Vladimir COTFAS Embedded Linux Sw Developer SegfaultsAreCool.info

647-478-7457 E-mail:

Professional Summary

• Contractor (W2) with Corning, Inc [Corning, NY], Affirmed Networks [Mass], Magic Leap [FL], VT iDirect [VA], Smith & Nephew [Mass]
• Contractor with Smart Energy Instruments [Oakville, ON], Certicom/RIM [Mississauga, ON], Mānta Test Systems [Mississauga, ON], IDT [Kanata, ON], ComQi [Burlington, ON], Kalray [Fr]
• Contractor (1099) with Motorola On Demand Systems, Home & Networks Mobility Division [Mass]
• Senior Embedded Software Developer at Chantry Networks/Siemens [Mississauga, ON]

Education

• Attended Microchip MASTERS in 2005 and 2007
• Took Montavista Course Device Drivers EMB530 in 2007
• Graduated from the Faculty of Mathematics, Department of Applied Mathematics (in English), Bucharest University, România, GPA: 9.54 (95.4%) (B.Sc. in Math/Statistics)

Programming Languages

• C, C++ [Stroustrup 2nd ed.] with some STL
• Perl, Javā
• Assêmbler: Intel x86 (TASM, GNU as) [since 1991], ARMv5/Xscale, PowerPC, m68k, Microchip 16F

Operating Systems: Linux [since 1993], FreeBSD, RTAI, FreeRTOS

Professional Experience and Achievements

Contract - Software Engineer // Smith & Nephew in Andover, MA	Oct 2020 - May 2022
Sr Staff Software Engineer IV // Smith & Nephew in Andover, MA	Jun 2022 2020 - Now

• Project: BSP for (unreleased) AI product (an FDA Class II device)
  • Xilinx RTL block design for Microbaze and peripherials: SPI, QSPI, UART.
  • Xilinx Microbaze code development. Ported u8glib to Microblaze.
  • Video over PCIe in/out using Xilinx XDMA IP. Wrote 2x Linux User Mode Drivers to control Xilinx VDMA IP over PCIe.
  • Video extraction from OpenGL apps via glReadPixels()
  • Video export to apps via V4L2 Loopback.
• Project: BSP support for INTELLIO 4K (an FDA Class II device):
  • Xilinx Microbaze code development and bug hunting re FPGA/RTL firmware.
  • Enabled crypto signing/verification of firmware upgrades.
  • Backported Samba 4.14.8 to a TI arm BSP from 2012 for SMBv3 compliance.
  • Added CUPS 1.7 to same TI BSP and support for Sony UP-DR80MD colour medical printer.
  • Automated Microblaze builds from CLI.
• Project: Bugfixed and enhanched INTELLIO 4K product (Class II), prepared documentation for FDA 510(k) submission.
• Project BSP support for Laird SOM60 (custom hw), included in INTELLIO product:
  • Extended Laird's weblcm-pyton RESTful system configurator.
  • Wrote a C library to drive weblcm-pythôn.
  • Enabled RNDIS via NetworkManager for Android Reverse Tethering.
  • Automated board flashing via C code driving weblcm-pytôn.
• Project: BSP support for LENS4K (an FDA Class II device):
  • Enabled RNDIS via udevd for Android Reverse Tethering.
  • Enabled crypto signing/verification of firmware upgrades.
  • Troubleshooted & fixed a malloc/free deadlock.
  • Memory usage profiling & Linux OOM Kⅈller tuning for a restricted memory environment.

Contract - Software Engineer // AES Security, Inc in Peabody, MA (USA)

Mar 2020 - Jun 2020

• Project BSP upgrade for at91sam9x5ek:
  • Upgraded at91bootstrap to 3.9.1, ONFI PMECC autodetect.
  • Upgraded u-Boot to 2019.04, integrated the local customisations, ONFI PMECC autodetect.
  • Upgraded kernel to 5.4.35, integrated custom CMX-867 SPI modem driver.
  • Automated board flashing via SAM-BA with TCL scripts.

Contract - Software Engineer // VT iDirect in Herndon, VA (USA)

Jan 2019 - Apr 2019

• Projects:
  • User mode/C++ I2C driver for Atmel ATECC508A
  • User mode/C++ driver for fpga GPIO pins
  • Kernel driver for fpga flash/EEPROM
  • Automated nightly provisioning/smoke te­sting of nightly builds via a custom Pythôn framework.

