Hi there

So, here it is. My first post on this website. Not sure what I'm going to write about yet on this domain, but let's see. Why then, you might ask, would you set up this site? Because I feel like often I see something, read something, encounter a situation, that triggers an idea or opinion that I just need to get off my chest, want to get out in the world.

So there we are. My background in short? Software engineer by day, triathlete by night - well, early mornings and evenings, really. But my triathlon-related stuff you can find elsewhere, this blog is meant to be about software and its impact on the world around us. And it's really that last bit that intrigues me the most. With a bachelor's degree in Computer Science and a master's degree in Software Engineering, both from the University of Amsterdam, my technical foundation is solid. But it's the way tech impacts the physical, human world that intrigues me the most. Software can not be seen in isolation. Software development needs to serve a purpose; in a business it should pretty much always impact the bottom line somehow. Are we developing the right thing? Are we just implementing a feature as requested by the business, or are we trying to find and solve the deeper question? What about our software development process? Are we shipping as regular as we want, or what is holding us back? Are we efficient? Is everybody happy? What about tech debt? Should we fix it now, or do we keep pushing it back? What does the business win or lose on the short, mid and/or long term? How can we make the right decision?

These are just a few questions out of the many that keep my mind occupied during the day. Most of them have no definite answer in the general sense ("it depends..."), but sometimes, every once in a while, one of these questions triggers a train of thought - one could call it an insight - that I really just want to get out there. These trains of thought may be messy, I probably won't review my own writings too often, and I definitely won't run them through any AI minion*. Just some raw thoughts, that's what you can expect here.

* Although I'm a big fan of leveraging AI in my daily work, articles that I write under my own name need to stay 100% personal. I just like purity.