Richard Wols

I started my programming career with HTML5/CSS3 and had a natural preference for it due to a background in design. I have experience using multiple CSS preprocessors (SCSS, Less) and try to focus as much on these as possible. Capabilities: - Creating default shared styling to keep duplicate code to a minimum. - Using subtle animations and transitions for a smooth user experience. - Creating my own responsive guidelines opposed to importing heavy styling libraries. - Using semantic HTML for a clear and readable template structure.

I started with a creative mindset since I was little, which resulted in a bachelor degree in construction engineering & architecture. Here I spent around 4 years learning about design principles, visual design, and translating requirements into a logical design, albeit for a building. When I started working in software, I noticed there was not that much difference between this translation for an application. Since my goal was to become a programmer I focussed on coding, but I always kept doing side projects to keep my visual, ux, and ui design up to par. This allows me to have a combined 8 years worth of experience in a broad spectrum of design. I believe a single designer who makes an amazing design is rare, so I use these skills to support designers with their creative process. Abilities: • Applying Design Thinking to help clients formulate their problem statements and translate these into requirements and initial paper prototypes. • Using Photoshop to create visual graphics to enhance the look and feel of an application. • Researching references based on the character of a company and creating a styleguide based on that. • Using Illustrator to create low-fi designs and vector graphics optimized for web-performance.

I have had experience building simple Node back-ends as webservers to display web applications. Aside from this, I participated in multiple hackathons where this connected to multiple microservices from the IBM Cloud platform. Since one year I have started doing more full-stack development where I write my own complete applications including security, authentication and databases. Abilities: • Creating endpoints for the front-end. • Hooking up a MongoDB database and using Mongoose to set up the data models. • Writing middleware for e.g. security with jwt. • Writing nodeJS completely in Typescript and using appropriate compilers to compile this to the right JS version. • Creating a webserver using express.

I have a great interest in the blockchain technology and have worked on some of the biggest blockchain projects at IBM and high-potential blockchain startups. I focus mainly on writing the front-end of these blockchain applications, where great consideration needs to be made with the amount of API calls to the network. I have competed and won the biggest blockchain hackathon in the world two years in a row where I had a big role in the ideation of the validity of the blockchain use-case. I strongly believe that blockchain is an amazing technology for a few use-cases, but that currently many consultants don't see the difference between using blockchain and a centralized database. Abilities: • Explaining the workings of blockchain in a simple way. • Working with blockchain developers and understanding their tasks. • Optimizing front-end for working with a blockchain network.

I started with JavaScript 3 years ago to extend user-interfaces with advanced functionality. From that point I got hooked to writing functions which are readable to coders and non-coders alike. I have experience with multiple JavaScript frameworks such as jQuery, Meteor, AngularJS, React and Angular2+. I have a preference for Angular2+ or JavaScript natively, and primarily like to use JavaScripts' superscript called 'TypeScript' which is object oriented. Currently I have started dabbling with multiple online algorythm challenges to implement JavaScript solutions to mathematical problems which involve big numbers (e.g. 1.000.000.000). Abilities: • Using native JavaScript to create working applications with normal HTML and CSS. • Using DOM manipulation methods to select, alter, or add/remove element in the DOM. • Using the latest ES6 JavaScript functionality such as arrow functions and classes. • Making anything thinkable possible, because with JavaScript you can.

When I started with Angular (2) I instantly fell in love with it. Since then I have cherrypicked Angular projects to date and grown my familiarity with the latest versions of the framework. I have worked on Angular applications for global fortune 500 companies and promising startups. Aside from that, I create full-stack applications in my free time using Angular and experimenting with my own assets. Even though I have experience with multiple other frameworks, Angular to me has a few superior traits which align greatly with my own opinions about software development: - It forces the use of TypeScript, which creates errors before running the application and promotes typesafe programming. - It sets preferred standards opposed to flexibility, which in turn allows for quick onboarding and readability for other developers. This makes it perfect for large scale feature-rich applications. - It comes with many advanced functionality making it fast to create a working application. Capabilities: - Setting up the complete routing of an application including lazy-loading and route-guards. - Creating a re-usable component library for consistent design and re-usability of UI elements. - Creating re-usable API methods and intercepting these to include headers, enable loading spinners, etc. - Using Angular Universal to enable Server Side Rendering for improved pagespeed and better indexing from search engines. - Making a Single Page Application fully compatible for Search Engine optimisation. - Creating a state management system using Angular native shared services opposed to implementing libraries. - Turning an application into a Progressive Web App, making it downloadable for mobile phones as if it was an app.