Multitasking and curious. Java Champion Mitya Alexandrov on the creation of the IT community, the "remote" and life

Lead architect, Java Champion, member of the JUG.RU program committee and organizer of the largest IT conference in the Balkans. This is not a cool startup team. These are the roles of one person - Mitya Alexandrov.

In our company, Mitya is one of those people whose example is inspiring. I heard his name from colleagues from the first days of work at T-Systems, and, of course, I was very worried before interviewing him.

Now Mitya lives in Sofia and works remotely, so we phoned him by video link. It turned out that I was worried in vain - talking with Mitya was easy and very interesting.




- Mitya, tell me how your professional path began?

- I always wanted to become a programmer. More, of course, as a pilot, but since childhood he coded on Basic and Pascal ... and somehow dragged on. At university, I took Java programming as an optional subject. I remember how this language was just becoming popular: I bought myself a Java 1.2 book., A 1,500-page brick that I even read through out of boredom.

My first job was also related to Java. My friends and I realized that this language can not only be used, but also bring something of our own. They gathered in cafes and coded. And then we got the idea to invite speakers and share experiences. This is now mitapas, pizza and all that every day everywhere. At that time, there were almost no professional meetings in the field of IT, but people already had a huge need for such a community. Therefore, when they gave us a free audience at Sofia University and said, do whatever you want, we began to read the reports ourselves, and the people tumbled down the crowd.

A few years ago, the five of us with friends created jPrime. February 3, 2015 decided to make an IT conference in Sofia. After 5 days, 6 large companies came to us and gave a lot of money. We had no experience, and we immediately sat down to write a site, because only that we knew how to do. But just three months later, in May, we made a full-fledged conference!

- Judging by the fact that jPrime is now the largest IT conference in the Balkans, did everything go well?

- Everything went like clockwork! We were supported by cool speakers from different countries, and 400 participants attended. Now 1000 people are already coming to us, and, most importantly, we have become a truly international project with a recognizable name.



- I watched tickets for jPrime 2020 and was very surprised: for a conference of this scale you have very low prices.

- Because profit is not our goal. We invest all income from jPrime in the following events and invest in the development of the IT community. The first conference brought us 200 euros. We spent them on beer to celebrate our success.

Working with the community is very motivating. There are no borders, neither geographical, nor ethnic, no. That is the whole point. Only the exchange of knowledge and experience. Several times a year we try to do free mini-conferences, bring up new speakers, invite "stars".

Recently, for working with the community, we received the Duke's Choice Award - a small Oscar in the Java world (smiles shyly) .

- Do not be shy, this is not your only reward. Few can claim the title of Java Champion. Tell me how you became one of them.

- Once I received an email: welcome to Java Champions! I thought it was some kind of joke. I looked at the calendar - like December, not April. Anyway, to become a Java champion, you need to apply. It turns out that Venkat Subramaniam, a guru in the Java world, did this for me. All members of the committee voted in favor, but I'm still not sure that I am worthy.

- What does it mean to be a Java Champion?

- In addition to recognition (laughs) , the title of Java Champion gives the right to attend all Oracle events and not only. So I went to San Francisco at the Code One conference, where there were 9,000 people. Elton John performed at afterparty, and even earlier - Aerosmith. But the main thing is the opportunity to meet personally with people who really create and develop the Java language and the entire ecosystem. It costs a lot!

By the way, this year Java marks 25 years. Few programming languages ​​can live that long, so the contribution of people to the development of Java is priceless. In my opinion, this is an unprecedented world example.

—You do not only attend and organize cool conferences, but you also make presentations yourself, you are a member of the JUG.RU program committee.

- Do you know how the lecture differs from the report?

- Hm, no.

- You can sleep at lectures.

Well, if without jokes, then I already participated in various conferences quite a lot, when I came to work at T-Systems. Colleagues offered to submit their report to Joker, and I really liked it. And then Alexey Fedorov and Andrey Dmitriev, the organizers of JUG.RU, invited me to join the program committee.
Do you know how this is done in America and Europe? A person submits his report, the program committee simply reads the topic and a brief description. All. In Russia, this is much cooler. We discuss the topic with the speaker, arrange rehearsals to make the presentation interesting, high-quality. When I was a speaker, they worked the same way with me.

Most of all, I like the fact that everyone remains in the black: we help the guys, share our experience and at the same time learn something from them. We have built a clear work process, and I get great pleasure from it.



- When I was preparing for the interview, I also found your technical blog. Perhaps you will write somehow for us on Habr?

“I already thought about that.” By the way, in January, my article about Java on the GPU was published in Java Magazine. This is a great honor for me.

- Mitya, congratulations! It is very cool. Articles, conferences, main work, community, travel. How do you do everything?

“I just don't sleep.” In fact, the secret is in asynchronous mode - it is much more efficient to build interaction with colleagues in it.

“It seems you mentioned him at one of the workshops.” Please tell us more.

- The idea of ​​an asynchronous approach is that an answer is not expected immediately. How can you concentrate on the task if someone writes to you every 5 minutes and you are obliged to answer that minute? And so he sent a letter and continued to work further on other tasks. For work, I usually respond within 3 hours.

Asynchronous approach is also one of the answers to the question why I work at T-Systems. Few companies can afford it. I can’t work with America in this mode, although I was certainly offered to try it. But too much time difference. And now, if I am in Sofia, between Russia and Germany, the difference in both directions is one hour.

- How did you end up in Sofia?

- It so happened that when I was in school, my dad was sent to Bulgaria to build a nuclear power plant. Since then, we began to live in 2 houses: Peter and Sofia. Now I am “wintering” in Bulgaria and working remotely.

- Home office is now a fashionable topic.

- Then we can say that I have been “in trend” for a long time: after 14 years old I was injured, I studied from home, and when I started working from the 2nd year and it was hard for me to get to the office, the company also went to meet .

Such work disciplines me very much. I always arrive on time for calls!

- Tell me, how did you come to T-Systems?

year 2014. St. Petersburg, summer. I have my own startup. Suddenly something pulled me to update my profile on hh.ru. I was immediately contacted by an HR specialist at T-Systems, and I thought: I’m going for an interview for fun, I’ll talk. It was a tough interview, but the very next day I received an offer. Unfortunately, since I was busy with my projects then, I asked to wait a year. Exactly one year, day after day, she called. And I thought, the first summer will finally rest ...

A week later, I was sent for a month on a business trip to Germany. Then I was Senior Developer, and now - Senior Architect.

Now I am working on a completely new project. I like to connect "at the start." Very few companies can afford to experiment, try something new. Here we are not outsourcers, we can make decisions ourselves. Here we think big. I like that.



- What inspires you to do so many projects?

“Just curiosity.”

- Mitya, thanks for the interview. We are waiting for you in St. Petersburg!

Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/undefined/