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Historical background

In 1981, after six years spent freelancing as a software engineer in the commercial/industrial heartlands, I decided to change my lifestyle and become a software 'cottage industry' based in the midst of natural beauty. I had already tried to break away from the cities once before - when I took a programming post with John Heathcoats the textile manufacturer in Tiverton, Devon, back in 1970. That time, I found out that my bachelor social life could not be transplanted so easily as my career, and I soon came back to Birmingham. This time was different - I now had a wife and a young family. We would make our own social life, and all would be well.

It was an idea ahead of its time. The PC industry which is now so much a part of our lives, did not exist. Microprocessors were found mainly in hobbyist 'home computers' and industrial process-control installations. The Internet was gradually evolving from its origins in ARPANET, and would not become a significant force for a decade.

Nevertheless, I registered the business name 'Island Software' in November 1981, and from February 1982 I devoted myself full-time to inventing software products from my new home in the Isle of Mull. Armed with a maxim borrowed from the field of Literature - 'only write about what you know about' - I applied myself to the automation of my own work. The first fruits of this approach were 'CP/M-86 Programmers Toolbox' and 'MS-DOS Programmers Toolbox'.

After a couple of false dawns with the likes of Lifeboat Associates and Caxton Software Publishing (who?), I finally thought I had solved the marketing problem when I tied up with Export Software International (ESI), the brainchild of Sandy Blackie in Edinburgh. Sandy had headed up the local ICL development centre at Dalkeith, and when it closed down he took several colleagues with him into this startup software publishing venture. Well, Sandy turned out to be better at marketing his company to me than he did at marketing my (or any) software to the public. In time they self-destructed, and I got back the master disks and a handful of leads. This was not enough to sustain an island base, and eventually the dream had to be put on 'hold'.

Much water has flowed under the bridge since Island Software relocated to the Marlborough Downs in 1986. I have lived in a Suffolk barn, on the edge of a Bavarian forest, in the most vividly scenic parts of the Kennet and Avon Canal, and in a West Country seaside town. Recent years have provided a large proportion of off-site working, and now - finally - I believe my industry is mature enough to support the 'cottage industry' basis that I was searching for in the early 1980's. With the cost of petrol soaring, the cost of internet connection low and stable, and the ubiquitous nature of the present Web, now has to be the time. Island Software is once again based on a Scottish island.

The main thrust of my business remains that of subcontract embedded software development within the electronics industry. See my Software Wizard web site for details. From time to time, the fruits of my inventiveness will be marketed via this Island Software web site.