Icetips News Network
| News & Bios | Archives | Icetips Software Products | About Icetips.net |
Icetips News Network | |||
| News & Bios | Archives | Icetips Software Products | About Icetips.net |
|
Bio: Steven Spierenburg 21-Aug-2002 -- Susan Pichotta For this week's INN Bio, we visit Europe again and meet a former professional (and Army) cook. Now a programmer, he's spent time working with Clarion & IBM AS400s, and building (or not?) websites. I definitely agree with his "who I admire most", and check out the photo showing a Microsoft billboard in a rather unlikely place. 
Who do you work for?Well, I'm in the middle of changing things, work wise. I quit my job a few weeks ago and am in the process of working for myself (again). The company I recently worked for is an AS400 company, selling ERP software to small and middle-sized companies. Software is written in RPG and running on AS400's. About three years ago I was hired to do e-commerce for them, mainly building websites for existing customers. This proved to be a challenge, to say the least<g>. It turned out that customers of the company were rather…conservative. Not the quickest lot to give you orders to build something as exciting as a website. So there's less work than anticipated and sitting idle can be fun for only a certain amount of time. Time to leave. The (new and not so new) company I'm involved in has been around for a while and is called "Panta Relatiebeheer BV". It's a company I started with my brother, Erik, about 5 to 6 years ago and was then named "Vista Software Engineering". After about 1 year we hired a fellow called Diederik den Hollander. Not being able to pay the guy on a regular basis and seeing he put a lot of time and effort into the company we made him an equal partner of, well basically a non-profit organisation Turns out that the guy became a very good friend of mine and here we were, the Three Amigos, working incredibly hard and living off dog food, so to speak. Looking every bit like the characters of the movie, having fun but not earning enough to feed the cat. Well, actually,
Well, like I said above, three years ago I was employed by the same company that took over Vista and we where together again! Three Amigos Part II: the undiscovered country. Learned a lot there and although there were some points of discussion and irritation, we had fun. That is, until Diederik left the company and I lost interest and motivation to stay there as well. I tried to hold on and make something out of it but could 'nay supply the power captain'. All the while that this was going on there was still a piece of software alive and kicking, the part the AS400 Company was not interested in when buying Vista. It's called "Panta Relatiebeheer" (for people who are interested: www.panta98.nl) and it's a CRM package. A man called Han Brugmans who believed in this software so much that he was/is willing to bet all on it to make it a success sold this software while the Three Amigos were employed elsewhere. We decided to form a new company (yep, Panta Relatiebeheer BV) and put all rights in there and make all four of us equal shareholders. Now this company is where I'll put all my time and effort into, as it seems to thrive and be successful against all odds. Imagine, hardly any work has been done on it in years and only 1 person to sell it and it's selling! Imagine what would/could happen if we put all our shoulders into it full-time and become active in it again? We'll see… This was the short version of the story. Anyone interested in the long story will have to wait until Amazon sells the book<vbg> What do you like best about what you do now?
We are currently making a transition from TPS files to MySQL for our CRM package. This proves to be quite an undertaking and has its 'quirks' along the way. But thanks to our own ingenuity and the helpful Clarion community we'll make it happen. Failure is not an option<g>! What has been one of your biggest challenges in using Clarion? That has to be the GUI Part. Clarion has always had a different perception on how to handle the GUI, be it the IDE or be it the software it allows you to create. It's different than how a lot of other software does it; specifically the way Microsoft presents things to the user. This proves to be challenging in the way you sell the software you create and how users interact with your software. It would be nice if the GUI widgets could comply to the standards that have been set and will be set. Of course there's the 3rd party market that tries to fill this gap, but to me this is something Clarion has to do natively. What has been one of your biggest challenges in business? Making money and keeping my sanity. Do you use any computer languages besides Clarion? I did program in Clipper for a period in time and almost liked that as well as I liked using Clarion. Clarion was 2.1 for DOS and Clarion 3.0 was about to emerge. To continue working in 2.1 was not an option anymore as the user market became more demanding and 3.0 was…well it was a horror<g>. So we moved to Clipper at the time and used it well enough. Very expandable and I like the debugger. Tears come to me eyes when I think about that one. If only we could have a debugger like that, the joy. Any debugger we can use without being forced to make a decision to either launch a rocket to the Moon or to inspect a variable (i.e. usable) would do. When did you start using Clarion? Well, in 1988 my brother co-owned a company called Advantage Software and started to import a software development tool called Clarion. I was just out of the Army and was being employed in the company my mother had set up with a partner. I was given the choice to see if I liked the hardware part of IT or the software part. I installed a couple of Novell networks in those days and started to use software to automate stuff for the business. My Mother, besides being the sales person she was, programmed a bit in Omnis for internal bookkeeping and inventory needs. She made nice software; you could see her personality in the GUI and handling parts<g>. It made sense to her, but could be a strain to others who wanted to use it ;-) That got me interested and started I programming in Omnis. Only it didn't last long, about a couple of weeks. I got a phone call from my brother telling he got this new and exciting program language called Clarion and how this would be a perfect opportunity for me to start and learn programming, the right way (Omnis was more of a form designer than a language). I swung by (his company was about 500 meters away from my Mothers) and picked up a copy right away, got back in the basement (poor me, that was the only room left in the building, sob) and installed Clarion.
