Roseanne Gare recruited David Smith as one of several programmers with educational backgrounds to develop software titles for Jacaranda. At the time, he was the (first ever) Director of Computing at Melbourne Grammar School, where he installed one of Australia’s first education networks (of BBCs). Smith stayed at MGS until 1986.
The Jacaranda software development team worked in a distributed fashion, meeting regularly but working wherever they happened to be. The newness of computing meant that “none of us I think had any formal training – certainly I’ve designed, taught and examined courses in various aspects of computers and programming, but have no formal qualifications myself. I very much learnt programming on the fly as a means to an end….Indeed what I love about programming is the ability, as a person with low manual dexterity skills, to sit down and create something essentially just by thinking.”
Following the closure of the Jacaranda Software in the early 1990s, Smith — with colleagues Bruce Mitchell and Steve Luckett — formed Greygum Software. They continued to make educational software for use in schools, both in Australia and overseas.
Other games developed:
Gold-Dust Island, Quick-Cartage Company, Scavenger Hunt, Sheep-Dog Trial, Cunning Running, Dinosaur Discovery, Wordsmith, Transformations, Vote 1, Bush Rescue, Terra Australis: Voyages of trade and discovery, Kraken: A deep-sea quest, Crossing the Mountains, Clockwise: Time activities for the whole primary school, Desert Quest.
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