Hey! My name is Kestrel Blackmore and I’m a keen software developer, sometimes musician, husband, father of three and Christian. I've recently given my online presence a real shot in the arm.

Back in 1997 whilst studying Computing at Victoria University I got my first full time job working for the universities I.T. department. Over the next four years I worked in different roles ranging from desktop support to system administration and network administration. I would have to admit it is among some of my most favourite memories because I was having a blast and doing it with great friends and colleagues.

I then decided it was time to go out into the real world and joined dot com startup iP3 working on developing a B2B and B2C eCommerce Supply Chain software. I have a lot of fond memories here in particular when the development team was sent to Christchurch, New Zealand, for three months so that we could work directly with Jade Corporation.

In 2004 I was approached by Information Process Technology to come on board and develop their online EDI Bureau Service. I didn’t know anything about Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) but my boss was an absolute EDI guru so, with his guidance, we developed several new online services that aided both our clients as well as our own internal systems. Some of my proudest moments at IPT were being involved in major projects with Country Road, Spotlight, Oroton Group and Pacific Networks.

In 2009 my career took a completely different direction as I took a position with Australian Food Training Centre as a workplace trainer specialising in the food industry. It was during this time that I started to delve into Ruby on Rails and was blown away by its simplicity and power. Whilst here I developed the Quality Indicators Pro system using Ruby on Rails. I designed and developed everything for that product including the sales website and help videos! It was an awesome experience.

Fast forward to 2011 and I started my own Web Design/Development business called Blackmore Websites. Having recently become a full Ruby on Rails devotee I developed a Job Booking system for a national franchisor and again was hugely grateful for the speed and ease with which RoR allows you to develop products. I wish I had known about it in the early years of my career! Don’t get me wrong, I still love .NET but it’s always good to branch out and experience other languages to get different perspectives.

At the start of 2012 I again rejoined the workforce as running my own business was not conducive to having a young, growing family. By this stage our third child had been born and I needed a regular income. I landed a developer position with Cavendish Superannuation as one of their developers and boy was it good to be working with other people again. It was here that I honed my .NET skills again and worked on moving some paper based application forms online learning the intricate and frustrating details of the ASP.NET Wizard control.

After close to six months with Cavendish the owners of the company sold it to AMP. The owners also had another company called Bendzulla Actuarial and I was asked to come across and head up their software development team. This was an exciting time as I, along with my team, put in the processes and procedures to adopt an agile methodology. Over the next 1.5 years we deployed a number of major releases that greatly improved the experience for clients and streamlined backend processes. At the end of 2013 the software development team was moved interstate and I decided part ways with the company then.

With the start of a new year, 2014, I joined SA Health in the Application Services team as a Development Team Leader. SA Health has close to 30,000 staff and is the organisation responsible for the delivery of all healthcare services within South Australia. With this comes a never ending list of custom software development requests which Application Services looks after. With systems ranging from mainframe computers, through web applications, mobile development and everything inbetween there's never a dull moment!

cheers,
Kestrel