Hello, and welcome to my CV.
My name is Ivan and I currently work and live in Croatia, Europe. I've recently graduated (October, 2011) with a master's degree in computer science from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in Zagreb, Croatia.
However, I've been professionally programming for over 4 years, starting with a part-time job and later moving into various full-time positions. In March 2009, I started a sole proprietorship which I've been running since, and through which I've been working as a freelancer / consultant for several companies.
If you're in a hurry, here's my relevant work experience, in reverse chronological order:
May, 2011 - now:
ShoutEm, one of the leading mobile application builders in the world. I've been working on the iPhone part of the platform as the lead iPhone developer.
Check out the website for more information, and here are some iTunes links:
Mobilizer, where you can test any apps you create on www.shoutem.com
and several applications built on the platform:
September, 2010 - April, 2011:
Gamepires, a new game development studio here in Zagreb, on their first project called Gas Guzzlers. I mostly worked on the toolset for the engine and the game - the level and material editors. This was all C++. For various reasons - perhaps most importantly, because I realized I I didn't want to work on AAA full-blown 3D games - I didn't stay for too long, but I've had a unique experience and made some friends along the way.
January, 2010 - September, 2010:
Five Minutes Ltd., the "parent" company of ShoutEm (ShoutEm was initially started there, but later branched into a separate entity). My first longer-term freelancing deal, I've worked as an iPhone developer for a couple of their clients: RealNetworks from Seattle and AppSmart from London.
March, 2009 - January - 2010:
Started my own sole proprietorship. During this period, I have worked for several, mostly USA clients on smaller iPhone projects. Most notable was the cooperation with Marroni Electronic Entertainment on iLikeCereal!! - a toy / game where you can play with cereals floating in milk, and iBailout!!, which is a Pac-Man-type game with a few twists and a satirical theme about the bailouts during the recent USA recession. It was published by Hands-On Mobile.
May, 2008 - March, 2009:
AVL-AST, at their Croatian branch. It's a position I will remember the most for having worked with some of the most talented developers I have ever met. I've been working in Python (which I have learned there) on a part of their core development framework. This was a student job (3 days per week) where I've gained invaluable knowledge from the smarter and more experienced than myself.
In my spare time during this period, I had also developed and released my first iPhone project, Sleek. Sleek is not available on the AppStore anymore, but you can see a video of it here: Sleek. This was the first Croatian iPhone app / game that was released in the AppStore.
June, 2007 - May, 2008:
Soko Z.I., on an unmanned aircraft control station. Also a student job (3-4 days per week), marked by using bad technologies (MFC) and working with great people. The project itself was interesting though and I've learned a lot about deadlines, managing a big code base and dealing with external devices. The company has since closed.
Earlier jobs:
Before Soko Z.I., I had worked as a game developer in a small company on gambling machines for a few months, but they disliked paying the developers for their work so I left quickly.
Prior to that, in 2006, I worked at CARNet (Croatian academic network) in technical support call center. That was my first official job. It wasn't programming, but it was useful talking to people who weren't tech-oriented and listening to their problems, trying to explain technical terms using a normal language and being patient with customers who want to talk about their dogs :)
During my first year of college, I developed my first commercial game, called Bluerows. It was a logic / puzzle game and it was sold as shareware on BigFishGames. I had pulled it from the site several months later, because it was picked up by a retail publisher here in Croatia. It can still be found on the shelves of some Croatian supermarkets.
In high-school, I worked as a game developer for a really cool small company which was producing custom gambling machines, and I worked on several RentACoder projects.
Programming competitions
I started competing in the 7th grade, when I won the 16th position in the state-level competition. Next year, in the 8th grade, I won the 4th place.
In high-school, I won the 6th place in my 2nd year and 5th place in my 3rd year.
