user:paulfdunn
created:Feb 19, 2026
karma:2
about:

Electrical engineer by training; broad practical experience. I created the first computerized method for calculating dosimetry for iodine-125 radiation seeds (used to treat brain tumors), running on a PDP-11, in 1985. (I participated in brain surgery during its first use. Note this was during a summer job while in college.) I went on to design HW/FW to control HDD servo systems, then read channels. Later, I designed production equipment to qualify tape media used in tape drives (Quantum DLT/SDTL/LTO). That got me on a path that transitioned me to SW where I: wrote test SW for large-scale storage devices, wrote WDC's OpenFlex management interface, and worked in data engineering for a large SaaS provider (Zendesk).

I've always had a strong interest in business, finance, and economics. I started retirement planning when only a few years out of school. I started programmatic trading in 1996. I now run AlgorithmicFIRE.com, a site where I post blogs, calculators, etc., to highlight what I found as the most important aspects of saving and retirement planning.