First Step Is The Hardest

A bit more about me…

• It all started from 8 bit – the beginnings.

Programming always fascinated me since as long as I remember. The first “app” I coded was on Atari 130XE. It was just a simple, unfinished “game” in Basic. Using a joystick you could fly a spaceship on the screen in whole 320 x 200 pixels in B & W colors. I still recall how painfully slow it was (I had no clue about optimization / compiling and machine code etc.).

Then a long gap happened. Then came high school and Pascal, later electrical engineering studies and Turbo Pascal and Matlab scripts. It always seemed natural for me to communicate that way with a computer. It was like an extension of the beautiful language of mathematics into the world of machines.

• The way forward.

Whatever the undertaking the first move is always the hardest. I believe in self-development and considered getting involved in programming for a long while. Doing this whilst working full time is a no mean feat but on 17th of January 2017 I made that first step.

On October 2017 I joined Open University where I study Computing and IT to get a second degree in my life eventually.

Now I usually spend time after work studying more advanced concepts in programming or working on personal projects.

I got involved in London Python and Python Sprints meetup groups and I am participating in open source community.

• How I feel about coding.

Being able to design and implement my ideas with the use of my favorite tool – the computer is the fulfillment of my dreams. I am quite meticulous and spend a lot of time refining the final products of my hard labor.

I prefer to learn by doing applying freshly gained skills straight into practice. Having an open mind helps in this tremendously as a lot of the aspects that are involved in web design and software creation are new to me but I enjoy them a lot.

Thanks to my resilience I don’t give up when countless errors and obstacles get in my way – I keep pushing until they move aside.

• Using skills known already – don’t reinvent the wheel. 

Fortunately the problem solving techniques used in computer science are very similar to finding solutions in electrical engineering (or any other engineering discipline for that matter) so I just adapt all the knowledge and experience already gained in my current and previous professional endeavors.

• Where I want to go.

I am focused on improving Python and backend knowledge and at the same time already working on front end skills in Angular.

I always loved building, be it from Lego blocks, electronic components and nowadays objects in a computer software. This is giving me a tremendous satisfaction by seeing the entire process carried out from one side to the other.