Roxana Jula, on a journey to learn about ARKit at Monstarlab

Roxana is amazing. She's having loads of fun developing iOS apps for Monstarlab. In Dubai. It has been a while since she's seen rain. And she is working hard on creating content online on the topic of AR Kit. Also she is an advocate for inclusivity by leading the charge at Women in Tech Dubai.

You can find Roxana online through her website: https://roxanajula.com
On Twitter, her handle there is RoxanaJula

Roxana specifically asked me to mention the Borderless Engineering Conference.

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Transcript

Jeroen Leenarts: 0:46

Hi, welcome to another special edition with Roxana Tula. She's lady who lives in Dubai of all places. And she works for a company that situated in Denmark. So that's already a number of countries that are mentioned. She's active on a community called Women in Tech Dubai. And she has a lot of interest in augmented reality and public speaking. So we're just going to dig into her backstory. And I already know that she got started with software and tech, or the really young age, if you hear some background noise, apologies for that they're still busy with my roof remodeling, I'll try to filter out as much as possible in impulse production. So Roxanna, Hi, how are you doing today?

Roxana Jula: 1:30

Hi, thanks for the introduction. I'm very good. Thank you.

Jeroen Leenarts: 1:34

So just to start with, with the biggest topic that I have quite a question about is how did you end up in Dubai?

Roxana Jula: 1:42

I am from originally from Romania, and I moved to Denmark, and I'm in Dubai. I'm all over the places. So a very international background. I, I moved to Denmark, initially, for my studies, for bachelor degrees. And after my studies, I started working for a company in Denmark called note. And about two years ago, we had this opportunity to move to relocate here to the new office in Dubai. And at that point, I was just like, why not? Why not move to Dubai? So it was very spontaneous decision. But I'm happy. Very happy. I did.

Jeroen Leenarts: 2:21

So and how long have you been in Dubai now?

Roxana Jula: 2:24

Almost two years?

Jeroen Leenarts: 2:27

And how's the weather there?

Roxana Jula: 2:29

Oh, it's so good. It's it's so nice. And I moved from Denmark, which is the complete opposite. So it was very nice change from rain to sun.

Jeroen Leenarts: 2:40

It's really nice. But it's always sunny in Dubai. Right?

Roxana Jula: 2:43

The last time I've seen rain was more than a year ago.

Jeroen Leenarts: 2:47

Oh, wow. Yeah. And if you look at like work culture in Dubai is the big difference compared to Denmark.

Roxana Jula: 2:55

I think it's a little bit hard for me to notice that because I moved within the same company. So we keep more or less the same culture in all offices in all of our locations. So I think that was, for me, it wasn't such a big cultural impact to move. Because of this. So I think I'm lucky in that sense. But I think, you know, Dubai is really good. In terms of tech companies. I have lots of friends working for other companies. And it's, I think it's very European style. Also, when it comes to those fields, yeah.

Jeroen Leenarts: 3:31

Okay, cool. And the company that you work for, what, what is your job there.

Roxana Jula: 3:37

So I work for Monster lab, we recently rebranded from nodes, because we extend it now. And it's like a big family globally, we have offices in like 25 cities. It's really exciting to be part of such a big, you know, group of people. I am a senior iOS developer. So that's what I do nine hours a day at work. So it's really exciting.

Jeroen Leenarts: 4:05

Okay, and just to really go back to another topic. You started with tech and software at a very young age. I think I've heard somewhere. So can you tell us a little bit when you got your hands on your first computer?

