Philip Wheat started out in development back when you learned from Compute Magazine (by typing in the code) and had to know something about soldering to expand your memory with most computers. When he entered college he had his eyes set on Aerospace Engineering, but between the call of the code, and the job market at the time, he quickly realized that there was pay in knowing about his passion, and he completed his studies in Computer Science. After his graduation, he worked in the field for a number of years, and seeing the state of the industry decided to go back into the Master’s Program in Computer Science – which was one of his better ideas as it brought him to the attention of Texas Instruments, which called him to their Dallas campuses and enabled him to work with the early stages some of the groundbreaking technologies that are in use today, such as ASIC design, DLP manufacturing, DSP development, and floor and wafer fabrication systems (plus some other things he still can’t talk about). But as incredible as the opportunities there were, the Internet Gold rush was on and he submitted to several former co-workers entreaties (well, maybe just tempting offers) and headed to Austin, TX to work with a (then) small consulting firm on the cutting edge of development and solutions delivery. He spent several years at Catapult Systems as their most demanded consultant, being called in to Microsoft to do briefings on Collaborations, Portals, and other Web information management technologies (in addition to his project delivery role) before moving to a regional role with Avanade, Inc. There he led regional Collaboration Solutions efforts and was a primary resource globally for SharePoint technologies. During this time he ran dual projects in the Office 2007 TAP program that led to successful deployments of custom solutions based upon SharePoint 2007 even before official release of that platform. He currently works with the Microsoft Developer and Platform Evangelism group as the Community Architect Evangelist for Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana, engaging with Architects on the needs and requirements of their role and helping developers to be more involved in the Architecture space. Some of his personal projects include Embedded Systems, Knowledge Management, Augmented Reality, Robotics, and Autonomous Systems. You’ll find him supporting groups of both geek social, and developer focus, and connecting with as many interesting people as he can. If you see him around, come up and introduce yourself, and let him know what you’re doing. He’s always interested in hearing what people are doing, and learning from the innovative people he knows, passionate developers, designers, and architects! If you want to keep up with where he is and what he’s doing, you can find out some of his current activities at his blog (Phil is also an admirer of Jonathan Pryce and sometimes shows homage by referring to himself in the 3rd person when he talks about himself.) (See the director’s cut of “Curse of the Fatal Death” if the reference isn’t known to you.)

Homepage: http://PhilipWheat.com