Skills and technologies
Programming languages:
- Objective-C (3 years, excellent)
- Python (8 months at AVL, intermediate - although a bit rusty)
- C++ (10 months at Soko, 6 months at Gamepires, many of my own projects, intermediate)
- Ruby (in my spare time, beginner)
- JavaScript (in my spare time, beginner)
- SQL (in my spare time, beginner)
Libraries, SDKs, APIs and frameworks:
- iOS SDK (3 years, excellent)
- Cocos2D (iBailout!!, several other contract projects, very good)
- OpenGL ES (Sleek, iLikeCereal!!, my side projects, intermediate)
- OpenCL (my master thesis, beginner to intermediate)
- MFC (used it a long time ago, beginner)
- Rails (in my spare time, beginner)
- Mac SDK (in my spare time, beginner)
Tools:
- Xcode (3 years, excellent)
- Git (2 years, intermediate to very good)
- Photoshop (several years, intermediate)
- Subversion (1 year, intermediate)
- Visual Studio (3-4 years prior to iOS, very good - though I'd prefer not to work with it again)
Other:
- SCRUM methodologies (ShoutEm)
- solid ability to write technical and other documentation (all)
- plenty of experience in estimating time and cost for a project (mostly while freelancing)
- project planning (freelancing)
- interfacing with web services (ShoutEm and other iOS projects)
- solid understanding of data structures and algorithms (programming competitions and all work experience)
- working with and configuring Linux/Unix machines (in my spare time + I've worked on Linux during my position at AVL, basics)
Current interests
Right now I'm focused on iOS development, which I'm enjoying very much. I started working with the SDK as soon as I could get my hands on in, in August 2008. Looking forward to new exciting projects and opportunities to learn, I'm aware technologies come and go, getting replaced with newer and better ones (for the most part). I firmly believe knowledge of specific technologies, although very important, doesn't make a good programmer. With that in mind, I don't consider myself tied to any particular technology and I'm constantly learning something new (Rails and other things related to web development at the moment). One thing I'd like to keep for the foreseeable future if by any means possible is the Mac as my development platform.
Aside from programming, I'm very interested in many other aspects of business, from marketing and product development to customer support and design. That's why I try to keep close to startups, where I can get a chance to learn and work on many different things in the company.
In my spare time, I cook a lot and I'm currently developing an iPhone / iPad app around that.
I love simplicity and elegance, happy customers, great products and water - ocean, sea, rivers, lakes, rain... I hate mediocrity, all things ugly and cold weather :)
Why you should hire me
At the end of any resume, this question is what it comes down to. Not everyone is a good fit for every company and while neither of us will know until we learn more about each other, here are some of the reasons why you may or might not want to hire me.
You may want to hire me because:
- You need a really good developer. No false modesty here; if I thought I was bad, I'd either improve (well, I'm trying to improve all the time, anyway) or be doing something else, and you have no use for false modesty either. I'm no ninja and I certainly don't feel like a rock star, but I think I'm pretty good, and getting better. I'll stop now and let my past references and future work speak instead :)
- You need a strong individual who can work as a team player. I can work independently, but when needed I'm always ready and happy to help a team member or do whatever is in the best interest of the team and company.
- You want someone who'll do what needs doing instead of saying "it's not my job". I can't (and don't want to) do everyone's job, but I'll jump in when I can, and always try to propose solutions instead of just complaining about the problems.
- You want someone who can communicate like a human being. This should go without saying, but is worth mentioning in our industry, I think.
- I'm always ready to learn and improve, I'm competitive and constantly striving to keep on top, which means your team has a better chance of keeping on top, too.
- If I commit to a project or company, I'm fully dedicated and do my best to help. I never work just waiting for the month to go by.
You might not want to hire me because:
- You want a code monkey. I seek interesting problems and challenges; there are other people who'll be happy to just sit and mindlessly type all day thinking about how they'll drink a beer afterwards, but not me (not that I don't like me a beer afterwards :) ). Every job has more and less interesting parts, there's no avoiding that. But if you need someone to produce meaningless code, please move on.
- You want someone who just codes 24/7. That's not me, I'm sorry. I work hard, but constantly working overtime is of no use to either of us. I get unhappy, demotivated, hate my work, lose concentration and do a bad job. You get poor quality, a bunch of problems in the present and in the future, unhappy team and you lose developers. A real need to finish something by a particular date for everyone's benefit can happen from time to time. That's ok, as long as it's not a routine.
You can also check out my LinkedIn profile here:
http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=10153036&trk=tab_pro
Have more questions? Drop me a line:
ivan.galic [atsign] gmail dot com
nightition (skype)
