Hey everybody, and welcome to another my JavaScript story. This week, we're
talking to K plus er. Did I get anywhere close? No, Nola
plusa. I should ask before I try. I don't speak German. Sorry,
no one. No one gets it right, not even speakers. Oh
is it not a German name? It is? But it's like when you
either you know it because I said it to you, or you read it,
and when you read it it's like it's it has some some parts in
it that I've written different from how they are spelled. Oh, I gotcha,
like half of the English language. Yeap. Basically, when I'm building
a new product, G two I is the company that I call to help
me find a developer who can build it. G two I is a hiring
platform run by engineers that matches you with React, React Native, graph,
QL and mobile developers that you can trust. Whether you are a new company
building your first product or an established company that wants additional engineering help, G
two I has the talent you need to accomplish your goals. Go to G
two i dot co to learn more about what G two I has to offer.
In my experience, G two I has linked me up with experienced engineers
that can fit my budget, and the G two I staff are friendly and
easy to work with. They know how product development works and can help you
find the perfect engineer for your stack. Go to G two I dot co
to learn more about G two I. Good deal. Well, why don't
you go ahead and remind people who you are real quick. I'll also just
point out that you were on React roundup about a year ago as we record
this February of twenty nineteen. We'll put a link to that in the show
notes talking about using and teaching React. Yeah, I'm a develop a Conza
and from Germany, from Stuttgout, Germany, and nowadays I mostly blogging about
technology, about serveilers and front end development and mobile development and such things.
Yeah, the last year I didn't do much production ready development anymore. I
was mostly into developer relations and yeah, and this April I will start teaching
at a university front end development to designers. And yeah, I only did
some few minor React native projects in twenty nineteen. And yeah, that's basically
I'm I'm writing all the time these days. Nice, very cool. Well,
this show we kind of back way up and we start with how you
got into programming, and then we kind of work our way forward to where
you are now. So let's start with how you got into programming. That's
a good question. How did I get into programming? I think the first
time I ever really programmed something small was when I was I, I don't
know, in third grade or something. I had a Commodore see sixty four
and did some basic, basic scripting with basic that was running on this Commodore,
And later I would do some scripting for video games. For example,
I would play Counterstrike with my friends, and you would script some stuff like
buying the same weapons every time you would start a match so you wouldn't have
to type it manually, and such things as where the first basic stuff,
so, like like basic modding of video games where my first introduction to programming.
Later I would do some scripting. I was in an I C channel
or in multiple io C channels back in the days, and I would write
scripts for bots or games or something that could be played inside these chet rooms.
Which is kind of funny because you know, I started in when I
was a young a young boy. I started to program bots, and this
was something that was fine in the past for me, and nowadays people were
starting again, Oh, we now need chat bots again, and yeah,
I found this kind of funny because it's something I've felt really old for me,
because I like, it was years ago when I was in i C
channels, and now people would want to have chatbots again to talk to their
customers and stuff. Yeah. And then I found it interesting to program stuff,
and I did some homepages for a band I had, and for friends
and such things. I started to learn HTML and CSS and later PHP and
did this in my free time for friends. And one day my school time
was finished and people were asking me, yeah, okay, what do you
want to do with your life? And I had the two ideas. One
was I was really good at chemistry at school, so I wanted to do
some some apprenticeship as a chemical labor a laboratory assistant. And the other part
was I did like to program. Yeah, So I applied for different apprenticeships
and didn't get one. So I went to school again, and I went
to an IT school and to an IT high school, and there I did
learn to program in C and in an assembler and things for two years.
And after that I applied for apprenticeships again, and again nobody wanted me.
