My Story
I have been involved with technology since my first years in high school. Back then it was using punch cards to program an ASCII image. I have always felt drawn to two things, aircraft and computer technology.This could have been as I wanted to fly to the moon as a 5-6 year old when my Dad made me my very own Rocket out of old washing machine parts, a 44 gallon drum, and various gauges he had lying around in the shed. Those were the days.
After High School I enlisted into the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), where my love of computer technology was reinforced by the job that I did. I often joked that if I told anyone what I did I would have to shred them, as it was classified. It was here that I learnt to read Baudot code (you know the holes in the telex tape), program a main frame computer as well as other unlisted skills like shoot a rifle with accuracy.
I spent 16 years in the RAAF, I met my husband and had my two boys whilst still serving. I have also been from one end of Australia to another. I enjoyed my time in the RAAF however after a series of incidents I decided to discharge (in military speak). It was after this that I started on the next chapter of my life.
Being a Western Australian, I came home to Perth with my husband and children in tow. I began teaching at the Central Institute of Technology (now part of Northern Metropolitan TAFE) in the Information Technology studies area. This is where I honed my knowledge of all things web related.
During this time I have seen the transformation of the web from somewhere to disseminate information to full on e-commerce. The rise and fall of various programming frameworks yet the basic foundations have stayed the same only improved upon. I spent 14.5 years at Central and left to get back to the industry I fell in love with – the internet.
Since July 2015 I have been helping small to medium businesses and organisations get the most out of their internet presence through my business Graphitedge. This may be in the form of building a website or helping them strategise their way forward or even helping them understand the nomenclature that is used by developers and marketers when talking about the internet.
I have been apart of the teaching group for Codemaster Institute since 2016. This is where I have been sharing my knowledge of front-end development mainly focussing on HTML, CSS and JavaScript foundations, as well as design principles. I enjoy being part of this group imparting my knowledge to people interested in learning these skills.
I also like to give back to my veteran community so I host and maintain several sites for different veteran organisations. North Beach RSL Sub-branch, my home sub-branch as well as Working Spirit a non-profit organisation that helps veterans find employment.