Roxana Jula: 4:22

I was actually my parents were visiting here last week. And I was talking with my father. And I was asking, like, what, what was exactly the first model of computer we had, because I couldn't remember it was so long time ago. And we said that it was a Pentium four. It was so long ago. And it's just crazy theory to try to remember how how you were interacting with computers at that point. And then we switched to having a laptop. I don't remember the brand. It might have been a Fujitsu Siemens, perhaps. So this was more than 15 years ago, you couldn't do that much with a with a computer. But it was very exciting at that point. And I think that's how I kind of got into it very early age, even before I started coding. I was super passionate about computers, not the hardware part of computers, which a lot of kids I think, is how they get into programming, perhaps. But I really like the software like what you were able to do on that on this new technology. So during our middle school, we had those classes called something like how to use a computer, and we would just do stuff like paint Word, Excel sheets, like if you knew excel at that point, you were super tech savvy, you know, and doing Got those classes, I used to help my colleagues with different tasks. And I think my teacher picked up on this. And it's actually quite interesting also that she was, she was a woman. So now that I look back at everything that happened and how I build my confidence in this field, I think that I might have an impact also, because I saw her as a, you know, woman in tech, so to speak. And one day, she came to me and told me that, hey, Eric said, I saw that you like computers, I saw that you're quite passionate about it. There are some programming classes at the local library during weekend, I signed you up for it, if you want to go up to you just go and try it out. And of course, I was, again, why not just go and try it out. And during middle school, I was also kind of like, I really loved learning, I was kind of a geek. So to me going on a Saturday morning at the local library to do programming sounded so much fun. And that's how it all started. And it's also funny to remember. And this one is when I was about 13 years old. And it's funny to remember that a lot of the programming that we did, it was on Ben and with Ben and paper. So we would just write algorithms down, you know, he would forget colons, and all of those kinds of things. But we were going through the logic of algorithms, that was pretty fun.

Jeroen Leenarts: 7:11

So it's actually quite interesting what you mentioned there, that was like a teacher that actually picked up on your interests and made sure that you could really grow in that area. And would you say that, at later stages during your journey in software development, were the other people who filled similar roles? Or?

Roxana Jula: 7:33

Yeah, I would say so. And it's, you don't notice it at the moment, you just kind of do things and you go with the flow a lot of times, but then you sit down the years later, and you just remember all those things in you, you figured out that this very small conversation ahead, or this, you know, this teacher coming to me to tell me about those computer science program is just what changed, right, the whole path and how I ended up doing this. So it's, it's very interesting. And, of course, teachers plays such an important part in our, you know, in our future. So that's, that was very interesting to see. Yeah.

Jeroen Leenarts: 8:09

And you're also mentioned that the school teacher that got you on this track, she also was a woman, and that she was like a role model for you as being a woman in tech, is that also the reason that you got started with these community groups for women.

Roxana Jula: 8:28

So after I started, so this was kind of seventh grade, when I started going to those programming classes, I figured out I really liked it. And because I was so young, I really didn't, didn't really feel like I don't belong to the tech field. I think a lot of us when we grow up, we just tend to overthink everything. And maybe that's also hard for women to join the tech field, if they're don't do it when they're very young. Because it's harder to have that to build that confidence that you could build up when you're a kid. And I think, again, after I finished my studies, and after I doing sort of just talking about my experience, I've seen such a good feedback from from people. And they sometimes you were inspired by the stories and in the journey. So that that is one of the reasons why I did this woman into community because it helps so much.

Jeroen Leenarts: 9:28

And what kinds of things does women in tech facilitate for fellow women in tech.

Roxana Jula: 9:36

So we do different events. Now we have to do all of them online because of the pandemic. But before we used to just get together and have different events, workshops, sometimes just for fun, and sometimes they would get technical. But it's I think it's super important to have this, of course, the tech part. And for example, we have a React workshop that is very useful. But maybe what is even useful is the fact that you get inspired, because nowadays you can find all the knowledge you want online, you can find hundreds and 1000s of courses in books, but getting that inspiration, right, just kind of have that fire to do it is what is hard to find. And when you join those communities, and when you go and you see others that are like motivated to do it, you want to do it also. So I think that's an important part in joining communities like this.

Jeroen Leenarts: 10:29

And would you say that that that women in tech is like an important aspect of your developer lifestyle? Or is it something that you do on the side because I run a meetup organization as well, but that's more generic focused on iOS development and It seems that women in tech is like, it sounds like it's way broader in its scope. But then, of course, with a more specific demographic in mind, being a women in tech. So is it something that that provides support or a safe place, or I'm just like the ultimate outsider, because I'm, I'm a male, I don't know what challenges women in tech have to face. What does women in tech bring to its participants.