Contract - Software Engineer // Kalray (France)

Sep 2018 - Oct 2018

• Project: Perf optimisations for bare metal NVMEoF target controller.

Contract - Software Engineer // Mānta Test Systems (Canada)

Oct 2009 - Jul 2010; Jul 2011; Nov 2011; Feb-Apr 2012 Oct 2012 - Jun 2013; Aug 2016 - Oct 2016; Dec 2016 - Jan 2017 Jun 2018 - Aug 2018

• Projects:
  • Kernel work (4.9.80 with RTAI-5.1 & RTNet-0.9.13)
    • Ported RTNet [abandoned 8 years ago by its maintainer] to RTAI and Linux 4.9.80 + drivers for pcnet32 and e1000e-pch.
    • Verified BSP suitability for the two Manta TMG 5100 flavours.
  • Kernel work (2.6.29 with RTAI-3.7.2 & RTNet)
    • Linux BSP adaptation for 2 EBX boards (VersaLogic, Advantech).
    • Debugged own bug (using ACPI nmi_watchdog): «RTAI semaphore locked in Linux makes RTAI spin forever in rt_mutex_unlock/rt_sem_signal every 40 reboots».
    • Disabled SMI interrupt by hacking an ISA bridge PCI device.
    • Hacked Linux 16-bit code (arch/x86/boot) to do custom initialisation based on board type.
    • Linux BSP adaptation for PICO 880 & porting 2.6.32-RedHat Intel e1000e driver to 2.6.29 and RTNet.
    • Re-ported an FPGA device driver from RTAI to PREEMPT_RT;
    • Used floating point native FPU instructions in kernel;
    • Tracked down hard RT latency problems in the Linux scheduler [PREEMPT_RT] and minimal drivers using a logic analyser;
    • Fixed the problems in RTNET/rtnetproxy that made it run out of rtskbs;
    • Ported the Intel e100 driver from Linux 2.6.29 to RTNET;
  • App work
    • Hacked OpenJDK 1.6 to add custom classes to class cache (classes.jsa) and characterised it on a slow x86 embedded target.
    • Profiled Mānta's Javā application under OpenJDK 1.6 to see how execution speed differed from GCJ-compiled code.
    • Ported a FPGA configuration tool from Pascāl/Win32 to C++/Andrōid-NDK/arm.
    • Reworked Mānta's GOOSE (IEC61850) application and extended it for new use cases.
    • Fixed bugs in GCJ C++ runtime.
    • Added udev to Arcom Linux and wrote udev scripts for keyboard, mouse and USB storage;
    • Ported the Triangle GOOSE (IEC61850) library from vanilla Linux to RTNET and adapted it to the Mānta RT application;

Contract - SW Përformānce & Reliābility Engineer // Magic Leap

Jan 2018 - Jul 2018, Jun 2019 - Feb 2020

• Projects (2018) (USA) [100% on site]
  • Enhanced Andrōid bionic (libc) malloc_debug to filter mem leak backtraces of a certain size for perf reasons.
  • Triāging incoming bugs. Përformānce/memory usage investigations.
  • Designed/implemented a T-SQL db system for tracking KPIs with a Pythôn front-end.
• Projects (2019) (Canada) [20% on site]
  • Wrote te­st cases for LuminOS apps integrated in a customised Câtapult framework.
  • Developed automated tools to flush out kernel log (dmesg) and logcat log spammers.

Contract - Distro Maintainer for an Embedded Ubüntu // ComQi [fmr Enqii] (Canada)

Mar 2017 - Nov 2017

Contract - Software Engineer // Phybridge Inc (Canada)

Apr 2012 - Jun 2012; Nov 2016 - Jan 2017; Aug 2017

• Project: customisation of a Broadcom StrataXGS L2/L3 switch (reference design)
  • Designed an upgrade mechanism for the Control Plane Linux OS; wrote the required build scrips and on-target upgrade framework (upgrades applied via a WWW interface).
  • LLDP: customised lldpd to work with the Linux pseudo-interface mechanism and the BCM L2 table.
  • Spanning Tree: customised mstpd to work with the BCM Content Aware Engine (fp qual) -- wrote the appropriate fp filters to except STP packets to the CP and route them thru the appropriate Linux pseudo-interface (knet).
  • [Nov 2016] IGMP: Route IGMP to CPU but not mcast traffic using FP rules.
  • [Dec 2016] Enabled per-VLAN in-band management interfaces.
  • [Jan 2017] 802.1x authentication - adaptation of hostapd to BCM commands.
  • [Aug 2017] IGMP: Snooping -- send v2/v3 Membership Reports as required by upstream devices.

