Olaf is one of the founders of Ikon ehf. Olaf has worked in software development and IT administration since 1985 but his formal education is Electronic Field Engineering and he graduated with a Journeyman Certificate in 1985. After many varied projects in Iceland in software development and the founding of Ikon ehf in 1988, he took on the job of developing internal data systems for Omnis Software Inc. (now Tiger Logic) in Silicon Valley, California USA in 1996. He came back to Iceland 1999 and soon left for Tenerife where he was offered to develop a Time Share sales system for Resort Properties. That project took about 2 years of and on and since then Olaf has focused on building Ikon ehf. In 2005 the company invested in office space at Nybylavegur 6 in Kopavogur, Iceland where the operations currently reside.

CURRICULUM VITAE / RESUMÉ

Name: Ólafur Garðarsson

Born: Keflavik Iceland, sept. 3. 1962 

Experience

1990 - present: General manager of Ikon ehf. - roles: Programming, IT systems services and general daily administration. Partial list of projects can be seen here.

2003 - present: Built webhosting business edal.net for Ikon ehf. We started out with buying managed shared services but when we were confident that we could successfuly manage our own webhost we aquired our own servers in datacenters and since then the business has grown every year. Previous experience with network administration has come in handy. One not only has to manage web hosts but also mail service, DNS, databases, php, ssl, python and many other services. Thankfully we have a good tool, cPanel, that makes things easier. Security is the biggest issue on webserver. So we have had to set up spam protection, virus protection, dynamic firewalls and such. The business has grown from being almost a hobby to being the main business of Ikon ehf.

1998 - 2003: Managed all information systems for SR-mjöl hf, at first remotely and in short visits and after 2001 almost full time. Designed, implemented and managed WAN connection of all 5 factories around Iceland with the head office. Built Terminal Services and upgraded older systems to Active Directory managed services. Managed Lotus Notes mail system and Lotus Notes GoPro services. SR-mjöl was merged with Síldarvinnslan hf in 2003 and in wake of merger Information Systems were combined by me Olaf and Jon Björn. Provide IT consultation and programming work to Síldarvinnslan to present.

1999 - 2001: Resort Properties Tenerife, XL Hotels & Resorts og RMS Inc. London. Built Oracle based system for Timeshare sales system with Omnis Studio user interface. Using modular methology business rules were separated from user interface design and GUI was programmed with Object Oriented technologies using Omnis Studio. Also did consultation on their Information Systems future direction and development.

1996 - 1999: Blyth Software Inc USA (later Omnis Software Inc and now Tiger Logic ) - Started as Omnis 7 Technical Support Engineer for 3 months under supervision of Frank Ammiro and Negin Hakimian. Was moved later to systems development to program Igor and other internal systems with the title of Information Systems Analyst. Started with maintaining Sybase databases but moved all systems to Oracle later.

1988 - 1990: Ikon ehf established. Omnis programmer, Financial director and Teacher in computer classes. 

1985 - 1988: Independent software developer. Almost exclusively Omnis 3 databases. 

1984 - 1985: Plastos hf. Started as a shift foreman and later moved to Electronic Workshop. Shift foreman in plastic bag factory, repair of production machinery. Setup and repair work on Electronic Scales.

1983 - 1984: Alternator hf. Keflavik. Engineer on design and construction of Solid State Electronic Inverter from variable frequency and voltage from alternators, driven by lighting engines and main engines of ships, to stable 50Hz 220V power source.

1983: Landsíminn (Iceland Telecommunications now Síminn hf). Radio Links Division. Repair and maintenance of radio and microwave telecommunications  links around Iceland.

1980: Sumer job with Steypustöð Suðurnesja hf.

1974 - 1983: Sumer jobs and work with school in fathers fishing and fish processing business. Also load and unload of ships for Skipaafgreiðsla Suðurnesja.

Formal Education

1988: Graduation as Technical Student from Tækniskóli Íslands (Iceland Technical College)

1985: Graduation as Electronic Field Engineer, Journeyman Certificate from Reykjavik Technical College (Iðnskólinn í Reykjavík).

1979: Basic's in metallurgies at Fjölbrautaskóli Suðurnesja. Vocational studies. 

Other studies

New Business Venture Fund - Seminar in business planning, Language related - TOEFL and SAT, Databases - Oracle PL/SQL, Oracle Backup and Recovery, Omnis Studio, Omnis 3 to 7, Java, Pascal, AJAX, PHP, OO programming, Webhosting and more, Agile methology, Music - Piano and keyboard, Dance - Jazz Ballett , Diving - PADI Advanced Diver.

Hobbies and interests

Technology and science, diving, fly fishing, basketball, travel, literature, music, theatre, cinema, gardening, nature observation and cross country hiking.