When I started my journey as a Software Engineer back in 2011, I was asked to develop iOS applications. It was a small team, and I was joined as an intern, so I took the opportunity and to be honest, it was a wise choice. Working on Mobile projects, in my opinion, is always a good starting point for recently graduated or even students as it is easier to learn and still requires knowledge that helps newbies to get better in software development.
However, for many years, I’ve always wanted to accept more challenging responsibilities. Although I have had the chance to contribute to different projects including the backend, my high-priority assigned tasks have always been the iOS project. It didn’t matter how interesting assigned tasks were, which mainly were very challenging in their scale, they would never satisfy my soul as a software engineer. If you look into the Mobile Development industry, you’ll find a lot of articles and “patterns” that might seem very interesting, but using them on such small scales (most of the time, not always), is just a way to add some spices to boring tasks.
These are why I finally decided to take a big and important decision. I started learning some skills in my spare time, especially, in the low-level operating systems. I studied Linux Kernel and tried to take courses for debugging and learning it. I also tried to challenge myself in different ways, including configuring and installing Linux Kernel manually, writing simple Kernel modules, doing LittlePenguin challenges, etc. Eventually, all these steps paid off and I could get a very interesting offer from F-Secure as a Senior Developer mainly for the macOS team, where we go beyond user interfaces and deal with low-level concepts and the operating system more in-depth.
I am very thankful to Ninchat for the opportunity and trust they gave to me and helped me to learn much more than just what I had been asked to work on. Timo, a good friend I am so proud to had talks about both technical and soft skills with. I got so much product-wise knowledge from Antti and Hermanni, and I never forget our Linux discussions with Sami. Pallab, a great engineer taught me how to adopt different skills and be a great team player. Jaffa was a great friend helping me to finish my Master’s Thesis. And finally, Ville and Heini, who helped me during the most difficult days of my life with the best you can ever expect.