About

On this page, you can find out more about me, my background, and my work. You can also find out more about this site, and how it was developed.

About Me

My name is Mike Simpson (aka MDSimpson, codemonkey_mike or fraploid), and I'm a Research Software Engineer and former Game Developer, based in the North-East of England.

• Trustee and Vice-President of the Society of Research Software Engineering (2023-present).
• A 2025 Fellow of the Software Sustainability Institute.

My Background

I've been a research software engineer for over a decade, and have worked on a wide range of projects, from small research projects to large, multi-institutional collaborations. I have experience in a variety of programming languages and technologies, and I'm passionate about improving the quality and sustainability of research software.

Previously, I earned an MSc in Computer Games Engineering from Newcastle University, and worked as a game developer for several years, before returning to the university for my PhD. I worked as a research associate for several years before officially becoming a Research Software Engineer in 2019.

About this site

This site is a personal website and blog, where I share my thoughts on software engineering, research software, and game development. It is built using Jekyll and hosted on GitHub Pages.

The site has been exported from WordPress, and is still a work in progress. I am still working on migrating content from the old site, and updating the design and layout of the site.

The site was developed using Jekyll, a static site generator, and is hosted on GitHub Pages. The source code for the site is available on GitHub.