My Timeline
A life made of ups and downs, happiness and sadness, love and respect and some good and bad decisions…
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Around the 70s
A soon to be Software Developer was born
Sorry but Online Privacy and Online Security prohibits me from being more detailed about my birth date and some other dates :).
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From 1988 to 1991
Programming with Basic and Pascal in School
I decided to choose a technical course about Computers and guess what? I fall in love with Programming in a Bull 1Mhz, with only 1 diskette of 5 1⁄2 inches and MS-DOS… what a good time I was having :)
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From 1991 to 1998
Initiation in Professional World
During this period I initiated my path into the professional world. I tried several professions and neither of them have give me the desired work/life balance that will guarantee a decent quality of life. In the end of this period unemployment was also a new experience for me. I took this time to complete course where I learned how to setup my own Business, one of my aspirations for years.
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From 1998 to 2006
My own Business - Lots of Work and almost no Holidays :(
Running your own Business requires lot of work, work and more work to survive and try to keep the Business running during the ROI period. Unfortunately the Portuguese crisis was getting worse and the cash flow was very low. During 2005 I decided that it was time to try to turn things around. So while keeping the current Business I decided to start selling used cars as a side activity to bring some more cash flow.
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8 of December 2006
Meet the Love of my Life
I was living very hard times in my professional life, but hey, not everything was bad during this period because I discovered the true ♥ of my life. Oh boy, now I can understand why all my friends changed when they fall in love… this is a new dimension, where we start seeing things differently, our priorities change a lot and other things start to matter for us. Thank you my love to come into my life.
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From 2006 to 2008
Reinventing my own Business
The side activity of selling used cars quickly became the main income of my Business. I decided to move to a better location in order to have the proper conditions to sell used cars, but life is hard when we do not have a good bank account. Working 7 days a week for 10 to 12 hours was necessary to keep things running because my debts where very high. By 2008 the Portuguese crisis was very severe to the point that I was not able to approve credits for selling my used cars. The only option was to close the Company that cost me so much money and many hours during the last 10 years of my life. This was the hardest decision to make in my life because it was implied to loose my house to the Bank. The love of my life and my parents were my salvation during this hard times… I can’t express how grateful I am to them.
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During 2009
Time to turn things around.
By nature, I am an optimist and Business was always in my veins. It was time to try to embrace the new trend of e-commerce, so I decided to build an online store to sell after market car parts. To achieve that I decided to use the Prestahop e-commerce platform, but very soon I discovered that lots of customization were needed and no money available to pay for them, so guess what… I started to dig in the code and my passion about programming was reborn and a new future for me was starting, without my own knowledge.
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During 2010
Dead end in my Online Store project
Due to a lack of interest in my suppliers to give all necessary data to build the Online Car Catalog, the project was dead, but the knowledge in developing with Php, Html, Css and some Javascript was already absorbed. By this time I was the only Prestashop Moderator for the Portuguese speaking community and this contributed further to my interest in programming.
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From 2010 until 2013
Starting my Freelancer career
To my surprise some users started to request price quotes and deadlines for me to develop features or quickly solve some of their issues. So it was time to start a Freelancer career as Developer during the day and maintain my door to door salesman job in the evening.
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May 2013
Difficult time requires drastic decisions
The crises in Portugal was so severe, that my 2 jobs, Freelancer and Salesman, where not enough to pay all bills. My 420 litre fridge was almost empty! I ended up seeing my wife holding the fridge door and crying… So difficult times require drastic decisions, therefore was time to pursue the career of my dreams and UK was the chosen destination.
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October 2013
Scotland here I come to try my luck
A Portuguese friend was already living in Scotland, near Edinburgh, and invited me to stay in his home until I was able to find a job. The decision was hard to make but I decided to make the move without bringing my wife until I was sure that I had a secure job and the money was enough for both of us to have a decent life in Scotland. So in beginning of October I arrived here. My situation was so bad economically that even though I wanted to be a Software Developer, I was willing to embrace any other profession in order to be able to survive… going back to Portugal was definitely not an option.
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From 2013 until 2018
My dream of being a developer became a reality
Only after 5 weeks in Edinburgh and 3 interviews I ensured my current job as Software Developer at NN4M, the leading company for transactional Mobile Apps in UK. I was very lucky that my life have crossed with Lorraine, Caroline and Jonathan Heap, the owners of NN4M, after a reply to a Gumtree job posting. Their support during the 2 times I was in hospital was amazing. My dream of working in what I most love was is now real.
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From 2018 until now
Departing to a new challenge
Since my earlier days as a software developer I don’t understand why things are not secure by default. At my previous role I was known to be obsessed with security, therefore the new role of Developer Advocate for Security in APIs and Mobile Apps comes as a natural progression on my career. I am a strong believer of security as an opt-out, not as an opt-in, and if your aren’t yet of the same opinion I would like to have a chance to change your mind.
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Who Knows the Future?
