Gino Jongenelen

GJ-WebDev

First of all, let's be honest: I wasn’t good at coming up with company names. Ten years ago I started programming in PHP and HTML to create basic websites. I learnt the basics by myself, but then I started to create bigger systems (invoicing systems). I dont even dare to look at that code anymore. OOP wasn’t a thing, frontend was a lot of jQuery-functions (all at global scope), and I was hosting websites on a single-disk NAS. Shame on me... (Never had any data-loss though!)

PushTo.Space

After the GJ-WebDev-era I learned a lot about real programming. I also came up with a better name, so I changed from GJ-WebDev to PushTo.Space (2010). I used the knowledge I harvested in my study and KOLLEKT.FM to create a online platform that combines the best of all the hosting providers (CloudFlare, GCP, AWD, domain registrars, mail-providers, etc.). My goal was to let regular people (non-geeks) to launch a website with a decent infrastructure, High-Availability, AutoBackup, DDOS mitigation and all of that for the lowest price possible. The frontend was built in AngularJS, but migrated to React as soon as I found out how cool it was. The backend was a bit more complex. Because of the low-level actions which had to be done in the infrastructure, I had limited choices per environment. That is why the managing backend was built in PHP, some workers were built in NodeJS (love that btw), Python, basic Bash scripts and eveything was communicating in real-time through a HA MQTT cluster.
Besides this development, I was also a freelancer at various companies with great projects. Because there was a secret-clausule in all the contracts which I created, I cannot name companies I worked with. What I can tell is that the projects varied from systems to maintain doctor appointments (region-wide), mobile app for embedded devices, setting up a companies IT infrastructure, and many more. Sure, sometimes I had to drive an hour to fix someones internet uplink or wake up at 4am to fix a failing server, but it was worth it. I learned a lot about closing deals, how coorperations work, and how to be a great value for them.

I had a lot of responsibilities at DAZA. Besides being the main developer in the company I was also the IT-specialist. The servers for file-hosting and email were my thing. I realised several projects at DAZA. For example, I created a online-system to maintain assembly-manuals (written in React, PHP and mobilized with Cordova), a gateway which sends messages from the RF-environment to an online location (Built in C++ on an ESP32) and a cloud-platform which is able to replace an old legacy nurse-call-systems. This platform was built in Angular4, the backend was built in PHP and NodeJS (Doctrine ORM), hosted on Docker/AWS and ran with workers on the background. The frontend-data was real-time powered by Websockets.

I was young, eager and wanted to evolve into a great developer. Because of this mentality I got invited to work for KOLLEKT.FM to work on their music platform as a backend engineer. Coming with little to offer, aside from some backend knowledge, I started as a volunteer. I learned a lot about startups, how they work and how they’re ran (on a small scale). My knowlegde became bigger and bigger, so I got hired within months. At that moment the real game started and I was working with great responsibilities. Managing and developing the backend (PHP on Eloquent ORM), server infrastructure (Docker and Rancher on AW), promoting the company (Rockstar demo’s), it was great.
Unfortunately the business model didn’t seem to be as profitable as thought, so that had to be changed. KOLLEKT.FM switched to the in-store music branch. Which led to a important mobile app (the music player itself). The app was build in React, but my knowledge of React wasn’t that great at that time. So I got a React-mentor who learned me everything about React, Redux and state-management. Not long after I learned React, I was forced to leave KOLLEKT.FM because I didn't have enough time to focus on my study. My React learning-curve didn't stagnate though! I always kept good contact with the guys, because my time at KOLLEKT.FM was informative and awesome!