Charles R. "Chip" Patton, Jr.

Professional Highlights Timeline

A part of The Chipster Zone. (Blog )

(updated 06/20/2008, or later)

Intergraph SG&I and Public Safety

• 2008: IFRLE: Learned Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and XAML in a hurry to bolster the manpower on the Intergraph Field Reporting for Law Enforcement product (the next generation replacment for Automated Field Reporting.
• 2005-2008: OneMobile and Next Generation I/MobileTC: Worked closely with Richard Eade and a team from the G/Technologies group lead by Gary Jeter to create a version of I/MobileTC based on .Net and the Microsoft Composite Application Block (CAB) framework. The "OneMobile" configuration allows the combination of InService functions like Outage Managment and Workforce Management with the design capabilities of the G/Tech products and add-ins like Field Design and Pole Inspection. I concentrated on the .Net portions and the ability to swap maps, including a proof of concept use of Microsoft's Virtual Earth control, while Richard architected the user interface in HTML and JavaScript with ActiveX controls underneath for things like GPS and communications to the back office.
• 2006: CruiseControl.Net Introduced: Introduced "Continuous Integration" via the CruiseControl.Net package. First on the OneMobile project and subsequently adopted by the Interfaces Product Build group.
• 2006: .Net IntUtil Library: Developed a .Net version (C#) of the Interface Group's "int_util" library (C++) that allows running under ISM (Interfaces Service Manager), logging, sending ESMD messages, etc.
• 2005: Test Driven Development Evangelized : Began touting the merits of automated testing with a presentation on 5/19/2005 entitled "Self Testing Code: Automated Unit Testing in Practice" that described my current use of NUnit and CPPUnit.

Symbol Technologies

• 2004: Wireless Enterprise Manager: Interfaced new Air Beam Manager product via a Java bridge into a JBOSS system for managing wireless assets.
• 2002 - 2004: AirBeam Manager: Development team created the next generation of Wireless Access Point managment software. Cross platform (Windows, Linux, Solaris, UIX, AIX) C++. Contributed the "Abstraction Layer" messaging object that coordinated distribution of XML formatted messages in the loosely coupled system.

HyperActive Technologies

• 2001: Founding Employee: Literally 6 guys in a basement. We started with a beta of Visual Studio .Net and developed what became the company's flagship product, HyperActive Bob. It uses machine vision to monitor Quick Serve Restaurant traffic and control how much food is prepared. As of 2007 all Zaxby's corporate restaurants are using the system and it is expanding into other chains.

Tpresence Inc.

• 2000 - 2001: Early 3D on the Web: This start-up company stretched the graphics and bandwidth performance of the Internet to provide an immersive 3-D experience, akin to what Second Life is doing now (i.e. 2007). Tpresence's free Holodesk product had tens of thousands of users. I came in to help build a commercial platform code named Acorn but it never became a mighty oak. The easy money dried up but not before we added 3D sound (VOIP). I became "Director of Software Engineering", managing up to ten people in this 40 person endeavor. I was also profiled in the Pittsburgh Business Times. Hal Wrigley, inventor of Robo Grip pliers, and Michael Keaton, the actor, were backers.

Intergraph Federal Systems

• 2000: GeoWeather: Worked under Dr. Carlene Neeley to overlay live weather feeds onto GeoMedia. We partnered with Litton/PRC on this project that was neat but turned out, at that time, to be more expensive than the interested customers could afford.
• 1997 - 2000: TDZ Wildcatter: Created sample 3D applications for the Federal market to show off our new line of graphics personal workstations. We took a lot of business away from Silicon Graphics Inc. before NVidia and Matrox caught us from below. I demoed from Orlando to Seattle, at big shows or individual customer sites.
• 1998-2000: ActiveFlight/ActiveTerrain: Worked with the sharp guys at CG^2 to create 3-D fly throughs from mapping and imagery data and tie these "live" to the 2D views in GeoMedia. Picked up a nice little contract out of the dustbin for the FCC in Oklahoma City that ended up being worth over $100K during some lean times at Ingr.
• 1993-1996: MADOC and Trips to Saudi Arabia: Worked under Dr. Glenn Weathers and Kris McBride to create an air defense operations center capability. I wrote the centerpiece that held and distributed the air picture.
• 1992, 1996 - 1999: PATRIOT Missile Command and Control: A high profile project where I played primarily a support role at first, but was eventually a Technical Manager on about a third of Intergraph's work for this program
• 1990-1992: Map 2: Very large scale mapping project. Yawn.

Boeing Helicopters

• 1988-1990: LHX / Commanche Simulation: I was the lead developer at the Boeing half of the Boeing/Sikorsky team. We won the next phase based in large part on the simulation since the aircraft was still in the design stage. For better or worse the Commanche was cancelled a decade or so later.
• 1986-1988: V-22 Osprey Tiltrotor Simulation: I was also lead on this simulation software project by the time I shifted to the Commanche. The Boeing/Bell team won this one, too, making it a double defeat for McDonnell-Douglas. (They were oppositely partnered will Bell and Sikorsky on the Commanche and Osprey programs making visits among the four companies a bit tricky.)

Back to The Chipster Zone

Click here to send email to Chip Patton
crpatton@HiWAAY.net

--