Contract - Software Engineer // IDT [fmr Tundra] (Canada)

Jul 2015 - Aug 2016

• Projects:
  • Tsi721 User-Mode PCIe Device Driver
    • Adapted/rewrote Tsi721 RapidIO kernel driver for DMA and MBOX to work in polled mode in user-mode Linux
    • Re-implemented some aspects of the Linux DMA engine framework for UM
  • UM Layer 3 Network Driver over RapidIO MBOX: Used Tsi721 UM MBOX and kernel Tun/Tap to interface with Linux TCP/IP (v4) stack
  • UM Layer 3 Network Driver over RapidIO RDMA: Combined Tsi721 UM MBOX + DMA driver and kernel Tun/Tap to interface with Linux TCP/IP (v4) stack [C++ source code: https://db.tt/2YpKzwuxWT]:
    • Zero copy of packets: use CMA/DMA memory for Tun read & write;
    • Peer to peer, autodiscovery protocol: used periodic RapidIO MBOX unicasts to advertise Inbound memory mapping+allocations to peer nodes -- akin LLDP;
    • Peer to peer, fault tolerant protocol: used periodic RapidIO MBOX unicasts to probe up/dead peer nodes;
    • Tun to RapidIO is using Tsi721's DMA engine;
    • Tsi721 has no signalling of inbound RapidIO DMA operations (but they are very fast);
    • RapidIO RX is done by hard polling known Inbound memory locations for changed data;
    • A helper thread collects L3 frames from Inbound memory and delivers them to Tun.
    One-way HTTP transfer (from ramfs): 1.53 GBytes/sec [MTU=17,000] (cf. RapidIO 1.6 GBytes/sec line rate).
    Standard flood ping(8) latency: 44 µS.

Contract - Software Engineer // Affirmed Networks in Acton, MA (USA)

Jan 2014 - Jul 2015

• Projects:
  • Subscriber Firewall
    • Wrote an RTSP firewall protocol helper (ALG) in C++
    • Wrote a SIP firewall protocol helper (ALG) in C++. This included a SIP parser/regenerator.
  • Ported mpd5/l2tp from FreeBSD (including kernel Netgraph modules for l2tp and ppp) to Linux user-mode. Integrated mpd into Affirmed TOS and extended it for High Availability/Redundancy.

Contract - Software Engineer // Smart Energy Instruments (Canada)

Jun 2012 - Sep 2012

• Project: Early board bringup/uClinux BSP of a custom SH-2 processor (in FPGA -- Spartan 3/6)
  • Wrote a "secure" bootloader with SHA-1 signature (ROM BL) and SHA-1 sig+RSA encryption (FAT BL).
  • Extended the bootloader for FAT-12 support (via FatFs), wrote a low-level FAT driver for a M25P32 SPI flash chip, 2x16 LCD driver, SH1101A OLED driver [te­st image https://db.tt/ySCI8Zv9E9], wrote a command processor, implemented autoboot, stateful environment.
  • Wrote Linux device drivers for: LCD (irq-based block transfers), GPIO keyboard, 1PPS, hw watchdog;
  • Tracked/debugged board stability issues;
• Project: PTPv2/IEEE 1588 Kernel driver+User-land Utilities
  • Extended the EMAC ethernet driver for IEEE 1588 (PTP) hardware-accelerated time stamping. Optimised EMAC for slow CPU: 4xRX ping-pong buffers [pseudo-DMA chain]; wrote in-driver packet dissectors for PTPv1/2 over 802.3, UDPv4 and UDPv6 for aiding the FPGA RTL;
  • Added HW acceleration to ptpd-2.2.2 (BSD license);
  • Wrote a GPS NMEA sentence parser for SkyTraq GPS chip;

Contract - Software Engineer // Certicom/RIM (Canada)

May 2011 - Feb 2012

• Projects:
  • Wrote an embedded SNMP agent with net-snmp using PostgreSQL as backend for tables/data points; wrote a MIB and C code generator.
  • Provisioned a CentOS crypto appliance:
    1. customisation of the install proces via an anaconda kickstart script;
    2. autōmation of certificate generation/signing/installation into a SSL hardware accelerator;
  • Studied the feasibily of transporting NTP via OpenVPN, OpenSSH/tun, a custom SSL/XML messaging+tun.

