Hi Sinan! Can you please tell us a little bit about yourself.
I’m Sinan, I started exactly one year ago at Digital Goodie as a Senior Backend Developer. I first started in our Core team and then switched to the Commerce team. I am also a scrum master at the moment, so I touch almost every part of the ecosystem backend wise. It is interesting but also makes it quite hard to answer to the question of what I do in Digital Goodie exactly.
In the Core team I mainly worked on Golang services, especially price services and its importers and system integration with the customer. After a while I switched to the commerce team where I work on search services. Since I am a scrum master too, more than half of my time is dedicated to help the work of others. This means that every time someone encounters a backend issue, regardless if that service is in the commerce domain or not, I get my hands dirty. In our company, we highly value self-direction, so when we see a problem, we solve it regardless of the team. I like that, because it involves exploring things, it is a bit like a treasure hunt! I like to learn things and since there are a lot of things to learn here if you are active, it has been very interesting to be a part of Digital Goodie.
What is the best thing about Digital Goodie?
The best thing about working at Digital Goodie is that if you want to contribute to something it is highly encouraged. If you are willing to get out of your comfort zone, you get to shine bright. Also, people are very friendly, the culture at the office is always supportive of new ideas. People are encouraging and teaching each other, so the collaboration works well.
You held a Goodie Campfire session* on 3D programming a while back. Could you tell us more about it?
3D programming enables people to visualize what they want to achieve. At the same time as 3D programming can be used as a tool to visualize what you might like to create – for example an interior designer might want to visualize a possible bathroom – it is of course also used in the entertainment industry for games, for example. The best part in 3D programming is that you definitely see what you have created!
You can do many things with 3D programming from engineering software, to games, augmented reality and many other things. I was programming a software for interior architects, which they could use for designing bathrooms, kitchens and whatnot.
The best software that I created was a software for a big company that produces electrical instruments and electrical wiring systems. As you gave the software 2D architectural plans, defined how many floors the building had, where the electricity would flow to the building and which points the electricity would be consumed in, the software generated the whole electrical wireframe in 3D.
* Goodie Campfire is a session that gathers together all Goodies and lets one of us share with the company something they feel passionate about – either work-related or hobby. Campfires are held 3-6 times a year.
What are the best things you have learnt with 3D programming?
I have learnt two things. First, working in 3D programming forces you to learn trigonometry and space geometry. Secondly, engineering wise it definitely teaches you how to write code in a performance way, optimistic codes. When you have a function, you are aware that if that function is within the rendering cycle it will be called for example 60 times per second so it has to be fast. If you are solving a problem, I have learnt not to just solve it, but solve it in the most efficient way. 3D programming has taught me how to find the most efficient solution.
Why do you find 3D programming interesting?
It looks fun when it is completed. As a backend engineer, the majority of my time is in front of a black screen – it is fun for me, but gibberish for many others. But when you make something in 3D it is visible and understandable for everyone. And you can even create art out of it. When you write something mathematical you can see it in a solid world. That is exciting.
Has it helped in other programming tasks to know 3D programming? Definitely, it has. It has helped me to find the most efficient solution. Our services should also respond in very short time periods. In that sense, it is not so much different from the challenges in 3D programming. Fast responses and consuming less resources is something we need to think about too, so thinking of efficiency is important in my current work too.
This is very interesting. One more question: you have probably used most of the coding languages available today – what is your favourite one?
I have used many languages in my career, but at the moment Golang is my favourite. Not because of the hype, but because it is simple to use, it comes with a toolchain so when you use Golang you don’t need any additional tools or programs for debugging your code.
Thank you so much for the interview, Sinan!
Sinan Islekdemir has worked as Senior Backend Developer
at Digital Goodie since 2018.
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