Meet the team - Niels
One by one we introduce all Unc Inc-ers to you. Last time it was our visual designer Caryn, now it's Niels' turn. Niels is one of our developers, or more specifically "Full Stack Developer", which means he takes care of both the frontend and backend of development work.
Who is Niels?
Niels lives in Beverwijk and spends most of his time in and near water. He does water polo; teaches and practices it, and is also a referee. He does not see it as obligations because he is part of a great group of water polo playing friends.
Let's start with Caryn's question
Caryn: If you could choose a movie or series that you could erase from your memory so that you could watch it for the first time and experience it all over again, which one would it be?"
Niels: "Tricky question! If I have to choose a movie it would be a classic that has made a lot of impression, like Shawshank Redemption or American History X. And Game of Thrones is a series I look forward to every time. It has a high entertainment value that I would like to experience for a lot longer."
What makes working at Unc Inc fun?
"The flat hierarchy. The culture here is accessible and friendly and everyone is allowed to think about everything. This makes you feel at ease and you dare to give input more easily. I am not a designer but if I have a particular idea or opinion about the design of a project I am working on, I am heard."
What project were you working on last week?
"I worked on the Microbit project. This is a platform for school students that allows them to learn programming. We are developing the website where students and teachers can take online video courses. We think this is a very good initiative and therefore we are happy to support this foundation.
For this project, I set up the development environment, the backend. This is a structure, or a kind of framework that my colleagues Boaz and Kim could work with. They are doing the frontend within this project. After it was ready, I did an extra check. We always do this, so we can be sure that no errors have crept in anywhere. After this, I was able to put the website live."
Can you name one of your projects that you are proud of?
"One of the projects I'm proud of is Rush Hour, a leading label and record store. We are developing a new platform and webshop that allows them to improve their digital sales and serves as a Point of Sales (POS) in the physical store. All the information about the records they sell or have sold can be found in that online store.
We are tackling this agile, which means we are implementing changes in phases. Every month we pick up a different part. This is especially important because we already have an old website, completely filled with data, including 95,000 records. And we can't go live with the new website and shop until all that data and functionality has been transferred. And for this, we developed a script to migrate all the old content to the new shop."
Where do you get your inspiration?
"I think every developer does follow Hacker News. And besides that, we share a lot here on the shop floor. We do this mainly through Slack."
And, of course, we have to ask about food!
Food runs like a thread through Unc Inc's existence. Sandwiches are Niels' specialty. Once, for example, he made paninis for the whole office as a special lunch.
What does your favo tosti look like Niels? "My favo tosti is one with ham and cheese, with a layer of red pesto underneath. A kind of mini pizza actually."
Who do you point to next and what would you like to ask him or her?
"I would like to put forward Floris de Langen, our creative director. I found out that Floris spends a lot of time in his garden. So my question to him is; what does your ideal garden look like?"