John Petersen
Independent Consultant, Independent

I have been a developer for about 20 years – starting with dBase and FoxBase +. I then got into FoxPro 2.0 and VB 3 – eventually giving way to Visual FoxPro. Then along came .NET! Through that time, I have developed applications in SQL Server since version 6. I have also developed applications with Oracle versions 9i and 10g. From 1995-2001, I was a Microsoft Developer MVP. I have spoken at many user groups and industry conferences including Tech Ed and Developer Days.

In 1999, I wrote the definitive whitepaper on ADO for VFP Developers. In 2002, I wrote the Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Databases for Que Publishing. For serveral years, I was an instructor for both AppDev and MEI. I was a co-author of Visual FoxPro Enterprise Development from Prima Publishing with Rod Paddock, Ron Talmadge and Eric Ranft. I was also a co-author of Visual Basic Web Development from Prima Publishing with Rod Paddock and Richard Campbell.

In 2004, I graduated from the Rutgers University School of Law with a Juris Doctor Degree. I passed the Pennsylvania and New Jersey Bar exams and was in private practice for several years – concentrating transactional and general business law (contracts, copyrights, trademarks, independent contractor agreements, NDA’s, intellectual property and mergers and aquisitions.).

Although I never completely stopped, several years ago, I returned to my first passion on a full time basis- software development. Today, I am writing for Code Magazine again and am active on the MSDN Forums. I actively participate in the Philly SQL Server, .NET and ALT NET user groups.