Long ago, before many of you were born – back when 1.44 MB on a floppy disc and beating your office mates to the shared terminal were the things that the occupants of the Computer Centre dreamed of – a bright young engineer named Paul Hatton joined IT Services from Cambridge University, via Rolls Royce Aerospace and the School of Chemical Engineering.
From the start, Paul’s task was to support academics in their research; a mission he has pursued for the last 28 years, with some inspiration – and much perspiration. He probably wouldn’t claim to have loved every minute of it. How does one enjoy resurrecting a vital – but ancient – piece of code (grad-ware), written by some long-gone PhD student, without notes – and make it run on an HPC system? It’s a tall order, even with the added incentive of a pint in the Bratby.
How times – and technologies – have changed. It is a clear mark of the success of BEAR and Advanced Research Computing that Paul is really sad to leave. Despite the temptations of staying and seeing his vision of a lightning fast, tightly-integrated, fully featured set of tools for research coming to fruition, working is no longer compatible with his love of trains – steam and diesel. It is also seriously impeding Paul’s ambition to complete his round the world rail journey, or traverse the States on a Harley – or sample every craft beer in the world.
Paul’s last day in the office was Thursday 24 May. The Advanced Research Computing team are sorry to see Paul go; we hope you will all join the team in wishing him well and thanking him for his dedication to research computing at the University.
To quote Paul, ‘Nelly is packing his trunk and saying goodbye to this particular circus’.
