I have known Peter nearly all of my adult life.  Through the gravitational forces, which create ties between life partners and their respective immediate families, but also as one of the original digital natives who invited me into that then little inhabited dominion.  

When I look back today at Peter’s life it is clear that he was a pioneer whose life choices are a precursor to much of what has happened with the digitization of the world since we first met.  He has worked mainly from home, communicating electronically, facilitating a software based commercial world for others to inhabit. 

Back at the beginning the world looked very different, devices were mostly non-descript pieces of tin the size of a suitcase at a minimum to be of any use and they communicated with each other using a path through a thicket.  However, all of the features that contributed to the brave new world we live in today were there and made practical by people like Peter.   

One thing I learned about Peter when we first met was that in addition to a fearsome sword, the British Army trained him in the art of computer programming.  I did not realize at the time what a significant impact on my own life.  Several years on, Peter kindly introduced me to this nascent world when he diverted me from a career in the theatre to something a bit more likely to support my young family by giving me a job as a junior developer.  The job was located - in what eventually came to be true tech start-up fashion – not in some plush office, but in v1.0 of the shed at the bottom of his garden.    

I did not take this lightly however, the portents of fame and fortune where there to see.  Peter had recently worked on the hugely successful BBC Micro and had a book deal as a bonus.  He was also working with a firm in California who had built and was promoting a personal computer named after a fruit.    At the time Peter was also dealing with finance firms and some dodgy looking individuals that I understood where loosely connected with the Ministry of Defense.  Although I was blissfully ignorant at the time, the technology we were working on was also right at the cutting edge of what was achievable.  So much so that I later discovered it was still seen as futuristic at major financial institutions 10 years later. 

Another lesson I learnt during this period is that timing, luck and relationships are as important as technological excellence when it comes to commercial success.  Unfortunately, the Californian computer manufacture turned out to be Orange rather than Apple, Peter fell out with his potential backers in the City over business terms and those mysterious men from the ministry simply faded into the background. 

Given the situation things looked pretty dire especially as the only prospect at the time needed a multi-site waste trading system developed and at HQ v1.0 at the time, the only resource Peter had available was, well me!   Undaunted Peter set out to write the whole thing himself, pretty much by himself. The fact that he succeeded was a massive personal achievement.  And I was literally no help, my only real contribution being to turn myself into a version of Moss from The IT Crowd. 

I always think of building software as a process whereby you strap yourself into a cockpit where it is you against the machine, which generally means you against your own logical failings.  To come up with any functioning system is a feat of creativity to rival writing of any form.  It is however entirely ephemeral, in cyberspace nobody hears you scream, but also nobody gets to view your achievements.  During this period Peter was building castles in the sky. 

I feel privileged to have witnessed what he achieved and have drawn inspiration from it during the ups and downs of my own subsequent career.  Although our lives have taken separate paths as we both moved on, I hope that now on his passing Peter can truly inhabit those castles that he built.