Leon Stringer MSc MBCS

Stafford, UK – leon.r.stringer /at/ gmail.com – linkedin.com/in/leon-stringer – github.com/leonstr

Summary

Experienced IT engineer with experience of support, development and project roles. Excellent troubleshooting skills with an eye for detail, a supportive team member and proud of the professional standard of my work. Currently specialising in Moodle on Linux.

• Platforms: Linux (mainly CentOS)/LAMP
• Development: PHP, Bash, Git.
• Databases: MySQL/MariaDB, SQL Server (elementary), PostgreSQL (elementary).
• Team work: Development of processes and technical documentation, skills transfer.
• Projects: Stakeholder liaison, planning and implementation, customer documentation.

Employment history

July 2024 to current: Moodle developer, University College London

Remote

• Resolving issues in Moodle via Tracker and providing core code fixes.
• Implementing new functionality in core Moodle.
• Making fixes and patches to third party plugins and in-house plugins.
• Performing code reviews for peers.
• Assisting in troubleshooting and resolving support issues.
• Assisting in user research evaluating proposed improvements of functionality.

Jan 2021 to July 2024: Freelance Moodle technical consultant

Stafford, Staffordshire

• Providing services to customers in the UK and worldwide.
• Technical support for Moodle site administration and hosting.
• Moodle plugin development, e.g. using third party APIs to assess students.
• Frequent contributor to Moodle.org community forums, awarded Particularly helpful Moodler badge.
• Contributed code fixes to Moodle core code and third party plugins.

Nov 2017 to Nov 2019: Director, PriorsVLE Ltd

Stafford, Staffordshire

• Set up a company specialising in technical consultancy for the Moodle learning platform.
• Moodle upgrade and migration work undertaken focussing on planning and testing for successful outcomes.
• Developed plugin integrating memberships exposed by REST API to Moodle users/courses.
• Forked plugin for OAuth 2 requirement fixing outstanding bugs and implementing GDPR API.
• Managed projects and wrote specification and technical handover documentation for customers.
• Attended MoodleMoot conference 2018 and 2019.
• Wrote technical blog posts and contributed to Moodle documentation.

Mar 2014 to Oct 2017: SysAdmin/Developer, HowToMoodle Ltd

Telford, Shropshire

• Provided support for hosting, customer support and training services for Moodle and Totara.
• Visited customer sites for pre-sales consultancy and to deliver training.
• Supported hosting platform (CentOS, Apache, MySQL/MariaDB, PHP) and customer self-hosted sites (e.g. SLES, Ubuntu, Windows Server and SQL Server).
• Supported systems using PHP, Bash scripting using Git for source code and configuration file management.
• Used Perl and Gnuplot to parse, analyse and report on log files.
• Integrated Moodle with external authentication systems (LDAP for Active Directory and SAML).
• Managed and monitored service availability using Icinga.
• Debugged code (e.g. Xdebug) and performed troubleshooting down to protocol level, submitting upstream bug reports and patches.

Nov 2011 to Feb 2014: Infrastructure Engineer, Capita plc

Telford, Shropshire

• Linux specialist providing 4th-line support and project implementation.
• Support for around 50 Moodle sites with customised codebase and optional Active Directory authentication.
• Support and troubleshooting of integration with federated single sign-on authentication (Shibboleth).
• Maintenance of VMware ESX farm and shared storage (Compellent).
• Development and scripting in PHP, Perl and Bash.
• Troubleshooting network protocols (HTTP, DNS, LDAP, etc.) with Fiddler, Wireshark and tcpdump.

Jun 2008 to Oct 2011: IT Engineer, ACS Xerox

Telford, Shropshire

• 3rd/4th-line server support for outsourced IT including 24-hour cover and site visits.
• Administration of customer Citrix servers, Active Directory, Group Policy and Exchange.
• Supported SLES/SUSE servers for IBM WebSphere-based e-commerce platform.
• Maintenance of Linux EXIM-based POP3 service.
• Development and support of Crystal Reports system for IBM DB2 reporting database.

Jun 2000 to Jun 2008: Network Support Officer, West Midlands Ambulance

Stafford, Staffordshire

• Support for emergency, non-emergency and back-office operations including 24-hour cover.
• Managed Active Directory and Exchange 2003, and Windows, Linux and Citrix servers.
• Network management responsibilities including cabling, switches, routers and firewalls.
• Implemented and supported PHP systems including eGroupWare helpdesk and status reports.
• Mentored team members for skills development.
• Supported and maintained SQL Server and MySQL databases.

Jun 1992 to Sep 1998: Developer, Metascybe Systems Ltd

Wimbledon, London

• Developed in Visual Basic and C, and VBScript on IIS.
• Provided support for developer products and delivered training on customer sites.

Education and Training

• November 2014: Intermediate Perl
• May 2014: Moodle Administrator
• May 2014: Moodle Course Creator Essential
• January 2011: PlateSpin Workload Management Administration
• April 2010: Introduction to Perl
• March 2010: Linux Professional Institute Level 2 Certification (LPIC-2)
• January 2009: Novell Accelerated Certified Linux Professional 10
• December 2008: Linux Professional Institute Level 1 Certification (LPIC-1)
• April 2008: PRINCE2 Practitioner
• October 2007: Implementing, Managing and Maintaining a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Network Infrastructure (M2277)
• July 2007: Maintaining a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Environment (M2275)
• 2005-2007: MSc Computer Science, Staffordshire University (Merit)
• February 2004: Linux and Unix Fundamentals
• March 2003: Citrix MetaFrame XP for Windows Administration with FR 2 (CTX-1222)
• April 2002: Implementing Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional & Server (2152)
• September 2001: VisiCAD Command System Administration
• 1998-2000: BSc (Hons) Computing Science, Staffordshire University (2:1)
• 1983-1990: Greenshaw High School, Sutton, Surrey

Conferences Attended

• September 2024: MoodleMoot DACH in Vienna, Austria
• September 2023: MoodleMoot Global in Barcelona, Spain
• April 2019: MoodleMoot UK/IE in Manchester, UK
• March 2018: MoodleMoot UK/IE in Glasgow, UK

Published Papers

2007 International Joint Conferences on Computer, Information & Systems Sciences, & Engineering

Location Information Discovery for IP Telephony by L. Stringer, F. Dudek & C. Bauer

Interests

I have a general interest in computing and science. I cycle regularly, and am an active member of my local running club.

References

Available on request.