So I went to university and and I studied computer science and media and yeah,
I did this. And while I was at at university, I had
a working student job where I did PHP programming. This was in two thousand
and six, and I studied from two thousand and seven until twoy eleven,
I think, did my bachelor degree in computer science and media and worked as
a developer on the site for a web analytics company. Yeah, and after
I finished my After I graduated with my bachelor, I did some small stuff
as a freelancer for half a year. But it didn't fear. I didn't
have any any direction, you know. It was like, I don't want
to do the same thing I did before, but I don't know what to
do el So I tried different projects after I graduated, and yeah, I
was just small stuff, I remember. The only thing I really remember was
that I did some some agency work for which was kind of funny because these
agency they had only their Apple computers or the Macs and Firefox and whatnot,
and I should uh, And we worked on a project for Microsoft to show
off their new Internet Explorer, I don't know ten or something. Yeah,
but we completely did this this advertisement web page with non Microsoft technology. Yeah,
this is the only thing I remember from my freelancing in twenty eleven,
and later I started to to I started a front end job at the company
where I also did my working student stuff, and because they wanted to do
a new front end and they were searching for a front end developer, and
this where where my my JavaScript journey really began. Gotcha. So I think
it's interesting just the kind of the back and forth there that you had as
far as yeah, you know, it's like, oh, well I wanted
to go to an internship and that didn't work out, or an apprenticeship sorry,
and that didn't work out. So you know, you're back and forth
and back and forth. It sounds like programming was your fallback. Yeah,
the point was a bit because it was that I I didn't consider programming as
a via the job option. Back in the days. It was like we
had chemistry at school, and I was an a student at chemistry and it
was like something I was really good and where some teachers told me, Okay,
you are good at this, yeah, keep going. And we didn't
have computer science or something like that at school. We had one one Excel
and what and such. Class at school in the tenth grade or something.
But most of the people were talking about I met didn't talk about computers or
something at school. It was no. Chemistry was the only thing that was
a real subject at school I had for multiple years and where teachers would say,
you are good at this, so I thought maybe this is it.
But then I yeh didn't get any jobs in it. So I thought,
yeah, I'm good at with computers. Yeah, so let's let's see if
I can I can make a career out of this. Yeah. It was
more hobby, you know. It was like chemistry felt like a job.
It was like something I did at school. I could only do at school,
and it felt like something you really where you really worked. And programming
was something I would do at home. What was a funny, funny,
funny hobby or something I had, Yeah, where programmed some games or modeled
some games and stuff and did some stuff for friends or it didn't feel like
some some work I was doing. And it was like, how could I
make money with something that is so fun? Yep? Yeah. That was
the thing that really got me too, is just I was like, this
is a blast, and they're gonna pay me for it? Okay, yeah,
basically basically that was it was it? So how did you wind up
doing web development as opposed to mold development or desktop development or some of the
other options that were out there? It was I hmm, good question.
How did I wind up like that? I think the point was that I
had a friend who was a developer at the company where I later worked as
a working student besides my studies, and they were searching for a guy who
could do some demonstration pages for their web analytics tool. So when I started
there, I didn't do much development. They just wanted me to install some
Umla CMS and set up there tracking proxy for this stuff, and then do
some scripts and videos where I displayed the capabilities of their web analytics tool.
So the people who are working at the company were mostly C C plus plus
and PHP developers, but most of them were C developers and not PHP developers,
So yeah, they didn't have too many and there were some developing technology
for the web, but they weren't developing with technology off the web, so
they needed someone who does this and had time to to get to know the
technology and wasn't too expensive. And so since I was a working student and
didn't have any any experience, I was probably a good good fit for this
and yeah, then they did many other projects in that company with PHP,
and since I did this integration with Umla, I had some PHP experience and
then yeah, it was like, I don't know, two thousand and nine
or something, I wrote my first dressed API with PHP and yeah, that
was basically when I was h where I solidified my my Yeah, my track
record for web development awesome. So how did you wind up doing React?
Then this was a coincidence too. I think I did a sabbatical in twenty
fourteen where I I wasn't totally satisfied with my previous job. I was working
seven years at the same company and didn't have any any It wasn't any side
of I don't know, promotions or personal growth or something. So I stopped
working for one year and did other things. I did some other studies at
a university where I studied computer science, and there I worked mostly mid with
Amber. Oh, yeah, the good old days. Yeah, that's what
was twenty fourteen, I think where I worked with Amber and then one day
my money was getting low and I was like, so I have to get
a new job. So what should I do, and I was like,
I know, I know front end development. So I was applying for some
front end development positions and yeah. I wrote a few applications and people came
back to me, and after a few months one company said yah, yeah,
you can work for us. And then I started and many. This
was in twenty fifteen. The main web developer there said they were using React
and I was like, yeah, I read about this somewhere on HECA news.
I don't know, but I didn't work with React at that time.
