Paul Labis: This is a personal blog where everyone can read my experiences, ideas and thoughts about programming, latest gadgets and other information technology related topics, lifestyle and many other stuff I would like to share to the public.

About

First of all, I would like to start by explaining my motivations and a little background on me. I'm starting this blog as a way to motivate myself, to do more than the usual, and to gain experience and hopefully help others along the way. 

I find myself in need of something which can only be had by not being in need of it. It is otherwise known as catch-22 logical paradox. As a developer in a software company and after all days spent developing applications, I made an important realizations of my current situation. In a software industry, for you to be able to move forward, you need experience. But, to gain experience, you need to move forward. I am putting myself in an extreme difficult position wanting and needing to learn new technologies and gain experience from it which I feel like not happening as I imagined years ago!

I am in the process of resolving it and I have a game plan. First, I will create tutorial articles through this blog. I found this valuable to me for gaining knowledge on technologies and serves as a motivation to helping others. Second, I'll be looking and participating in Open Source projects to gain more experience and build connections or  a network with various experienced developers from whom I can gleam knowledge.

I don't know where this will end up or take me. Hopefully this will result in me making connections and gaining relevant experience and knowledge needed to move my career forward.

The about me:

Paul Labis
I'm someone who came to software in their 12th. As far as I could remember, I first touched a computer back when I am 11 years old. When my family moved from province to city proper, my aunt neighbour  has a computer at home, from there my cousin instructed me how to operate a computer to the point were I learned word processing and dismantling computer hardware for upgrades and cleaning. 

From that day on, I got interested on science and technology. My very first application was a profiling system built with Foxpro during my high school days. I hardly remember what Foxpro version that I was using though. It was followed by several applications built with  technologies such as HTML, Php, JavaScript, CSS, Visual Basic, Access and MySQL databases. 

I was quite good in understanding technology and how it applies to improve business process. That may have explained why I was one of the few Information Management students awarded  in "Best in Business Software Development" during the Ateneo de Cagayan University graduates  Recognition Day of 2008. However,  without my team's hardwork, frustrations and commitment on our thesis project, the award wouldn't be possible. So, let me thank again the people who were involved, Eric Suarez, Cris Casinillo, Ryan Keh and Mitzi Bringas for doing their best on our thesis project Sales and Inventory  Management System (SIMS). The comradeship we've experience had been very memorable.

My first professional job after graduation was as a Junior Software Engineer at Orange and Bronze Software, Labs. which is known as a company of elite and kick-ass Filipino Java Developers headed by Calen Martin Legaspi in Makati City, Philippines. I got lucky though to be employed. They got my interest when they came to the Information Technology Convention held in Cagayan de Oro City, where they discussed about Java and IT Employment.

Since I started working in the company, I learned how to be a good developer and what separates us from others. I learned never before heard topics from the university which are Good Programming Practices (GPP), Implementation Patterns, Test Driven Development (TDD), Code Standards, Agile Software Development, SCRUM, various Java Frameworks and many, many more... 


Currently, I work for Social Media Science, Inc.(SMS) as a software engineer. SMS is known globally as industry leader in areas related to online visibility and promotions. Its products and services are one of worlds leading and most advanced, automated systems in field of online social media. It was founded by Tom Rozof, Chales Heflin and Joerg Weishaupt in 2009. 

So, here I am now. I'm still Software Engineer and hungry to learn more. I'm finding my way towards accomplishing my goals and moving my career another step forward in a way I know would probably work. I hope to share my intelligence and experience in technology and life with you all, and maybe help you in one way or another. Good luck!

Regards,
Paul Michael Labis