revenue growth with new and existing Mediasurface customers including The Prudential, Wood Mackenzie, Association of Chartered Certified Accountants, VisitScotland and West Lothian Council.
With 18 years of IT experience behind him, Peter's work history includes various roles in Scottish and Southern Energy and, most recently, Oracle Corporation where Peter held several roles from Technical Pre-Sales to Regional Sales Director for the Energy & Utilities vertical market. Peter joined Mediasurface in 2000 as Regional Sales Manager before becoming Regional Director, Scotland & Ireland, in 2001.