Richard Hightower is Chief Mentor/Consultant for
ArcMind, a full-service software development company. Rick is a
software engineer by training who specializes in software
development tools and processes, and developing enterprise
applications using J2EE, XML, UML, JDBC, SQL, and open source
technologies. Formerly he was the Senior Software Engineer for Java
Architecture at Intel's Enterprise Architecture Lab. Rick is the
co-author of
Professional Jakarta Struts, and he
contributed two chapters to the book
Mastering
Tomcat.
Rick has spoken at a variety of industry conferences and events,
including JavaOne, TheServerSide.com Software Symposium JDJEdge,
WebServicesEdge, and the Complete Programmer Network software
symposiums.
Warner Onstine is a founder and CTO of
Interface Guru, a leading Web Usability firm where he consults on
back-end technology issues with specific emphasis on how technology
and usability work together to present the user with an easy-to-use
interface. Warner also runs his own custom development shop,
Sandcast Software, which focuses on community and team-oriented
software.
Warner got his first computer, a TI-99 4/A, when he was 9 and
almost immediately attempted to program a game in Basic on it,
which did not work. He stubbornly refuses to get rid of that
machine though, along with his trusty NeXT Turbo MonoStation, upon
which he got his first taste of Objective-C. This eventually led to
Java, skipping right over C++.
His strong community background soon led him to open source, where
he has had the chance to meet and interact with several incredible
individuals from Jakarta and other open source communities. This
also has helped him to keep an open eye on the trends that will
soon shape the new landscape-one of his specialties.
Another skill he has is in assisting companies with making the
right choices at the right time, utilizing XP, in-depth knowledge
of their subject area, and the currently available tools germane to
their problem. Warner is also a co-founder and President of the
Tucson Java Users Group, which he helped form in 2001, which keeps
him rather busy at times. Previously, Warner worked at eBlox, Inc.
(a Web development company), Intalio, Inc. (a bay-area Business
Process Management Server company), and the University of Arizona
Main Library on the Digital Library Team.
Paul Visan is an expert J2EE developer. He
serves as a Principal Software Engineer for eBlox, Inc, where he
finds that open source tools are invaluable to his work. Paul is a
proud Romanian native, now living in the heart of Tucson Arizona.
He is a regular contributor to IBM's developerWorks, for which he
has written a series of tutorials on Java Web Services. Paul would
like to thank Andrew Barton, Nicholas Lesiecki, Tim Ryan, and
Victoria McSherry for helping with this book.
Damon Payne currently works as the Microsoft
Business Group manager for Centare Group, Ltd. in Milwaukee, WI.
Damon is very passionate about open source technology in the Java
and Microsoft .NET worlds. His other professional interests include
Mobile development, data persistence patterns, and product
development. When not programming or speaking Damon enjoys raising
his wonderful daughter, Brooke, home theater, and music.
Joseph D. Gradecki is a software engineer at
Comprehensive Software Solutions, where he works on their SABIL
product, a enterprise-level securities processing system. He has
built numerous dynamic, enterprise applications using Java,
AspectJ, servlets, JSPs, Resin, MySQL, BroadVision, XML, and more.
He is the author of Mastering JXTA and the coauthor of MySQL and
Java Developer''s Guide (with Mark Matthews and Jim Cole). Joeholds
Bachelors and Masters degrees in Computer Science and is currently
pursuing a Ph.D.
Kate Rhodes is a self-taught programmer, serial
entrepreneur, and occasional musician with a Japanese nickname and
an unstoppable urge to learn new things, solve new problems, and
write open source apps. She's got too many pets, too many projects,
and too little time. If she could afford an army of programming
minions she'd have one.
She's ranked better than most and worse than some. She's worked in
impressive places you've possibly heard of and unimpressive places
you've never heard of. She's done some stuff she's very proud of
and some she isn't. And so long as life keeps offering up
interesting new challenges for her to learn from, she's happy. If
you're overcome with curiosity you can always see what Kate and her
wife are up to at www.masukomi.org.
Robert Watkins is a Brisbane, Australia-based
software developer of nine years' experience. He's been called a
programmer, a software engineer, an architect, and a few other
things (many unprintable), but mostly ignores the titles and does
what he has to do. These days he is mostly working in J2EE and
related technologies, and is a passionate advocate of agile
development techniques. When not working, he spends most of his
time with his wife and twin children, and when he gets a chance, he
takes time out to read Terry Pratchett novels. Robert is also one
of the developers on the CruiseControl project.
Erik Meade is an employee of Wells Fargo, who
attended XPImmersionTwo, interviewed at XPImmersionThree, coached
at XPImmersionFour, and hung out on the evenings of
XPImmersionFive. He is the edior of junit.org and an evangelist of
JUnit, Ant, CruiseControl, HttpUnit, Tomcat, and open source in
general. He is also a contributor to JUnitPerf.