Contract - BPSS // Moneris Inc. (Canada)

Feb 2011 - May 2011

Projects:

• Wrote a webapp (Javā/Perl/MySQL on RHEL5) for time (SLA) tracking.
• Integrated MIR3 notifications (web services / SOAP) into process monitoring applications via a Perl/Wīn32 script.

Contract - Software Engineer // Corning, Inc (USA)

Dec 2008 - Dec 2010

• Projects:
  • System Architecture / Embedded Programming: User-space control application for Radio-over-Fiber
    • (The IDAS system was composed of a Linux PPC SBC which runs the control application and communicates with many RF boards via I2C.)
    • Designed (top-down) the Linux control application of the RF system (used UML);
    • Implemented the build system: wrote Makefiles from scratch for the code (with x86 and ppc builds)
    • Wrote the C++ application framework (classes for Threads, Queues);
    • Wrote a C++ Thread class/pthread wrapper that implements functionality similar to the Javā Thread class, in addition it keeps track of CPU ticks (user, system) used per-thread and provides code checkpointing facilities;
    • Wrote the C++ code for a TCP/IP inter-application messaging bus based on TLVs;
    • Wrote the C++ code for I2C access [custom L2/L7 proto which I co-designed];
    • Wrote the C++ code for application storage -- all done thru SQLite;
    • Implemented/redesigned the RF auto-calibration algorithm (which spanned multiple RF boards);
    • Wrote the C++ code for a UDP/IP logger with SQL backend;
    • Debugged/traced GCC oddities on ppc32: mutexes must be memset to 0, no mutexes as auto vars (or part of C++ auto objects) on stack;
    • Documented all code with Doxygen tags and hooked it up into the autōmated build;
    • Wrote the framework for C++ CGI scripts (login/logout, permissions and session tracking);
    • Integrated all software/hardware to the point where auto-calibration functioned correctly.
    • Wrote Shell scripts that autōmate certain operations by talking to CGI C++ scripts;
    • Wrote a Cisco-like CLI based on libcli that ties into the product for configuration purposes.
    • Integrated the Linux build with TFŠ/MSBuild via a nmake project, plink and some glue batch files (CMD and Linux).
  • Kernel work (2.6.24 & 2.6.30)
    • Device Driver: Changed the IBM Yosemite I2C driver to do varying-length I2C reads (using a custom L2 proto).
    • Board Bring-Up: Customised the 2.6.30 kernel for a Corning variant or PPC440EPx/Sequoia board: enabled NOR flash, hacked the dts supplied by the board vendor and the ST RTC driver to be compatible;

Contract - Software Engineer // Morotola/Broadbus in Boxboro, MA (USA)

Jan 2008 - Jul 2008

• Projects (User-space applications for Video on Demand Server):
  • I changed the algorithm for writing to the content storage memory ("triple-write" in paged memory);
  • I re-organised the Hardware Abstraction layer (HAL) for UPM1 [1st gen hardware]; I wrote the HAL for UPM2 [2nd gen hardware];
  • I changed the apps that access the content storage memory to use the new API and debugged various C++ application and kernel/driver crashes;
  • I ported the kernel code for a custom UDP socket from 2.4.21 to 2.6.21 (the patch allowed one to collect multiple incoming UDP frames in one system call);
  • I migrated C++/C0RBA applictions from Linux 2.4/GLIBC 2.2.5/C0RBA 1.4.1 to Linux 2.6/GLIBC 2.5/C0RBA 1.5a_p4 and fixed crashes and weird race conditions in the process.