Try to imagine the skyline of Manhattan, totally GUI'd onto the screen with the screen designer, all ASCII and monochrome. You had to find a building or a window inside a building to activate a procedure in the application! Of course, mice only existed on the floor of the basement where I was working in those days, so you could Tab-Key your way through the so-called menu instead of point-and-click, but man, it was horrible. I remember when I showed it to my brother and Peter & Arie Rens (they were co-owners of Advantage at the time, we go way back!) and the look on their faces. On the one hand they thought it was cleverly done and a decent exercise of just how far you could push the Clarion screen designer, on the other hand they could hardly suppress snickers and smiles about the un-usability of it all. I felt proud and stupid at the same time. I lost the application and I'm still sorry for it. That was one I would have wanted to keep for future generations. What's the coolest project(s) you've worked on using Clarion? Difficult to choose or say actually. I'll go for a project in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. Diederik was developing and maintaining an application in Dar Es Salaam and occasionally had to go abroad to do on site programming. It was software to track import/export of second hand clothing. Last year he had to go to Dar again and didn't feel like it, he had to go alone and I guess he was not looking forward to being alone there. I thought about it and thought "you know, I like working with him, it's a totally different place than I've ever been to, work wise, and perhaps I can get to see something of Africa to boot". I took two weeks off and went to go work with him. We made a deal with the owner of the business over there. Ten days of hard work and 4 days of R&R in the nature. That was great! We had to program from dusk till dawn, programming like men possessed. One day I had the flu, had it bad, kept working and saw things floating around me<g>. But it was cool and it was fun. People looked up to you because you did 'something magical' and sitting outside in the sun on coffee breaks, watching the people walk by looking amazed at you, women in wonderfully colourful clothing walking by proudly. It was almost mystical and magical. It was unreal at times. Have you done anything for a living other than software development? Yes, I was a market trader (occupation of my dad and grandfather) and a Cook. I took courses in being a market trader, but didn't quite get it, what the fun was and abandoned it after ½ year. The most serious profession I did and was quite determined to become was being a cook/chef. I went to school for it and worked in restaurants to practice. I loved the profession and enjoyed it thoroughly. But there was this environment you had to work in and that didn't appeal to me. It's a harsh, brutal and quite unfriendly environment. Believe me, if you have ever seen the comedy "Chef!" on the BBC, you'll know what I'm talking about
On a side note, here's some logic that the Army seems to employ: I was due to be called to duty in the Army and had just decided that the professional cooking environment was not for me and I didn't want to have anything to do with cooking for a while. So here I arrive at the testing facility to be tested if I was physically and mentally fit enough to serve in Her Queens Army. At the end of the test there was a little conversation with a lieutenant and at one point he asked: 'what do you want to be when we enlist you in the Army?' Well, I answered 'anything you want me to be as long as I don't have to cook!' Guess what I had to do when the call to arms came? Yep, I was a platoon cook for 14 months<vbg>. It was Ok though. Never had to beg for food, people like you when you control the food and in the field it was actually quite rewarding. On the barracks you were under the command of a civilian cook who didn't give a sh*t if the food tasted good or not, but in the field you were your own man, you made it good or bad. Every time we were on manoeuvres we got compliments from the soldiers about how good the food was, better than in the barracks. What are your hobbies/what do you like to do when you're not using Clarion? Several things. I still love preparing and cooking food. And within that broad range of things to do in the kitchen, I like making ice cream the best! I got my own ice cream maker (self freezing unit, semi-professional) and about 4 books on making ice cream, sorbets and sherbets. When I make ice cream you'll notice the difference between that stuff I make and the ones you buy in the supermarket, if I may be so arrogant<g>. The other hobby I have an almost fetish-like obsession with turning my house into an audio and video super node that would put NASA to shame and they'd hire me as an consultant to do all things audio and video on any mission to Mars<vbg>! Seriously, I had a heck of a time getting video to work on my PC, kicking it wirelessly to my TV through a TV-out card and a wireless transmitter/receiver, having audio flood
To top it all of I have a webpadd (Star Trek, here I come!) that has a wireless card and controls the screen of either the Server or the work PC through VNC and thus allows me to control WinAmp and the play lists I want to choose. And then there is the wireless remote control-to-control ZoomPlayer whenever I play video's on my TV (the PC is not in the same room as the TV or stereo, but you should have guessed that by now). My girlfriend recently said that this is enough; I think that's unfair of her. Married, children, grandchildren, other close family you want to mention? Well, I mentioned my girlfriend several times and with reason (although she should let me buy more gadgets, it's just not fair *sniff*). She is my soul mate and life long buddy. I wouldn't be the same person I am today if it wasn't for her. Sounds like a cliché but I mean it, she altered my perception on fundamental parts of life and made me appreciate things floating by unnoticed before I met her.