I mean, this is I don't know, five years ago or something,
and I only knew Emba. But I thought, yeah, I couldn't be
so much more difficult than EMBA, and so I tried it and this was
yeah, twenty fifteen. I started with React because it was already used in
the project and I came later, so I had to use it. Yeah,
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Century small plan. That's code dev chat at Century dot io. Yeah,
that's about the time that I that I encountered a couple of I'm trying to
think where I encountered React, and I remember sitting at a lunch and I
think Dang, I think Ryan Florence was there and he had just switched off
of Ember to React and was telling us that Ember was crap and that React
was the best thing ever and I don't believe it. Yeah, yeah,
it was pretty funny. At the time, I was really into angulars,
so that's where I was coming from. I was like, Okay, I'm
glad you like it anyway, So what have you done with React that you're
particularly proud of or excited to talk about? Yeah? I am what have
I done with Reactor? I think the most successful thing I did with React
was writing the book React from Zero, where I taught people about how their
existing JavaScript knowledge fits together with React. Because many people were like, what
is js x and how did I get these Angular records in my JavaScript?
And what's happening? And this book was basically the glue between this is.
It isn't a big book or something or particularly detailed, but yeah, I
think it was when it came out, something like the missing piece for many
people who knew JavaScript and didn't know React but found it interesting because yeah,
it's the most popular framework out there, and yeah, this was the most
successful thing I did with with React until now, I think. Yeah,
And it's interesting too because a lot of people are coming in so React from
Zero is kind of a great place to come from. You also mentioned you've
done some React Native. Oh, yes, I bus was something random too.
I just was applying for some projects and then after my first React project
and I was like, so now I need some new projects and React Native.
I know React, How hard could it be to do React Native totally
underestimated the problem of mobile development. Yeah, so I had the I was
like, yeah, sure, I can do a reagnative project. I already
did React for a few years and why not. And it was harder than
I imagined because I'm sure I could use much of my reacknowledge for building your
eyes. But the hard parts of regnative warrant building your eyes. It was
all the glue between the Native, the native run times, and the React
the JavaScript part. You know. It was like now you the people want
in payments and yeah, suddenly I had to deal with objectives and Android bugs
and I've I've never seen these programming languages in my life. It was just
too much. Yeah, it was much more than I imagined. It was
much harder because when you are coming from from web development, it's it's I
have the feeling it's much more structured. People were always oh, it's crazy
web development. How can you do it? And I'm coming from what what,
I don't know, cute, cute or something, and they were like,
how can you program something like the web? It's this really big thing
with with this clunky programming language JavaScript. Then I found this much easier than
the stuff I found in mobile development. Yeah, you were like, okay,
now I have multiple programming languages and they are all a bit different,
and yeah, and then you don't not even it's not just these these programming
languages are different. They come with their own tooling, and Apple and Google
have different APIs, and ye, some stuff is in is more flaky than
others, and it's it was just because everything that has nothing that had nothing
to do with with front end development, you know. It was like I've
built my my UI at works, and now I have to to link it
up with with the native platform or the APIs from from Google or Apple.
And I totally underestimated this. But yeah, it's many. Many things have
have been done since since then with with the libraries and stuff, and everything
went better and better every every time I needed to make an update. There
As companies I I did these apps for are coming every half a year or
something, and we need an update, or we have we got some something
as the whole Facebook stuff, you know, when they are we want we
want some Facebook library integrated, and then they have to integrate the Facebook SDK,
and then you have some Facebook log in, and then Facebook would send
you every now and then some updates like oh we are deprecating this SDK and
now you have to make a new new version for something. Plus your stuff
will stop working. And somehow I have the feeling this happens much more often
in in native mobile app world then it happens in the web world. I
don't know, but it just feels to me like that it's entirely possible,
especially since a lot of those how do I put it, a lot of
those systems, they're they're built closer to the metal, and so if they
want to change the capabilities of the hardware, then they've got to change up
drivers, which may trickle up. But I think even then, some of
those APIs they really try hard to keep the same. So it's it's just
a matter of yeah, the ecosystem and where you're working and what the trade
offs are, and sometimes that can get hard. Yeah, Yeah, it's
like I said, it's just you have more more points of failure. You
know, somehow when you when you install something for for your some library for
the web, you you usually end up with some JavaScript you can keep up
rather easily. But on on mobile you suddenly have some Objectivicy or some Swift
or Cotlin or Java or something, and and on top of that you you
have JavaScript. And yeah, if if everything works, fine, it's it's
cool. But if yeah, if you if someone wants some some some cross
platform stuff, it's it gets it gets ugly rather quick. But like I
have to say, like I said, it's it's getting better every years.