F/t - Senior Embedded Software Engineer - Data Plane // ChantryNetworks, a Siemens Company (Canada)

Jun 2005 - Jan 2008

Projects:

• Embedded Programming
  • I implemented an in-kernel Code Profiler (Linux) for profiling the execution of Intel IXA framework Core Components;
  • I re-implemented the Redirector component for Teja/IXP1200 (a HTTP stream hijacker): I offloaded the TCP packet re-assembly to the Linux kernel via a TUN/TAP interface and a 'transparent proxy' firewall rule. I wrote a Perl/multithreaded high performance transparent HTTP proxy that implements the Captive Portal semantics; extended the Redirector to process HTTP/8080 requests in proxy mode and SSL/CONNECT mode;
  • Re-used the Redirector code for the IXP2800 platform by adding a Core Component [= a custom Linux kernel module] to the Intel IXA SDK. The component forwards raw packes to the Redirector by means of a UDP socket;
  • I implemented (using FUSE) a means of remoting the IXA SDK ARP table as a /proc/net/arp-like mechanism - this method juggles two Linux kernels yet it keeps most of the processing in user mode thus not burdening the kernels with lengthy run-to-completion processing;
  • Modified the IXA IXP2800 framework to run on Linux 2.6.10 with PREEMPT RT (C20);
  • Ported the C20 software to VMware and Xen by customising the vmxnet and 8139too drivers.
• Simulation techniques: ACTT, the Chantry Networks Access Point Simulator [also see the previous job]
  • I wrote WASSP PUMP as a Linux kernel module - it is an L3 tunnel driver for Chantry's AP tunneling protocol so voice stream simulations can be conducted in association with ACTT;
  • I embedded Perl/multithreaded in ACTT for easy scripting (also embedded Tcl). ACTT is Chantry's internal Access Controller te­st Tool (ACTT) - a WiFi Access Point simulator;
  • I wrote te­st scenarios (in ACTT's own language and Perl) that simulate crash/overloading situations as seen in the field. These scenarios are used by the Q­A Department for regression te­sting;
  • I embedded an XML-RPC server in ACTT making it an RPC endpoint for autōmation;
  • I wrote (in Perl) a Web GUI for ACTT for monitoring its progress - it talks to ACTT via XML-RPC;
  • I kept ACTT up to date with the changes in Chantry's hardware WiFi Access Point;
• Code Profiling, Low-Level Debugging, Troubleshooting Field Problems
  • C1xxx: I fixed crashes & severe bugs in the Teja/IXP1200 code: random memory corruptions, leaks of hardware packet descriptors, memory leaks, smashed mutexes, bogus divisions by zero - I wrote instrumentation code that addresses the bugs [GDB was not available on the platform, nor was Valgrind].
    Note: none of the code that I fixed was written by me - I was one level of escalation above Sustaining;
  • Wrote a wrapper library for POSIX mutexes in order to detect as early as possible a mutex corruption in a multithreaded environment;
  • Added instrumentation code to Teja/IXP1200 that helps to track the oldest bug in the company ("IXP Poll Lost");
  • Added instrumentation code to the IXA SDK/IXP2800 that tracks occurences of the IXP Poll Lost and wrote a checkpointing framework for Core Components;
  • I wrote tools that preserve debug info in enterprise builds for Teja/IXP1200 and IXA SDK/2800;
  • Wrote an autōmated crash analysis program that decoded raw stack dumps into C files/line numbers for Teja/IXP1200 [XScale] ("kaboom") (C1xxx);
  • Wrote an autōmated crash analysis program for IXA SDK/2800 [XScale] ("kaboom2k") (C2000);
  • C1xxx: Worked-around Linux Xscale FPU emulator bug (double-fault): moved SoftFloat from kernel mode to user mode and compiled Control Plane (Teja) code with -msoft-float; fixed endianess problem in libfloat;
  • Fixed a bug in ISC's dhcpd: was not responding properly on requests coming from tunnel devices;
• Misc Programming
  • Wrote a GÏS (2D) format converter from Ekahau to AirTight Planner; wrote a Javā/SWT Drag&Drop GUI for the converter and shipped it compiled as .EXE with gcj/Wīn32;
  • Wrote an adapter/sniffer for the SIAPP multicast protocol used for inter-AP communication for the SoloAP product;
• Leadership
  • Mentored junior engineers on safe programming practices;
  • Supervised junior/intermediate engineers on various projects (Ethereal dissector, OmniPeek decoder, ClearCase trigger);
  • I lead the effort of adding instrumentation code to the IXP2800 prior to the release (using GCC's -finstrument-functions);
• Harddisk Forensics
  • I lead a hard-drive forensics project and implemented measures against data loss;
  • Tracked Harddisk and Flash Disk (ATA) defects in the field and did root cause analysis for bad sectors; wrote autōmated Linux tools that diagnose HDD problems using S.M.A.R.T and brute-force reads;
  • Tracked Linux Ext3 file system bugs (e.g. vanished journal on a sane media);
  • Wrote a subsystem for Database Rotation & Autōmated Backup;
• Configurantion Management/Builds
  • Moved legacy C1xxx build machine into VMware by taking a snapshot of the physical Linux machine;
  • Set up build machines as VMware VMs for new platforms (C2000, C20, NGAP);
  • Designed a ClearCase trigger that intergrates with the BugZero bug tracking system for detailed tracking of check-ins per PR;
  • Autōmated builds under Klocwork for autōmated defect detection; integrated with ClearCase for tracking who introduced the defects;
  • Improved ClearCase server performance by investigating hardware subsystems and network problems;
  • Transitioned build process/scripts to BuildForge;