Roxana Jula: 11:15

And that's exactly how he described it. It brings support, that's so important. It's it rings that kind of say, space you go when you share your experiences. And a lot of times, when you're in tech, perhaps you're a programmer or an accompany not so many times you will have other fellow woman programmers. So it's just kind of like a nice community that brings that kind of, you can go there, you can open up you can you can share your struggle, your challenges, you can get advice. We also it within the community, we always share job positions, if we find out there are some openings, which I think also is extremely important when you talk about diversity, to make sure that the job openings are shared within all the communities and not just within our closed the closed groups of perhaps the job posters. It's kind of like very broad, but I think it plays such an important part. And for example, we also have boot camps, where every Sunday, we have those coding challenges that can help build that skill you need for taking tech interviews. So we're just trying to figure out like a good balance in in providing support and technical expertise and also fun activities. And something that I noticed in Dubai is that those communities could be even more important than in other locations, because Dubai is so so many internationals are here. And so many of us I think it's over 80% of Dubai is internationals. So that means that a lot of us are here away from our friends from our families. And being able to to have this community and connect with others. I think it's it's super important.

Jeroen Leenarts: 13:03

Okay, cool. We went a bit of a tangent here. So we basically we were at, I think it was the seventh grade or middle school. So you had the programming classes offered by your teacher. And then at some point, you got your diploma, and then you had to choose what path you would want to take with your education. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Roxana Jula: 13:27

Yes. And it was also interesting to note that I don't know if you have this in your from Netherlands, correct? Yeah, I don't know if you have it from the Netherlands. I think a lot of European countries have those kind of Olympiads, you would go to so you have math, Olympiad, computer science, Olympiad, and so on. And I started participating in those, it was quite interesting and fun. And I sign up actually, during my high school, I went into a computer science intensive program, where we would do again, pseudocode, and Pascal, which, again, is just so so far back and nobody uses anymore. I don't think so. And actually remember at that point, was just asking my teachers, why are we doing Pascal is like not even now. It's it's not used by companies. It was so outdated at that point. And they just say like, it's still a good programming language to learn about data structures and algorithms and how to think algorithmically. And I think they had, they had a good point in that I think it was, it laid a very good foundation for me when it comes to programming. And this is what I did during my high school, I studied computer science, I focused on it. And I knew that I want to move out of Romania to for my studies. First off, I wanted to travel, I want to try something new. But I also wanted to go somewhere where I can do a lot more practical things during my studies, because I knew in Romania, at least at that point, it was a lot of theory, it was just go and listen to the teachers explain to you what is programming. And that's how I found out about this kind of Academy in Denmark, where you could go about and get a better but it was very practical focused. It was always projects. It was actually for each of the programs you would have one semester where you could just go to a company and do an internship that was your actual semester in school, expanded out a company and do a project and presented to get a grade. So it was I think it was a very good decision to go to that kind of education and and learn programming in a more practical way. And actually ended up doing two bachelor degrees. Just because I couldn't decide I was doing my studies. I didn't know do I want to do web development, software development mobile, I just I felt like I wanted to try everything, and not miss out. And I think a lot of people are struggling with this when they try to get into tech. And that's why after I finished my first bachelor of software development, I continued with kind of an extra specialization in web development. And that being a mobile developer, so

Jeroen Leenarts: 16:14

yeah, I believe it's a thing, the fear of missing out in technology. And I fell into the trap on a number of occasions myself as well. So yeah, you ended up in Denmark for your education. And you stuck around there after you graduated? Is that still the company that you work for nowadays? Or?

Roxana Jula: 16:37

Yeah, it is, it is actually. And, you know, after I finished my studies, I just search on Google Translate, how do you spell app development in Danish? I copied that. And I put it into Google, I put in the city name. So that's how I made a list of all the companies that do app development in that city enormous. And I just started sending emails to everybody, Hey, do you want to take me for an internship. And I think that's a good way to start to just start with an internship. Because what you learn in school is great, but getting that experience in a company is just totally different experience, right. And actually, the flat, it's a funny story, because I applied as an Android developer for position as an Android developer. That's what they had open at that point. And during my studies, I did iOS and Android. And I just apply for an Android position, because it was the last that I tried and the most recent one. But after I had the interview with the company, they actually said that they really liked me, and they would offer me a position but it would be for iOS, if I'm interested. And that's kind of again, one of those situations where an opportunity came and influenced my whole career afterward.

Jeroen Leenarts: 17:55

Yeah, so you mentioned that you did iOS and Android during your studies. So were you working on on on Apple hardware in during your studies? Or was it facilitated by the by the school?