Then there are my friends without whom life would be dull and mediocre. Thanks to all of them for being around and caring! Where were you born? Amsterdam, The Netherlands Where do you live now? Amsterdam, The Netherlands What's interesting about where you live? Hey, its Amsterdam, The Netherlands! Seriously, I love this town. I live next to a canal and have a spacious view of several 'Amsterdamse School' buildings. The atmosphere is great and I generally love living in a big town, although by some standards it is a small/medium-sized village. Architecture is generally nice and old. Have you lived any other interesting places? Didn't I just say I lived in Amsterdam, The Netherlands<vbg>? Is there more than that? But no really, I always lived in Amsterdam, apart from growing up in a village called Wilnis about 25 kilometers from Amsterdam for 15 years, but I'll never forgive my parents for that omission. Shame on them! Oh yeah, I lived in Almere, 25 kilometers from Amsterdam, for about three years but I always pretend that didn't happen, so we'll ignore that. Nope, Amsterdam it is for me, nothing more, nothing less<vbg>! Been around the World a bit and seen lots of interesting and beautiful places, but I'm always so glad to be back in my own town. Which person, from past or present, do you most admire and why? Not a single person. I admire the faceless/unnoticed people that made history. People like the soldiers that fought for our freedoms during WWII for instance. Sure, the generals get all the attention and glory, but it's the unnamed soldier that put his/her butt on the line on the beaches I admire the most. And soldiers are just one group of people that did this through time (and sometimes they did/do unspeakable things as well, so I'm not glorifying the Army here) it's all sorts of people doing whatever is necessary to have a good life or by their actions push humanity forward in the positive sense of it all.
What is your favorite food? I scream, you scream, everybody loves Ice Cream! Especially mine. Deer filet with raspberry sauce Dal Baht Italian Kitchen in general Modern French Cuisine What is your favorite drink? Don't have any particular drink I favour over the other, although I don't like hard liquor very musch, hiccup…burp. Beers are nice, especially some Belgian beers. Soft drinks are ok. In the summer I sometimes like to have a Pastis. What is your favorite type of music? I'd say Rock with lots of guitars and some good drum-parts thrown into it. But classical music appeals to me as well. Exotic music, world music, reggae, those sorts of things. Basically all music except r&b, rap and other bland stuff like that. What is your favorite book? Movie? Books: Scott Card, Larry Niven, This Perfect Day by Ira Levin Movies: too much to mention, I really like movies but worth noting are: Holy Grail and Life of Brian by Monty Python, they made an impact on me as I was a young boy. If Clarion never existed, what do you think you would be doing at this time? I haven't a clue in what language I'd program in but it would be programming I have no doubt. It got me at the time and Clarion made the transition easy, but had it not existed I would use another tool to do it in I guess. Anything else you want to mention? Yeah. Reading all these answers back to the questions asked I start to see a pattern here. Seems to me that my family and me are always trying to be self-employed. My father was, my grandfather was, my mother was, my brother was and I was/am. What does this tell me? What is that all about? I'll give this some more thought and see if I can come up with a good explanation for it, because it is interesting, at least to me And I would like to thank you, Sue, for semi-forcing me back into memory-lane and thus making me remember (and write it down making it all the more intense) those wonderful years I had with Clarion and all the stories that surround it. Especially the part where I could practically see my Mother again programming in Omnis and doing it in her own practical and funny way, that was priceless! Cheers.
|
You are visitor number:
since 21-Aug-2002
