Defence: Applications & Secure Systems

Four contract engagements, delivering software into secure, regulated environments. The technology stacks differed — embedded C++ at one end, a modern Windows desktop application at the other, and web technology in between — but the shape of the job held across all four. These are systems where the environment is constrained, the requirements are specified in detail and then move anyway, and the interface is the part somebody has to live with once the engineering is finished.

What came before was the same industry from the other side of the payroll: eight years building an in-house modelling and simulation capability as a full-time employee, rather than delivering applications to clients under contract. That work has a page of its own.

Embedded Human-Computer Interaction

2016 — 2019

The first engagement was electronic architecture software for a crewed land platform, with human-computer interaction as the specific focus — the parts of the system an operator sees and works, rather than the parts underneath them. Embedded work sets its own terms. The hardware is fixed and the processing and memory budgets are fixed with it, a display bolted into a vehicle is very different to a display on a desk.

Work included:

• Delivery of HCI-focused electronic architecture software for a crewed land platform.
• Development across more than one variant of the platform, including one built for training.
• Interface design and implementation within embedded, resource-constrained environments.
• Balancing operator usability against fixed platform limitations, where the platform does not move.

Technologies and tools used included:

• C and C++ (Green Hills)
• Microsoft Productivity Tools
• In-house Tooling and Libraries
• Subversion Source Control

Cryptographic Key Management

2020 — 2021

Next was a Windows client for a cryptographic key management and distribution system, joining the client's in-house software team as a front-end specialist. It ran in a highly regulated environment, where correctness, security and traceability had to be demonstrable. C# on .NET Framework, with WPF for the interface.

Work included:

• Front-end design and implementation for a Windows-based cryptographic key management and distribution client.
• Translation of customer requirements and security-driven use cases into a usable, robust interface.
• Clean integration with the services sitting behind the interface.
• Delivery under regulatory constraints in which correctness and traceability mattered as much as function.

Technologies and tools used included:

• C# and .NET Framework 4.x
• WPF, for the Windows desktop interface
• In-house Tooling and Libraries

Shared Front-End and Core Technology

2021 — 2022

Different to the other engagements as this involved the design and creation of shared web technology rather than a finished application. The team was building a next-generation planning capability as a family of client-facing applications, and this work sat in the front-end and core technology all of them were built from.

That changes what the job is. A feature inside one application answers to that application and can be argued about on its own terms; a component in a shared core answers to every application that will ever use it, including the ones nobody has written yet. Modern web technologies, delivered into a CI-driven pipeline, offering good performance and maintainability.

Work included:

• Contribution to shared front-end and core technology used across multiple client-facing applications.
• Feature delivery in modern web technologies within a CI-driven environment.
• Balancing performance, maintainability and usability across a codebase with several consumers.

Technologies and tools used included:

• HTML, CSS, JavaScript and TypeScript
• Aurelia (framework for building SPAs)
• npm-based tooling, delivered into a CI-driven pipeline
• Git and Bitbucket
• Jira and Confluence
• Agile and SAFe environment

Technical Ownership of a Planning and Control Application

2022 — 2025

A large assignment that took full technical ownership of a next-generation planning, control and deployment application, built for a modern Windows desktop inside a secure environment. Ownership meant the whole of it — evaluating and choosing the UI framework, setting the system architecture that followed from that choice, and implementing it end to end.

The application was UI-heavy by its nature and it had to stay responsive. It was built to Microsoft's Fluent design principles on WinUI 3 and the Windows App SDK, targeting Windows 11 — a deliberately current stack for a domain that does not always get one.

The technical specifications were detailed and the regulatory and security constraints strict, and the requirements moved throughout, as requirements do across three years. Holding an architecture steady while the requirements around it change is most of what technical ownership turns out to mean in practice.

Work included:

• Full technical ownership of a UI-heavy planning, control and deployment application.
• UI framework evaluation and selection, and the system architecture that followed from it.
• End-to-end implementation through to production-ready software, on a modern Windows desktop stack.
• Translation of complex operational workflows into an intuitive, performant interface aligned with Fluent design principles.
• Delivery against detailed technical specifications and evolving requirements, under strict regulatory and security constraints.

Technologies and tools used included:

• C# and .NET 6+
• Microsoft Visual Studio
• WinUI 3 and the Windows App SDK, targeting Windows 11
• Microsoft Fluent UI design principles
• Multithreaded and asynchronous application development

This was contract work, carried out through Code Concise for client organisations rather than as an employee. They are unnamed here by choice rather than by obligation. Nothing on this page should be read as a statement on their behalf or as their endorsement.

These engagements also appear on the career timeline.