hughesd - what is it?

It's a website. A personal website. I'm a web programmer, so it's sort of expected for me to have a website, even if it isn't a fantastic one.

I started the hughesd website about 2 years ago, following on from the fun I had with the DrakeNet web site. I set it up with Fasthosts, through the UKReg affiliate. I have oodles of web space, ODBC, ASP and PHP facilities and loads of email functions. It is these functions that have let me branch out into the world of CMS with this site at last, after being restricted to HTML with DrakeNet.

So what's it all about? Well, first and foremost it is a place where I can share stuff with you, the general public... It allowed me to set up forums and download areas where I could put files I wanted to share. It lets me set up blogs so I can air my views on things, but I haven't started doing that yet...

You might be wondering why I called it hughesd? Well, in my previous job the login for my computer on the network was created by taking the first 6 letters of my surname and sticking my first initial on the end. Seeing as my surname is 6 letters long, that resulted in my login being hughesd! Not very interesting... A mate of mine ended up with his login being blackfm, and he created a website with the same format (www.blackfm.co.uk) and everyone thought he was a radio station... The site is still there - in a fashion...

So who is Dave Hughes then?

Well, here's a brief biography.

I was born in December 1973 in the town of Kirkcaldy, Fife, son of a midwife and a mechanic. I went to school, had some fun, passed some exams and got a job or three. Eventually, in 1993, I decided to go to University and moved to Stapleford, near Nottingham, to attend the Nottingham Trent University.

I studied Computer Studies at NHD and failed the final exam (gaining an HNC instead), although there were some things that happened during the last year that kind of demoralised everyone... I then decided to try again, attempting a BSc in Working with Technology - a course that tried to teach sociology, psychology and technology in the same course. Unfortunately my year was the inaugural year of the course, and there were many upsets and changes to the course during the first year alone, but the messing about with what did and did not cinstitute a placement ended the course for me. I decided then to pursue a full-time career in computers with the company I was working for as a weekend staff member...

Thus began 8 years of working for Dixons Stores Group in the PC Service division of Mastercare (later christened PC ServiceCall). I started as a customer service adviser, later becoming a technical support analyst for Freeserve before becoming a business support consultant for Dixons and NEC Computers UK - all whilst still being employed by PC ServiceCall. I then became a Systems Development Analyst for PCSC's in-house programming and development team, creating and maintaining software vital to the running of the business. I helped with the creation of call logging software and customer email software primarily, and my last project was a staff database and time management system.

From there I moved to my current job at time of writing, Web Development Manager for the Derwent Shared Services department of the NHS, where I am responsible for a small team who are dedicated to the maintenance of web and intranet sites across Derbyshire.

I am currently engaged to the lovely Anne (who I actually met at high school) and do my best to take care of her and the three children. Anne and the kids have their own site here on hughesd. I first met Anne in third year at Kirkcaldy High School, and briefly dated her until a rather nasty split after only a few months. We lost touch completely for 15 years until she emailed me out of the blue in May 2003 and we started talking again.

Some unfortunate circumstances led to her needing to leave Kirkcaldy, and she decided to move to Nottingham with her three children. We spent a lot of time together, and eventually decided to try a relationship again, which is going absolutely swimmingly, thank you very much!

My hobbies include building and painting models kits (from scale aircraft to Games Workshop's Warhammer 40,000 range), programming, writing and badminton.

Our household consists of (not counting humans) two cats, one budgie and ten neon tetra fish.

I often take some of those online tests for various things - here are the results of a few of them:


How evil are you?

I am 72% evil.

Wow! I'm almost pure evil! Sin is my way of life. If there is a hell I have packed my bags for the trip.

Are you evil? find out at Hilowitz.com


Results of my Personality Defect Test