About Us

John D. Hagan is one of the nation's leading computer experts. He was responsible for engineering, directing, and managing PennNet, a large and complex data communication network at the University of Pennsylvania. John was the senior member of the team that researched, designed, and developed the network, and he earned the nickname "Father of PennNet."

As Penn's Director of Network Operations, he ensured the smooth daily operation of the network, which had more than 25,000 computers and extended to more than 100 buildings. He and his staff successfully installed approximately 500 network outlets and responded to approximately 100 service requests per month.

John has been a user of the Internet since 1978, and he continues to be an Internet pioneer. He is coauthor of Internet RFC1433, Directed ARP, which was published in March 1993 and is one of the selected documents that define and provide vision to the Internet's technical foundation.

John's own work has included contract consulting and planning for NASA and the early Space Shuttle program. John has been a high school educator, having taught programming to elementary-school children. During his student days at Penn, John was a physics intern for a neutrino astronomy project in the Black Hills of South Dakota.

Michael J. Schwager combines skills in writing and computer consulting. He designs and develops databases and Web sites, and he is adept at explaining technical matters. He often trains clients to use computers—and to use them more efficiently and effectively. Michael has broad experience in hardware and software installation, upgrades, troubleshooting, and telephone support, primarily on small and medium-sized systems and networks.

Michael has written copy for several corporate Web sites. He has also wirtten online manuals for Drexel University and printed manuals for clients such as OCR Systems, Inc., SmithKline Beecham, and the University of Pennsylvania. He has written or edited ten books and is working on several others. With Marvin Roffman he wrote Take Charge of Your Financial Future, which Publisher's Weekly called "One of the most valuable money books in memory" and which reached the Philadelphia Inquirer's list of business bestsellers.

Michael's articles have appeared in the New York Times, New Woman, the Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine, and many other publications. Subjects have been as diverse as kidney transplants, suspension-bridge construction, dinosaurs, and baseball. His work has received awards from the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), the Hospital Association of Pennsylvania, and the Pennsylvania Federation of Historical Societies, among others.

Daniel Kirchheimer has over 25 years experience in the IT industry and nearly a decade in A/V systems design and development.

After attending the University of Pennsylvania, Daniel joined the financial services software firm Dalcomp, Inc. in New York, where he rose to the position of Systems Architect. Following that, he was retained by Equitable Capital Management to design and develop a multicurrency international securities trading system.

After the completion of that project, Daniel co-founded Trilon, Inc., where he has continued to apply his diverse skills to solving clients' problems, while maintaining the thorough approach, emphasis on quality, and attention to detail that have marked all his endeavors. In addition, he has added audiovisual systems design and development to his reportoire, and he is the originator of several key principles for maintaining both speech intelligibility and stereo imaging in mixed-use challenging spaces.

In his current role as technical expert at Trilon, Daniel performs troubleshooting, product research, and systems design and development for data processing and audiovisual systems.