Timothy Quilling
I was born in Winter Park, Florida, near the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. At a young age, before I could read, I started playing games from Microsoft Entertainment Pack like Pipe Dream, Chip's Challenge, and SkiFree. Games from The Learning Company like Reader Rabbit, ClueFinders, and Carmen Sandiego helped teach me to read and type.
Circa 2004 I read about a website called Neopets in a Disney Adventures magazine. Especially intrigued by their free Adobe Flash games, I faxed them my parents' approval, booted the dial-up modem on the family landline and made an account. Some of Neopets' puzzles even encouraged the player to start peeking into HTML.
Around that time I purchased a Game Boy Advance and started buying used games from GameStop's glass display where they kept cartridges. While Super Mario Bros 3 kept me entertained for a while I eventually fell in with strategy games like Mega Man Battle Network. During one of the many scavenger hunts the games send you on, I found myself on discussion forums like GameFaqs, where players shared tips and secrets.
By the time I was a teenager I had become rather comfortable on the internet. I spent quite a bit of time on MSN Messenger and Xfire (one of the first IM clients to have an in-game overlay, which was a big deal when you only had one monitor and all games played in fullscreen), playing games like Maple Story or Gunz: The Duel with friends. I was around when YouTube started up, I remember when people started migrating from MySpace to Facebook, I was born after Eternal September but I still have a Usenet subscription today.
I started attending Seminole State College in 2012, initially as a dual-enrollment high school student, and got involved in student life at the Lake Mary campus as much as I could. I played intramural soccer with a team of friends I met on campus. I joined the Environmental awareness club and helped setup a presentation table for the student club fair about recycling. I was a member of the Grindle Honor Institute which graciously afforded me the opportunity to work closely with some of the school's best faculty. I served as Secretary and Treasurer of the Student Government Association, which gave me a chance to hear from the student body every week, work closely with other student clubs on campus, as well as attend an overnight leadership retreat in Jacksonville. I really treasure all of the experiences I had at this school.
I enrolled in a Bachelor's program for Information Systems Technology and earned my degree in 2017. My program had a focus on familiarity with the currently popular programming languages, operating systems, and network devices. A smaller portion of my credits were reserved for business management classes. I also earned an Honors Science Diploma. I walked at University of Central Florida's arena for my commencement ceremony.
I spent some time working for Charter Communications (now Spectrum, formerly Bright House), which got me familiar with last mile telecommunications. At that time they were primarily focusing on their DOCSIS 3.1 products, which meant a lot of working with the associated modems and the consumer access points we provided along with them. I was also trained on traditional landline support. Spectrum introduced several modern web streaming services intended to supplant their cable television offerings, and I usually found myself in the front of new UX issues for the websites and mobile apps. You could often find me in my cubicle with the technology cart rolled out and loaded up with test iPhones, iPads, and Android tablets to work through a new update.
In 2019 I found a new home at CentralSquare Technologies who primarily make their business creating software solutions for municipal cities and counties. They've found use for me as a systems administrator for their cloud sites and as a subject matter expert for our public administration software. I spend much of my time concerning myself with the operations of our IBMi multi-tenant systems, writing internal tools for automation, debugging CL and RPG code, and modernizing our web interfaces. I've personally transitioned many clients from their 5250 terminal emulator green screens to our Javascript-based interfaces.
I spend a lot of my personal time exploring hobby projects, playing with pet technologies, and learning new things. I get joy out of creating little demos with Godot (as well as Unreal, Unity, and Bevy) and have a soft spot for the retro indie gaming community. I have a growing interest in electronic engineering and have been practicing my Rust in hopes of writing a few embedded electronics. When I'm outside I love to ride my bike and wander walkable cities.
I like scrambled eggs, coffee with four sugars and mocha creamer, medium-well steak, pizza with pineapple, white rice, pinto beans, strawberry shakes, bowls of cereal, baked chicken breasts, sweet BBQ sauce, spaghetti, chili, and greek yogurt.
I love to watch television and movies and I love to talk and connect with others about them. Star Trek has always had a dear spot in my heart since my father, who grew up watching TOS, introduced me to TNG. You can often catch me rewatching episodes of DS9 or Voyager. I enjoy a lot of comedy sitcoms as well as the occasional dramatic fiction.
I have strong convictions about modern progressivism. I would like to mitigate income inequality by driving higher union rates and stronger policies to close the gap in income. After seeing the 2008 financial crisis first-hand, I desire to see Wall Street regulation that would prevent another collapse. I desire health care reform with the ultimate goal of a single-payer healthcare system. I support a federally mandated minimum wage increase. I feel we are responsible for implementing strong environmental policies to combat climate change. I desire a criminal justice reform that would end the war on drugs and reduce the prison population.
I'm looking for new opportunities to apply myself and contribute to causes that enact positive change. I like to make contributions to open-source software and otherwise assist in building healthy online communities where I can. If after reading all that you're interested in keeping in touch with me or learning more, I'd recommend following me on one of my social medias.