IRV KALB
Mountain View, CA 94041
(650) 964-6631
E-Mail: Irv at furrypants.com
INDEPENDENT CONTRACTOR (Since 1992) Design and development of interactive multimedia in Lingo for Director/Shockwave on Mac and Windows (and now Flash/ActionScript). I have done a great deal of work on kid’s software and education/training titles. I am a strong believer in object oriented programming and use it everywhere in my work.
EDUCATIONAL, TRAINING, and CORPORATE TITLES:
Pure Ditigal Technologies, CA. Manager of the group that developed the viewer application for the Pure Digital "Flip" Video camcorder. I managed other developers, wrote key pieces of the software, and negiotiated technical API's with video sharing sites.
Animated Speech Corporation, CA. Architect, Lead programmer, and manager of software development. Developed and shipped "Timo Vocabulary", "Timo Stories", and the "Lesson Creator". These are a series of products that use a 3D animated speaker to teach vocabulary to kids with hearing, learning, or speaking impediments.
Visual Book Productions, FL "iLumina" interactive version of the Bible. I was responsible for the underlying architecture of the project. I also built much of the core Bible functionality, while managing other programmers. The project was designed to allow additional modules (books) to be added to, and interact with, the base set of modules.
Thinking Strings, NJ "Interactive Explorations (tm) ". I was the sole programmer on a project to build a framework for college level courses based on internet connected CD-ROM's. The first product is a full semester course on Archaeology, but the underlying framework can be used to teach any subject. The product includes full student tracking and reporting of status to a professor. It also includes a "Grade Book" on the professor's side that allows the professor to see the performance of all students in all classes.
MassMutual, MA "MassMutual Transitions". A CD-ROM used by insurance agents to enter data about clients who want to buy annuities. The program verifies the correctness of the data and guides the agent through the process of filling out forms correctly. This results in a much lower error rate and much quicker turn-around for the MassMutual annuity product. (Developed in conjunction with AldenImage and H20 Associates)
Computer Curriculum Corporation, CA "Getting Started with SuccessMaker". A training CD-ROM which instructed teachers on how to effectively use CCC’s flagship product. (CCC is now part of Pearson Education)
Harvard University "Managing for Creativity". A full management training course on CD-ROM which teaches managers how to instill creativity in their employees. The system tracked what the user had seen so that the user could quit at any time and come back in exactly where they had left off. (Developed in conjunction with LightSpeed Interactive)
Athena Interactive "The New Leader". CD-ROM training course for training managers. The title uses a great deal of QuickTime video to show luminaries in the field of management discussing their techniques. (Developed in conjunction with LightSpeed Interactive).
Novellus, CA. Designed and implemented an "automated showcase" which allows their sales people to give a customized presentation of their products. It allows their sales people to incorporate Director-based, and PowerPoint based presentations. (Developed in conjunction with LightSpeed Interactive)
Williams and Wilkens Baltimore MD. Major overhaul of "de’Medici System’s" Hospital Safety Training System. Re-wrote code to take advantage of Lingo’s object oriented constructs. This has made the system much easier to customize for specific hospitals. Developed many new modules to add to the system.
Zelos Ventures San Francisco, CA. Re-implementation of "Escape From Management Hell" CD-ROM. Re-wrote a large portion of the underlying code, fixed existing bugs, and added a great deal of new functionality.
Scitor Sunnyvale, CA. Development of a new-employee electronic handbook.
KID’S SOFTWARE:
"Darby, The Dalmatian" and "Darby’s Dream Adventure", interactive children’s CD-ROM’s developed and shipped entirely by my wife and me. These are original works written and illustrated by my wife. I designed the overall user interface and programmed the titles in Director and Lingo (each title contains 15 games). I constructed all of the animations and performed all of the sound editing. Both are available with demo Shockwave games by clicking here.
Rolling Orange, CA. I implemented a set of four musical games for kids that are now playing as kiosks at the Seattle Symphony Orchestra in Seattle WA.
