Cover Letters
Stormpulse
I have been doing GIS analyst work for the City of Denton in north Texas for the past 3 years, but my passion is software development. This summer I've been working on a Python program (https://github.com/dogtato/dbfutil) that I originally created to replace a two-day process I had to do every month. I made a script that could do it in a few hours and only required about 10 minutes of set up before clicking Run. The current program does the entire task in under 20 minutes.
I started working on the project seriously because I needed to refresh my skills and because I need to provide some evidence to employers that I haven't just been sitting around forgetting how to program. In creating a program mostly from scratch, I've had to constantly learn new things, and being the sole developer, it doesn't matter how daunting or baffling they are because there's no one else to do it. One of my favorite parts was transitioning from a Tkinter GUI to pygtk, which let me create a much more attractive, powerful, and usable interface.
I also enjoy creating documentation, because I enjoy having documentation. Frustrated with the bare-bones documentation ESRI has built in to its software, I made a MediaWiki install on my website (http://dogtato.net/giswiki) and started using that to document different data and projects. I've always made it a point to document code well, whether it's a personal project, a homework assignment, or something meant for broader consumption.
My non-professional passion is Capoeira, the Brazilian art that's a blend of martial arts, dance, and gymnastics. I can't claim to be a master, or even an expert, but I teach anyone I can find who's willing to learn. Mastery is a really long road that I can't make much progress down because I seem to be the only devoted Capoerista in the Denton area, but the Austin area has many.
The word "Senior" in the job title makes me worry I don't have the quantity of experience you're looking for, but everything about the position (a love of developing, Python, GIS, Linux, smaller company, Austin) matches my skills and interests.
