Steve Sparks

I like to make stuff. All kinds of stuff. These days I do a lot of iPhone/iPad development, Mac, Ruby on Rails, the occasional Java, and some on other platforms; A little hardware; and a bunch of random, assorted other things. Very often I'm asked to make two or three of these things talk to each other.I built my first circuits at the age of five with the help of a fun toy called "Lectron Electric Dominoes." They are still made and I have a set. By age six I understood DC circuits. I laid down my first lines of code in 1982 on an Atari 400 in 6502 Assembly and BASIC. I began tying computers and hardware together in 1992, at Alfred State College, when we built a rudimentary automated bartender, automated train set, and a number of other projects using 8051-class microcontrollers. In 1995 I jumped with both feet into the nascent web, and signed on at Delta Air Lines. (It's a family business; my grandfather was Delta's oldest living pilot when he died in 2012, and my namesake uncle is a senior mechanic at Delta.) That was a delightful "startup in a blue chip" experience. After the site was completed, several of us left to build Accucast, an email marketing platform. The market advantage of the platform was its on-premise option and, crucially, the ability to manage complex relational data both for recipient selection and in the construction of the message. Accucast was acquired by Premiere Global in 2006 and I stayed with Premiere until 2009. I spent the following year at home with infant twins while my wife finished her Ph.D. During this period I dove into iOS development.After a stint at Emory University Hospital, I landed at Big Nerd Ranch. It's been an excellent place for me to obsess about iOS, become reacquainted with embedded, and get exposed to new technologies and techniques for web development. BNR has a wonderful work environment that is strongly supportive of all walks of life, and exemplifies the value of building a great culture.