Contract - Software Developer - Sustaining // ChantryNetworks, a Siemens Company (Canada)

Nov 2004 - Jun 2005

Projects:

• I extended ACTT to implement the draft-CAPWAP (CTP) open tunneling protocol for WiFi access points;
• I extended ACTT to fully simulate a WiFi Access Point [any number of them simultaneously thru virtualisation] by modelling each simulated mobile user (MU) into a Linux pseudo-Ethernet (TAP) interface thus making possible te­sting the AC with real-world applications (e.g ftp, Mozilla) → this was a cost and time saving for the company as purchasing 200 hardware APs and deploying them on a sigle floor of a building was unfeasible;
• I wrote an SNMP agent (embedded in ACTT) that performs tasks on behalf of each of the virtual APs simulated by ACTT: obtaining configuration info, statistics, alarms, etc;
• I wrote a Perl script to autōmate the authentication of MUs based on a web page (Captive Portal) thus allowing to simulate tens of simultaneous MUs trying to authenticate at the same time [script stacked on top of a TAP interface and ACTT] [also ported on Wīn32] → this was a huge improvement as previously they were able to do only up to four at the same time using laptops and manpower;
• I wrote a Perl script that autōmates the dis-association of MUs [also ported on Wīn32] → this proved to be a time saver for the Q­A guys as previously they had do this by hand;
• I extended the scripting language embedded in ACTT to acomodate the new functionality I added to ACTT;
• I repaired a host of complex/subtle bugs in ACTT and fixed all memory leaks;
• I wrote (in Perl) tools that autōmate the work of the te­sters/Q­A by driving the GUI of the Access Controller; the tools were ported to Wīn32 → this was a great help and time-saver for repetitive tasks that had to be done by hand and saved them money by not having Chantry spend increments of $6,000 a pop for a dedicated tool;
• I created a migration scenario for Chantry's flagship product from Linux distribution A (old, unsupported) to Linux distribution B (current, vendor-supported) (A differs from B) [actual names withheld due to confidentiality issues].

SpamWall My own proprietary project A sophisticated system for squashing spam and virus-bearing e-mail. This is a 3-tier distributed system integrating components written in C, Perl, Javā (servlets) and PĤP; it uses PostgreSQL SQL and ODBC/PostgreSQL as backends for data storage. It is available for Linux and MS-Wīndows. It has a demo Client with a GUI written in Javā+SWT.

Aug 2001 - present

Contract - Embedded Software Engineer // eBox Inc. of Cambridge, ON Embedded Linux and Javā Programming

Jan 2003 - Feb 2004

Projects:

• I put together a Javā Machine: I took a single-board computer (Gene-4310) and I created a Linux flash image (size = 29M) that had everything necessary for the Sun Javā Virtual Machine 1.4: kernel, X11, shared libraries and the JRE files;
• I wrote an error-tolerant, self-healing boot loader for the Javā Machine;
• I wrote a map viewer that displayed a map stored in the ESRÏ Shapefile format (based on material provided by the GeoTools project);
• I created maps and sub-maps of the GTA using PostGÏS+PostgreSQL, I wrote Pl/PgSQL stored procedures for handling of GÏS data;
• I wrote a GPS-driven realtime GÏS map viewer (Javā)

