James Derrick

WORK HISTORY

EDUCATION

ABOUT JAMES DERRICK

Developer Enablement at Ansys focuses on building community, creating content, and empowering developers to adopt our tools. In this role, I have organized multiple academic Code Fests (e.g, Cornell PyAnsys CodeFest: and serve as the main developer of ansys-codefest on PyPI (https://pypi.org/project/ansys-codefest/). I have also presented at major conferences, including PyCon US 2024 (talk link: https://youtu.be/BJ2Ve4opPIk?si=ehNMkb-1S5EA40rG).As an admin and curator of the Ansys Developer Forum (https://discuss.ansys.com/), I help foster a vibrant and growing developer community. I am also a key contributor to the Ansys Developer Portal, publishing blogs, tutorials, and technical examples (sample blog: https://developer.ansys.com/blog/advent-code-2023-survivors-and-results). In addition, I have organized Ansys’ internal Hackathon for three consecutive years and led our Advent of Code sponsorships in 2023 and 2024.My technical expertise is centered on Python, and I am the instructor of Ansys’ “Introduction to Python” course (https://courses.ansys.com/index.php/courses/intro-to-python/). I am also exploring Rust as part of broadening my developer skillset. Earlier in my career, I worked in DevOps enablement at Ansys and as an Application Developer at Granta Design, where I built bespoke Python tools for customers, including delivering a 1.0 release as the primary developer.My academic background includes a PhD in Physics from Imperial College London, where I researched the shock compaction of granular materials using the iSALE shock physics code (FORTRAN90) with Python-based data processing. I also hold a First-Class MSci in Physics from Imperial, with a master’s project in Laboratory Astrophysics on supersonic plasma jets.Outside of work, I enjoy hiking, running, and playing trombone, and I serve as the treasurer of CMFG