About this blog and its befuddled author
I named my blog after a portion of the refrain in this Grateful Dead classic.
Technical articles, stories and vague recollections of Bob Kjelgaard, a Senior Software Design Engineer (Test) in Windows Driver Frameworks Quality Assurance. All opinions ventured are definitely the author's own, and are not official statements of the Microsoft Corporation.
A brief bio:
Born and raised in upstate New York (near Binghamton)- as far as age goes- I predate satellites, space travel and integrated circuits- computers were built with vacuum tubes when I was born and 16K of memory was a lot.
BS in Mathematics from CalTech (Pasadena, CA)
Worked as Electronic Test Technician in Los Angeles area for a while
10 years at IBM (Owego, NY- no longer an IBM facility, though) as an Electronics Engineer / Scientist- primarily in Automated Test Equipment (both hardware and software aspects)
Began with Microsoft in 1989, but have bounced in and out a bit
- SDET 1989-1993- OS/2, Windows 3.1, Windows NT 3.1- all related to printing subsystem / printer drivers.
- Contract SDE 1994-1997- Windows Printing System, Windows 98 / Win 2K- again, printer drivers / print subsystem or closely related areas
- Contract SDE 2003-2005- XP SP2 and server SP1, Windows Vista- kernel audio drivers (portcls/sysaudio/kmixer and also some work in KS itself)- mostly maintenance with some small features.
- SDET 2005-present- Windows Driver Foundation- initially for Kernel-Mode Driver Framework, now overall Windows Driver Frameworks.
During some of those non-Microsoft years:
- SDE- device drivers (parallel port and later some USB), printer drivers and other printing components (monitors, print processors), some pre-boot modifications (boot record hacks and the like). Some sockets stuff, some work on Still Image in its early days. Software package installers, various bits of UI. Even some VB / database stuff, come to think of it...
- Consultant or Contract SDE- same sort of stuff
- Owned and operated (as in practically lived in, sometimes) a laundromat. That got me in the Wall Street Journal [not in a particularly flattering way]- more fame than I care for...
Odds and ends:
- Was member of (eventually even president of) a Kiwanis club in my hometown.
- Ran for office (county legislature) once- was rather firmly trounced.
- Volunteer Firefighter (when I lived in rural New York- got certified, but left for Microsoft soon after)
- Semi-pro musician during most of the late 1970's and 1980's- bass guitar, later lead guitar- mostly R&B / light rock / jazzy stuff (even some country at one point)
- Longtime Dead Head (yes, the blog name came from somwhere...)- come to think of it, played many hours in a Dead tribute jam band, too...
- Anime fan- my collection of Yoko Kanno and Yuki Kajiura CDs nearly rivals my Grateful Dead set, and my DVD collection is (so far- the new Dr Who will probably break this) nothin' but.
- Avid gamer (I own ALL the Halo books, and you can find me on XBox Live many hours of the week)
- Sci-Fi fan (so who isn't?)
Yes, I am related to the [deceased for quite some time] author Jim (James Arthur) Kjelgaard- he was my great uncle [my grandfather was his brother Robert and I was named after my grandfather]. Read a lot of his books when I was young, and I also thoroughly enjoyed them.
Anything else ya wanted to know?
