mail@SoftDesign.co.uk

to talk, comment, discuss or chat, no strings

John Cato

"John seems to do his most valuable work without opening his mouth or lifting a finger: he walks into a project where everyone's stressed to the teeth and within half an hour, somehow, everything becomes calm and happy, the mists seem to clear and the job is somehow do-able after all.

The cunning trick is: he asks people how they are, and then listens. In general, it usually turns out that people know what the problem is already; all they need is some space in which to talk it through and think it through.

John knows a quite terrifying amount about computers and about how organisations work. No human being should have to know the things he knows, and I think he enjoys saving people from the hellish side of computers and organisations because he's been there so often himself.

John's name crops up a lot in "object-oriented programming" circles in Britain and the US, and in HCI (Human-Computer Interaction). He has developed some elegant techniques for defining goals and testing software with users, which can be enormous fun, are hugely effective, and, as far as we know, are completely original.

John is also Bhuddist; he has studied Aikido; an excellent cook; he gives a surprising amount of his private time to the AIDS charity, the Aled Richards Trust.

John is one of the 5 people I'm gladdest to have worked with. (The others are Chris McEvoy, the late Errol le Cain - the illustrator of children's books, and two remarkable art-directors: Lindsey Redding and Peter Robinson.)"

Chris McEvoy

"Chris is the most outstanding designer and programmer that I have ever known in over 24 years of being in the business. His natural insight, integrity, skill and effectiveness is bar none. He wont let you get away with making a bad decision, and he wont let himself get away with it either. He makes the complex simple, and that is the hardest thing to do.

In a work setting, his ability to create highly fault free designs and systems is one of his most notable qualities. His trustworthiness and supportiveness of all is most reassuring and this along with his other skills delivers excellent results from all who work with him.

He has been a friend and colleague since 1985, something I value highly, and his contribution to any team is superlative."

"Chris is a "human iceberg". The bit you see is only a fraction of what's actually there, which explains the often-surprising solidity of his ideas and work: what looks merely nice always turns out to have profound and well-thought-through implications.

I'll describe Chris's "visible fraction" first. Everybody's first impression of Chris is that he's a rather taciturn, determined programmer in jeans and a leather jacket, who sits at his machine from six in the morning writing magical code that runs first time.

You then discover that he's immensely well-informed on all manner of subjects, with a rare ability to see the world through different people's eyes, and make sense of all these different points of view. This is the first reason why his code is so good: he asks "who is this for, what might they want to do with it?" before he does anything. A second reason is: he has better short-term memory than most people. Most of us can only hold onto about 7 ideas at once. With Chris, the number is more like 9 or 10. The difference may not sound like much but has huge practical advantages in anticipating problems and spotting opportunities early in the game. He has an unusual ability to take in all the factors of a situation and play around with them in his mind, spotting the "no-go" areas, and the "fault-lines" where, if you hit it just so, the problem will split neatly into nice, clean, manageable chunks.

Chris is a socialist; he has done voluntary community work; I can't speak about his cooking."

Bob Hughes

"Bob is absolutely remarkable in so many areas of design and design awareness, with a passion for the beautiful and an incredible ability to make complex things simple through animations and explanation. His integrity to quality and style is something to behold. He has a real passion for excellence, making such a positive difference to the work he does and to those around him.

He has a fascination and knack for meeting such a wide range of remarkable people and for finding them a joy to know, as they do him.

His desire for the very best for his customer is tenacious, highly laudable and without comparison. His knowledge of the design domain is extremely broad from advertising and copy writing through to multimedia and time based media design."