Contract - Anti-Spam Engineer // University of Toronto (CHASS Department) Unsolicited (Commercial) E-mail prevention & control

Jan 2003 - Apr 2003

Tasks:

• I re-organised their mail delivery architecture;
• I extracted useful information from the pre-existing spam collection and I organised it in databases (e.g. IP addresses, domain names, etc);
• I wrote a Sendmail 8.12 plug-in (for the Milter extension) that handled the incoming stream of e-mail at connection level making real-time decisions (reject/accept) based on the knowledge stored in the above databases;
• The plugin was controlled by preferences stored in a SQL database;

Contract - Embedded Software Engineer // Admiral Secure Products (Mississauga, ON) NNOS device-driver programming

May 2002 (1 month)

Projects - NNOS (8x8 Inc's real-time embedded OS) Kernel Programming:

• I re-wrote the subsystem that handles the GPIO-generated IRQ's.
• I wrote an IRQ-driven serial device driver (UART).
• I wrote a modem device driver for Multi-Tech Systems' MT5634SMI (memory-mapped).

Contract - Software Developer // Belcarra Messaging Corp. (Vancouver, BC) [100% remote work] Maintenance of BMC's Cyrus mail package

Jun-July 2001 (1.5 months)

Project - I created a suite of tools for mailbox index repair and regeneration for the Cyrus-IMAP server. I provided full technical support for the above tools for Belcarra's clients on Linux/i386 and Solaris/sun4u.

Embedded Software Engineer // Lineo Canada Inc (fmr. Fireplug Computers) Embedded OS device-driver programming

Jan 2001 - May 2001

Projects - Linux Kernel Programming:

• Wrote an HDLC device-driver for the Motorola 68360 (QICC) 32-bit microcontroller.
• Participated in a 68360-based board bringup (designed early memory te­sts).
• te­sted & supported two ARM-based handhelds the company's own version of Linux.

• Project - Linux Kernel Programming: Refined the port to vtech-mipsel-linux and improved the frame-buffer code.
• Projects - User-land Programming:
  • Contributed to the Microwindows Open Source Project by integrating it with the Helio architecture; Did various bugfixes, created two utilities.
  • Implemented a cross-platform (Linux and Wīn32) flashing tool (application) with a FLTK GUI (dt-FLTK) for VTech's PDA (English and German versions) application. This has increased the exposure of the company's product to people running Wīndows and Linux.
  • Set up an internal Samba Server (PDC). This has improved the work environment of the team of te­sters in my department by providing them with a reliable storage solution at no cost.

• Implemented and maintained an integrated (Samba) Linux/Wīn95 solution: network printing, file sharing, security.
• Created a firewall (Linux) with NAT, VPN (pptp).
• Implemented a PPP server (with traffic accounting).
• Maintained Internet servers: BIND8 - in a "sandbox", DHCP, Apache.
• Implemented a UNIX/DOS connectivity solution (DOS telnet client for UNIX) thus reusing old equipment and saving money by providing new access points to the UNIX server at no extra cost.

• Projects - FreeBSD kernel programming:
  • Researched the market for competing products and participated in the design of the firm's router solution
  • Re-wrote a ROM-able bootloader (for FreeBSD) compliant with the PXE specification
  • Did bug hunting, bugfixes and custom improvements of the FreeBSD kernel
• Implemented (under FreeBSD) a firewall with Network Address Translation for the internal use of the company
• Mentored Junior programmers

• Project - Linux Kernel Programming: modified the 2.2.x kernel to allow every system daemon (service) to run only with user privileges (e.g. sendmail, BIND (named), lpd). Modified sendmail to comply with this.
• Projects - User-land Programming:
  • Developed an application (Linux version 2.0.xx + ipfwadm + Perl) for accounting on leased-lines.
  • Co-developped a UNIX/microcontroller solution - a software that talked to a microcontroller in order to perform specific tasks
  • Created Intelligent WEB pages using Apache/SSI: an HTML request was displayed in surfer's language (guess based on the browser's language and the reverse resolution of surfer's IP address)
  • Created a complete Internet/dialup package for DOS (PPP, e-mail reading/writing, WWW browsing). This increased the number of clients with people low on budget or owners of old 286 computers.

Languages: English: fluently spoken and written, French: average, Romanıan: native speaker.