Stephen Airy - Pianist & Computer Technician*

Hi! My name is Stephen Airy, welcome to my website!

This is a work in progress; as such, there will be a lot that doesn't work properly. For example, almost all the text on this site is the same size. I still need to learn how to properly code font sizes and many other things (one example being how wide text spans on the page on different browsers and devices) with HTML / CSS. I really want to avoid things like javascript, similar things to flash (I know that's being deprecated) and other things, as I have had really bad experiences with them and sites using them in the past.

I am a graduate (September 2017) of the NFAR Tech Training / Software Testing program, and hold an ISTQB foundation level certification. I am also studying to obtain a Comp TIA A+ certification.

I graduated high school in 1999, and studied computer science through part of 2001, then decided to take a different direction in life.

I was diagnosed around January 2001 with what was called Asperger's Syndrome at the time. Many things have been difficult for me, including knowing how to explain how and what is difficult. ☺

I am currently an intern at UCSD - Radlab / PoNG center. I have been involved in beta testing for a team working on designing a space race game. Basically you control a ship hurtling down a tunnel, faster and faster. You get points for time, and for picking up stars. You speed up even more if you pick up a speed boost pod, but you die if you hit an asteroid or the wall. The game supports eyetracking, however my testing has been done with just the mouse.

I have been working with computers for the vast majority of my life. I dabbled a little in programming in the early 1990s, and am thinking I may want to get back into it sometime in the future. I've also built a couple computers, swapped parts in and out, done some troubleshooting, installed and set up Windows and other applications, among other things. (I also have a little bit of very basic Linux experience.)

Below is a timelapse video (unlisted, on YouTube) of me basically doing a case swap on my personal desktop PC in December 2017. I had had enough of the Rosewill Thor V2, so decided to swap it for a Fractal Design Define R5.

I also did a little of simple website creation in the late 1990s or early 2000s; however this is my first foray back into it since then.

Sometimes the supreme queen here will tell me that it's time to take a break from work.

I have also played piano for most of my life - actually even longer than I've been in computers. I've played for my local church, at a few church camps, and a couple other occasions, and I enjoy playing at home when I have the opportunity, or casually at friends' houses when I am visiting and the opportunity arises.

I have a YouTube channel with some piano music publicly uploaded, it can be seen here. I may also add some direct links to some unlisted videos that I have uploaded.

One of my recent youtube piano uploads is below. The song is "Can't Help Falling In Love".

I'll also embed a piano music video I recorded a few months ago, while testing the webcam on my laptop.

The songs played in the above video are:

• Edelweiss - from Sound of Music
• The Sound Of Music
• Climb Ev'ry Mountain
• Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)
• My Tribute (by Andrae Crouch)

If the sound isn't working, it's also on my Google Photos - here. Like I mentioned earlier, this site is a work in progress, and some things are not functioning as well as I would like. Also the video and audio do get somewhat out of sync as the video progresses; I suspect it may have something to do with the audio vs video bitrate or sampling rate being slightly incorrect in the original recording.

So far in my testing of this site:

• In FireFox (Quantum), the above video (the one tested on laptop webcam) does not have sound, but the other videos do play.)
• In Chrome (My normal default browser), the youtube videos don't load at all. (Trying to access the youtube site errors out with a 400 Bad Request error.) The embedded video does play with sound, though
• In Edge, the YouTube videos work, but the format of the embedded video is apparently not supported.
• All testing has been done on Windows. I do have Linux VMs running, but various issues are preventing testing it on those at this time.

Also here's a video of "You Light Up My Life". My laptop is looping the Unigine Valley benchmark.

Other interests I have to varying degrees include photography and videography, amateur radio and related things, and I hope to add to this list later, my mind is drawing a blank.

I am interested in working with computers, including building them, reviewing and testing hardware, troubleshooting, repairs, among other things. I also would love to record and perform piano music.

My contact info:

• Business email: stephen.airy@gmail.com
• Other email: pianoplayer88key@gmail.com
• Cell: (619) 277-0192 I get a high percentage of spam / bogus calls, so please leave a voicemail if I don't answer (which I may not if I don't recognize the number coming in, due to the volume of spam).
• (reserved in case I decide to add social media contacts later, like Twitch, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. I have formerly used Snapchat, KIK and a couple others, but am not currently using them.

Thank you for visiting my site. I hope to be able to add more content in the future, and organize it better. For example I have a lot of piano music I may want to post someday.