It's I had some time, I had had the feeling that reg Native was
like, yeah, getting slower and slower, and people were doing less and
less updates. But when I read some some news about yeah they were not
testing that, and they saw all their unclosed uh, their their open issues
and how they got more and more and that they need to do something different,
and they started it, I think in the beginning of the last year,
and things really changed. Everything got much smaller, much quicker. They
got the new JavaScript run time going, and re architected their platform. And
last time I did some updates, it was a big a bigger, bigger
jump because so much changed, but that what I ended up with was much
smaller and much I felt much concise. Cool. So what are you working
on these days? Yeah, these days, I'm I'm basically a writing blog
post for a living. Now I'm doing mostly ghost writing for for multiple companies
out there. Probably I'm a very prolific writer. Yeah, probably probably half
of the blog post you readA from me. No, not that much,
but quite some. Some blogging because it's not like it's not as good as
paid, as good as developing, but it's still paid rather good if you
write for technology related stuff because yeah, you have to have to know how
not everyone can write about out every technology and so it's yeah, it's it's
a nice job. Because I'm I'm not really you know, I'm not really
a career guy. I'm not I'm not a freelancer because I want to make
the big moneies. I'm a freelancer because I don't want someone to tell me
that I have to be at the office at nine o'clock. You know,
I have the same problem. Yeah, that's that's that's that's the only the
only reason. Yeah, I'm I'm like sleeping till noon every day. I
don't know when I last time set an alarm clock in my life. Yeah,
I and blogging is something I can do a really flexible. People are
like, oh, we need this blog post, and yeah, you have
like a week or two time to do this, because most people who are
doing tech blogging don't do this as their main job. They do it as
some some extra revenue source beside their developer job. And then the working hours
are flexible. I write when I want to, I write where I want
to, I write what I want to, and yeah, then it's it's
not badly paid, it's okay paid, and so I can can live from
this now. And the next thing I'm doing is because I'm mostly writing educational
blog posts about technology, I thought about doing some some real education, you
know, like with with real people sitting in front of me when I'm telling
them what they need to know, so I get a bit better feedback of
of them, you know, from them, because at the moment I'm it's
like I'm throwing out my knowledge in the Internet and something. Times people say
yeah, this is cool, and sometimes they say nothing, and sometimes I
hear most people didn't react in any way. And then years later I heard
some people they read something from me and they didn't even tell me or something.
It's like, you don't really know if you do good work or not.
So I saw that university here in Stuttgart was searching for an educator for
front end development for their design students, and I applied for this and they
were like, yeah, let's do this, and so in April, I
will teach people JavaScript in university and hope that I get better at teaching people
in general while doing so. Cool, very cool. Well, we're kind
of getting a ways into our interview. I'm if people want to find you
online and connect with you, where do they do that? I think Twitter
is the best. My Twitter handle is a bit hard to to pronounce,
like my name in general, I will write it into chat. That's my
Twitter handle K for why one s. People can also write emails to me
at K at k dot is if they're like to contact me about any I
don't know if they need a developer for mobile front end sybalist technology, or
if they need an educator or they just need someone to write blog posts for
them, they can write me, or if they need some pointers about learning
about programming in general. Yeah, so not not only business opportunities, but
also people who have some I don't know who need some pointers to learn about
programming or so can write me to awesome. All right, well, let's
let's go ahead and do some picks. Now, you were on the show
before we did picks, and it's just shout outs about stuff that we like.
So last night it might have been the night before. I think it
was the night before I started watching the latest season of The Expanse, And
so I'm gonna pick that because I I've been enjoying that. So the TV
show sci fi series the books are pretty good, probably better than the TV
show, but it's a close thing. Oh, so we can pick such
things too, Yeah, go for it. Yeah, what did I watch
the last week's I watched Undone, I think on Emerson Prime. It's an
animated TV show I like pretty much. If you liked the movie. How
is it called Scanner Dockley. It's it's like Escanna Dockley. It has the
same the same graphics, and it's also a bit crazy psychologically. This is
I'm a Shot a Shot show and I enjoyed it very much. Nice you
said that's on Amazon Prime. I think I watched it on Amazon Prime.
Yes, yeah, it looks like there is a show called Undone on Amazon
Prime. Yeah. It's some strange overdraw like in Scanna Escana dah. Yeah.
Okay, very cool. Well thanks for coming and chatting with me for
a few minutes. I'm really appreciate it. Yeah, sure, anytime,
all right, folks, So we're gonna go ahead and wrap this up.
It's always fun to catch up, and we'll be back next week in the
meantime, max out all right. Bandwidth for this segment is provided by cash
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