About David
Born in Los Alamos, NM, I attended Aspen Elementary School, Los Alamos Middle School, and Los Alamos High School. I then went on to get a bachelors in computer science at New Mexico Tech. I worked at National Radio Astronomy Observatory for about 10 years, and then returned to New Mexico Tech for a masters in mechanical engineering. I would have preferred to attend a different university, but the cost was such that I didn't have much choice.
Professionally, I am mechatronics engineer. You can get an idea of my work experience from my resume. Being easily distracted by bright shiny ideas, I am interested in mechanical, electrical, and civil engineering as well as computer programming. As civil engineering requires a license, and can not be casually practiced at home, I have little experience in it. Having recently finished a masters in mechanical engineering, I am not looking for a job.
In my free time I do a lot of hiking, backpacking, camping, and traveling. I try to repair my own cars, and would like to learn more home construction & repair. I spend a fair bit of time with technology, both old and new. I have a somewhat large collection of old Mac laptops, starting with the late 1980's era Macintosh Portable. Today I am more focused on newer technology. One of my current goals is to start posting on the Digilent Xylenx Zybo Zinq 7000 FPGA development board, though this depends on how quickly I find a job.
The Web Page
Dragonsdawn.org was created back in 2006 to provide a permanent email address and an experimental web page. I have expanded it over time to provide an online presence, especially since I generally avoid social media.
The name Dragonsdawn.org was chosen primarily because just about every name I thought of was taken. While job hunting the name is often criticized as sounding unprofessional. I may some day register a professional-sounding domain name, and create a purely professional webpage. However, I am more interested in expanding the technical side of this page to cover interesting technical work than I am in engineering my appearance. Of more concern is that I have no desire to infringe on Anne McCaffery's fantasy series, The Dragonriders of Pern. And, while I respect McCaffery as an accomplished author, this site is not intended as fan service.
Today, the primary goal of the webpage is to share interesting stuff, be it travel, photography, technology, or anything else. One of my earlier projects was broken off into scarybridges.com, as it makes a neat stand-alone website.
If you have feedback or recommendations on this webpage, feel free to send them to the email at the bottom of the page, replacing the anti-spam {at) and (dot] with the appropriate symbols.
The front page photos
The two photos on the front page date back to my original attempts to make a webpage, when Dragonsdawn.org was first created. The top photo, in which Rio Bravo Boulevard appears to be a dirt track, was selected to represent just how obscure this website is. The lower photo, with the Colorado Welcome Center buried in snow, was a neat photo I took back when I first started making this website. I am seriously considering replacements for both, or otherwise reworking the main page. Maybe had a narrow, wide, banner image and split the contents into two columns. But I haven't yet decided on anything, so the old photos remain.
The photos of the author:
Top: Working in the NMT Mechatronics machine shop, while seeking my masters degree, November 2015.
Middle: At Cumbres Pass, starting a 2 week back on the Continental Divide Trail, August 2018.
Bottom: In the Cave of the Crystals, in the Naica Mine, Mexico, 2008. Adding the trip this was taken on to the NMT Caving Club trip reports is on my to-do list...