Roxana Jula: 18:09

There were, we had the apple labs. So you would have an Apple computer, but I quite early days, in my studies, I bought an MacBook Air, it was so expensive. I remember I had to do like, from all over the places collect that kind of money to get it. And it is, I think it's a big issue, right? And join being an iOS developer. And I think a lot of developers struggle with this actually getting the hardware to be a developer. Yeah,

Jeroen Leenarts: 18:39

that's true. Because the the there's a lot of stuff that you need to buy before you can actually open up Xcode and run your first program on iOS device. What year did you graduate? Because we didn't mention that.

Roxana Jula: 18:54

So that was, oh, it's hard to remember. So I high school, I graduated in 2011. So I graduated around four or five years ago from from university.

Jeroen Leenarts: 19:09

So and then you you found your first job in the city that you were living now called Monster labs. What was it like like, being Romanian, National Living in Denmark, starting your first job, not knowing the language. So perhaps,

Roxana Jula: 19:24

that was very good, because in Denmark, everybody speaks English. And everybody's extremely open to just talk with you in English. That's actually why I ended up not learning the language because it was just, it was so accessible just to speak to in English, would everybody people you would go to a shop and just start speaking in English, they will start speaking right away back to you in English. So it wasn't any kind of, you know, traction in there. So, and it was the same in the company. And basically what I said, I need to make sure that I want to continue living in Denmark before I commit to learning the language because it is quite complex. Especially for me who like Romanian is a Latin language, so it's quite difficult to learn something like Danish. So you in the end, I didn't end up leaving the rest of my life in Denmark, maybe one day I'll go back, I don't know, open to any opportunities, but it was it was very nice. And I think I'm very grateful for for my internship there and the support that I received and the patients that I got during my internship to learn because I started again, I was development and I was implemented before it was actually what Objective C and now I joined this internship with Swift so I had to catch up to everything that was new.

Jeroen Leenarts: 20:49

So at Monster labs, what kinds of projects do you work on? Is it the single product? Or is it stuff for clients? Or is it in, in house development?

Roxana Jula: 20:57

It is an agency. So we always have different projects that we work on. Lots of them, I think I cannot really share. But they've done I've worked on some really cool projects. I don't even know the number now. It must be over 1015 20, maybe apps that I touched, I think one of the most exciting one is like a government app in Scandinavia. So they have digital postal service. So every important piece of mail, you get it in a digital form, not through your mailbox, which I think was really cool. I've done an app for kind of finding your sneakers, cool sneakers and finding out the best prices for them. I worked for a Taxi app in Denmark. Many different interesting projects, the most recent one, I worked for an E auction platform, which was super challenging, but very nice to work on. So with you a lot of things. Yeah.

Jeroen Leenarts: 22:04

So you mentioned you've been working for like four or five years with this company. And he also mentioned that you've worked on like 10, or 15 different projects. So what is the first thing if you get your hands on a new code base? How do you get into things? How do you find your way around in the new code base for you.

Roxana Jula: 22:25

So there are different scenarios, when you work for an agency, you either start doing the project from the ground up, so then you just build it yourself. And you you you know the code and uniform up the latest kind of guidelines you have we have within the company. Otherwise, in sometimes you are allocated to work on a feature or some bug fixes, and just have to open up the code and running it and then just start doing it and looking at the code the advantages that because we have those guidelines in the same way, it was the same architecture, it's quite easy to follow along. And I think we're pretty close in style all of the developers. So I think it's easy to it's much easier than maybe looking at the code from a different company, I would say. But I think what I do is just you know, say for example, you have a bug to fix, you get that and you start backtracking perhaps you maybe you don't know what's the class where you have to do the changes. So then I'm using the Visual Debugger. And I just kind of pause the screen in the simulator and try to inspect it and see what's the class this UI is coming from, and just backtrack everything. And just look through the code. I think if the code is written well and clean. With a bit of experience, it should be easy to find your way around.

Jeroen Leenarts: 23:54

And do you often work solo on projects or with a number of peers or are in sort of the lead role, or

Roxana Jula: 24:02

it's a combination? So the last big project I worked on, I was the only iOS developer and I was also leading the mobile team. So I was making sure the Android developer is always in sync with me. Sometimes, you get to work with another iOS developer. So it's a team of two. But I would say that's the regular teams we have right now. Maybe three, it's something very big, but usually it's one or two. Okay, I work in the same time.