The Learning Company, CA. Development of several games for the "Arthur's Reading" CD-ROM, and the underlying state saving mechanism. Also built a demo version of this title to be placed on other CD-ROM's. Created a Shockwave game based on the Clue Finders character's.
Broderbund Software, CA. Contributed heavily to an underlying framework and implemented many of the major activities for a very complicated consumer title, "Carmen San Diego Math Detective". I created an engine and built a set of "Dr. Seuss Workbook" CD-ROM's, and worked on a reading title called "Arthur's Reading". Worked on a number of different Shockwave games for the "Carmen SanDiego" web site (in the "Training Room"). I also built a Shockwave demo of the Broderbund title "Think Quick Challenge". (Broderbund/The Learning Company is now owned by RiverDeep Inc.).
Monterey Bay Aquarium, CA. A simple Shockwave game of selecting tide pool animals.
JuniorNet, MA. Development of two Shockwave games for JuniorNet which include content from the Reading Rainbow TV show.
IMSI, CA. Development of "I Can Do Magic" CD-ROM title which shows how to perform 25 magic tricks. It also includes a section on magicians, and magic history.
KidSoft, CA. Developed a number of different games for a CD-ROM title for a joint venture with America On Line. Rewrote much of the underlying code for the KidSoft quarterly magazine to greatly improve performance.
T/Maker, CA. Implemented ten interactive children’s games for "Professor Iris’ Animal Safari" CD-ROM. Provided overall technical guidance to their programmers and assisted with the conversion to Windows. Also developed parents’ guides for "Four Footed Friends" and "Stratiwackius" CD-ROM’s.
Big Top Productions, CA. Restructuring of code on the "Hello Kitty Deluxe" CD-ROM product to make it much more efficient. Major modifications to the existing code base to increase performance, fix bugs, and add new functionality.
OTHER PROJECTS:
WebTV/MicroSoft, Mountain View, CA. Development of user interface prototypes of new applications for WebTV.
Tech Museum, CA. Enhancements to the "Digital Studio" exhibit - a very large exhibit which allows users to record their own audio, video, photographs, and animations.
Macromedia, CA. Developed the "Animation Wizard" as a functional demonstration of Director 5.0 features. It shipped on the Director 5 & 6 CD’s.
Acuris, CA. Developed a visual data base which allows users to browse through Acuris’ library of 3D "ClipModels", then download whatever models the user wishes, in a number of different of formats.
LSI Logic, CA. Developed a touch-screen based interactive kiosk which allows users to view all parts of the computer chip manufacturing process. The underlying code drives a Pioneer video disc player.
Internet Shopping Network (Home Shopping Network), CA. Design and development of the user side of a computer-based home shopping program. Also developed the user side of one of the first live auctions taking place over the Internet.
PUBLICATIONS:
Currently writing an online book on Object Oriented Programming in Lingo (tentatively titled "LOOPE" - Lingo Object Oriented Programming Environment). The first chapters can be found here.
Articles published on the "Director On-Line User's Group"
Former contributing Editor to the Lingo User's Journal. I have written articles on the following topics; Object managers, Replacement for the ActorList in Lingo, Generic Navigation Object, Custom Scroller object, Implementing Arrays in Lingo, Radio Buttons as Objects, Implementing a Progress Bar, Generic Press Button Routine, Implementing Sliders.
PREVIOUS POSITIONS:
Acuson, Mountain View, CA Manager, User Interface/Application Development
Apple Computer, Cupertino, CA Manager, Software Development
Convergent Technologies, San Jose, CA Mgr, Software Development, Sr Software Developer
Computer Sciences Corp., Los Angeles, CA Software Developer
EDUCATION:
MS Computer Science, West Coast University, CA
BS Computer Science, Rutgers University, NJ
Author, and Self-publisher of Ultimate: Fundamentals of the Sport (an instructional book for teaching the sport of Ultimate Frisbee)