About

My name is Matt and I’ve had cat-basket.org as a personal website for over 25 years now

I’m not quite as obsessed with cats as the domain name might suggest… Or the many photos of cats I’ve posted here might suggest… And while I may have shared my home with a small number of cats for over 20 years (and prior to then I couldn’t resist making a fuss of friends’ cats) I’m honestly not obsessed. Promise.

My profession is primarily in software development (originally applications using Lotus Notes as a platform, and for the past 20+ years full-stack web-based applications) but, as is usual for anyone working at a small company, I have a variety of other roles (including the care and feeding of some network/server infrastructure, customer support, and plenty more). My path to ending up with a career in computing began with being introduced to the BBC Model B at primary school. That lead to some interest in computers during my childhood culminating in me running a dial-up bulletin board system (BBS) in my mid teens. After completing my A-levels I went on to complete a BSc in Information Systems (with an “artificial intelligence” specialism) at the University of Leeds before finally starting on that career of software development. When I’m not wrangling software/computers at work I may be engaging in my hobby of photography (which, I’ll admit, sometimes involves photographing cats) and that often involves another hobby of mine: cycling to go and find things to photograph (usually things other than cats).

I currently live in Oxfordshire with my partner… and two cats.