Welcome to my E-portfolio!

Background information

The name of the company is Pipeline Software Development. It has just been established by three friends who have recently graduated from university together. All three of them are software engineers and are dedicated to writing software that is able to be edited and upgraded easily and effectively.

However, at the moment they are very busy approaching organisations and other contacts with their ideas for development projects. This means that they are unable to design and build their development workstations themselves so they have designated this to be out-sourced and have chosen me to do this for them. All of them are incredibly knowledgeable and each of them are specialised in different aspects of software development. 

Ryan Townsend is a Java developer so he requires a reasonably powerful system. He is also  a keen writer and has a blog on the Internet that is updated weekly. He will be writing the documentation for all the company’s products. He prefers to use Linux when working with Java but prefers using Windows® for word-processing and updating his blog. He would appreciate a dual-boot system if possible, provided the budget isn’t too constraining.

Joshua Nightingale is a Linux/UNIX systems developer. He is currently working on the further development of the latest RedHat open-source operating system release: Fedora Core 4. He is developing for the x86_64 architecture so requires a 64-bit processor. He also needs an Internet connection to enable him to collaborate with other developers currently working with him.

John Kern is a C/C++ developer so he requires a relatively fast system. He needs a Linux system so he can use KDE and GCC to compile his coding. He would also like a version of Windows® installed because he is slightly interested in improving his Windows®/.NET development skills. However he will do without this, if the budget won’t stretch that far since working with Linux is his top choice.

The company has one office in south-west London that it has just started renting, and still has not purchased any furniture, so I have been asked to buy that also. I need to bear in mind that as they will be spending at least 32 hours a week on their workstations, good ergonomics is a must. The office is quite small (5m x 4m) but it is air conditioned and already has a BT phone line installed.

Since the company will be working on the software of the future, security is a big issue. For this reason I have been asked to come up with some security suggestions. A secure internet connection is vital in order to stop hackers from stealing their work. Additionally the company has also asked me to recommend them an easy and fast method for backing up their hard disk drives.

They have given me a budget of £7,500. This money is part of a grant given to them by the Prince’s Trust so it needs to be spent wisely.