After studying computer science and two years as a assistant professor at the Institute for Psychology at University of Linz/Austria I decided 1986 to work as a researcher at TA Triumph Adler AG in Nuremberg. First I was involved within knowledge-based user interface design and their programming, after that I designed and implemented explanation components for expert systems. Within the research field "natural-language query components" I developed with my team in the beginning of 1990 one of the first electronic dictionaries in the German-speaking area. The result of this software development is a product called UniLex which for example is used very successfully by the Brandstetter-Verlag in Wiesbaden for the electronic versions of its dictionaries in CD ROM format. During this software development at TA I was responsible for several European language projects (Multilex, TWB) as a project manager.
Within the framework of a management buyout of TA I set up TA Electronic Publishing GmbH (renamed later in: EP Electronic Publishing Partners GmbH)in 1993 together with a colleague and I lead this company first as the technical managing director. From 1999 to June 2001 I was responsible as single managing director.
In our special area we developed database based products in the linguistic field, particularly electronic dictionaries, terminology management systems and a production system for (printed) dictionaries. CD ROM-products like "Gewusst-wo", "Wer-ist-Wer" and the "Police-Manual" for the Beleke-Publishing House were developed on this basis too. We developed also WWW versions for specific products (for example "Gewusst-wo", "Der Kinderarzt").
In 1995 we won a big call for tender issued by the Translation Service of the European Commission which aimed for the development of a translation support system EURAMIS. This project lasted from 1995 to 2000. The Unicode based Unix/Windows client/servers software EURAMIS is used on a daily basis within the Translation Service of the CEC and translates up to 30.000 pages of documents into all official languages of the CEC every month. In addition to the project management I have written most specifications for the system, for example the "Translation Memory" that provides a means for the database based translation of documents using various retrieval mechanisms. I also designed the architecture of this system and its central components. Several tools were developed by me in C and other programming languages. The system is executable both under Unix (Solaris, Linux) and under MS Windows. C, C++, Perl, Java and Unix-Shell-Scripts are used as programming languages.
The EURAMIS and follow-up systems like EPTAS, Globelix contain the following components:
As my colleagues and I had acquired deep SGML and XML-knowledge we developed a document format-independent SGML-based format that allows the representation of different document formats like WinWord, RTF, MIF and various SGML formats in a homogeneous representation. A lot of the ideas employed in that are used today within the framework of standardization ideas now.
Based on this knowledge we developed the SGML/XML based SIRIUS document management system that is already used by several publishing houses successfully.
The position as the director of the company also included responsibility for finance and resource planning including doing yearly balance sheets together with the company tax advisor.
The other share holders and I sold the EP Electronic Publishing GmbH in June 1999 to ALPNET, Inc., a big American translation company and continued working as ALPNET Technology GmbH.
I was responsible for the internal use and for the roll-out of the system at SUN Microsystems of the translation system Globelix (former Euramis system). We also integrated our translation tools into ERP/CRM/DMS and CMS systems.
Since July 2001 I am active as a consultant in the area of language software, software development and project management again.
Since October 2002 I am directory and shareholder of Heartsome Europe GmbH, a language technology company, which I have founded with another shareholder from Singapore - Heartsome PTE Ltd. - and Mr. Münnich. HereI develop zusamnew language products (Araya) together with colleagues in Singapore, Thailand and Korea (Araya) and products for the creation of XML documents and production in different Media (DocTrans). In October 2004 a separation was done between Heartsome PTE (Singapore) and Heartsome Europe GmbH, now being the main owner of the Heartsome Europe GmbH which will be renamed shortly.Since April 2004 I am managing director and scientific director of Tourismus Research Center Krems GesmbH, a research center in the area of IT and tourism in Krems, Austria.
See also curriculum vitae
