Jon Venn worked for some years in the aircraft industry before earning the B.Sc. degree in computer science at North Staffordshire Polytechnic in 1975. He obtained the M.Sc. degree in physical oceanography from University College of North Wales at Bangor in 1977, and is a part-time student of City of London Polytechnic, studying for the Ph.D. degree in shallow sea tidal friction and sediment transport.From 1978 to 1983 he was a Research Assistant with the Ocean Modelling Group at D.A.M.T.P. at the University of Cambridge, and is now employed as a Research Associate in the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering at the University of Birmingham, Birmingham, U.K., where he specializes in surface current measurement and the use of array processors for on-line digital signal processing and the computation of sea-state parameters.