Recently, I had the pleasure of attending the Chain React conference in Portland, Oregon, hosted by the nice folks over at Infinite Red. It’s a React Native-focused conference, hosting talks by those who work on the core team, members of the open-source community, and developers who use the framework in their everyday work. Here at […]

In my free time, I like to play Dungeons and Dragons with a group of friends. It’s a fun way to keep in contact with friends who don’t live near me. It gives us a space to create our own adventures. It’s great for de-stressing, exercising our creative energies, and just having fun together. But […]

Many people want to become software developers. Some of those people, like me, have decided to change their career in order to pursue that passion. The great news is that it can be done! However, it is by no means easy. I wanted to share my non-traditional process of becoming a professional software developer through […]

Creative problem solving. Collaboration and communication. Working calmly under pressure. These are traits that can make for a good developer or just a good coworker in general. They also happen to be excellent qualities for breaking out of an escape room!

Today, I’d like to share a story about how one of my wizard mentors taught me a new skill (test-driven development) and really got it into my brain. Not by lecturing me or forcing me to do it, but by patiently, persistently encouraging me to grow.

When I graduated and started at Atomic, I had a lot of anxiety because I felt like I was surrounded by wizards. I’ve spent the last three years learning to think like a wizard, to conjure joy from pain and cast protection spells over the important things. I finally feel like I’ve grown into a […]

At Atomic, our managing partners do most of our official pre-project consulting (sales) work. As a developer, I’m dedicated full-time to a client project. So I’m typically not involved in meeting new clients, and I wasn’t aware of how projects and clients come to Atomic.

Are you a software designer or developer looking to connect with others in West Michigan? How about an owner of a software consultancy who would like some exposure to potential new employees? Maybe you lead a department of software designers and developers and would like to expose them to new ideas?

I just finished my first year here at Atomic, which also happens to be my first year as a professional software consultant and developer. It was quite a year. I worked on five different projects during that time. The longest lasted seven months, and the shortest, only a week. I’ve gotten crash courses in not […]