Jeroen Leenarts: 24:34

And looking at your working life right now, what are the biggest challenges that you that you run into, and especially the ones that you keep running into?

Roxana Jula: 24:45

Actually, this the beginning of this year, I was promoted to senior position. And I kind of feel like with the senior position, you start to get a bit of more responsibility. And for me, it's not just learning my way around. And for example, estimations is an important thing when you're a senior, which is I think, for all developers is one of the hardest thing to do. So I've said that that is sometimes a challenge. Actually, you know, I think lots of times when I get to just do coding, that's the easy part of the job when you just can consider your code. That's that's the easy part. It's difficult when you have to perhaps not necessarily difficult but a bit more challenging when you have to, perhaps understand requirements or talk with the clients or maybe even do some testing or reproduce some things, some bugs that were written reported, didn't just keeping track with everything.

Jeroen Leenarts: 25:49

Okay, and then to turn it around what are the best parts of your current working life?

Roxana Jula: 25:55

What I like about an agency is both like a challenge. And then something very rewarding is the fact that I get to work with so many projects. So it's never, it's never boring, it's always go time, it's always trying something new learning new products, learning new features. Because when you work on a single app, you might end up working with the same kind of programming features. But when you get to touch so many apps, it just gets such a broad experience. And I think I think that's very exciting for me.

Jeroen Leenarts: 26:27

And is one of the projects that you've worked on. Also the source of your interest for AR.

Roxana Jula: 26:34

It is yes. And actually the interest with AR started, we had it was announced. What was it four or five years, four years ago? And yeah, exactly. And we had a cold night at a company just like this, just try it out. Let's do a cold night on AR. And we had two teams. One did iOS AR, which I was part of that team. And there was another team who did Android AR. So that's how I just something clicked for me. I was like, This is really fun. We did like a tic toc game where you would put in QR codes on the table. And there will be like an x and a zero on top of it and some something like that. It was very basic, but it just kind of started an interest in me. And then we actually had a client who wanted to do something in the space of AR and I ended up working on that project. And it just build up from there. I don't do that much that many AR apps yet because within my current work, but we are I think we're starting to see more and more interest. Definitely last year.

Jeroen Leenarts: 27:47

And you also mentioned something interesting, because you work at an agency, then you got some involvement with AR, and then either by chance, or I don't know what a project came along that needed AR related technologies. Is it 10 Something that you got that project because you happen to be out of a project at that point in time? Or is it something that you can indicate or opt into?

Roxana Jula: 28:15

Actually, a lot of times you don't get to pick the projects you work on. So actually, this project first went to a different developer. And I don't remember exactly how it happened and how I ended up taking it, I think I've shown interest. And I said, I want to try it out. And I believe the other developer was asking for some support. And I was just really interested in it. So I saw I saw it as a great challenge. And it ended up being a switch to me, and then I just took it until the end. So that was pretty cool.

Jeroen Leenarts: 28:50

And was the AR stuff, also the starting point of you doing public engagement so that you did public talks or things like that.

Roxana Jula: 29:02

It was in Italy. So for me because I don't work that much with AR in my current job, I have to find ways to kind of push myself to learn about it. And I think writing articles and speaking at events, that's exactly a great way to do it. Because let's say you write an article on a topic, I just feel like every time I have to dive so deep into that topic, because I don't want to embarrass myself, I want to make sure that everything I'm putting out there is you know, it's correct information and it's it's giving a really good overview. So that is is motivating me to to learn about this and work more. So I did a few talks. Very, very exciting. On augmented reality I was supposed to go to Tokyo last year for the try swift in Tokyo is like the my dream city. So it was the perfect scenario. I'm going to do a talk in Tokyo about augmented reality like this is the best life and then the pandemic came along and we ended up doing online which was still of course grateful to have that chance. But it is very interesting and I start I don't even know like how I started with this interest in public speaking but I'm so happy I did it because there's so many advantages you get for from from doing this

Jeroen Leenarts: 30:23

and getting started with public speaking was it just something you did? Well on a whim really like hey, this sounds like a fun idea. Let's just try it or did you did a more structured approach in coming up with the idea and and really preparing yourself for it and then pitching talks here and there?

Roxana Jula: 30:43

Definitely in the beginning, I was I said, I didn't want to talk at global events. So what I did was I'm just going to start doing smaller talks. So I did talks for the local community here. I did for the woman who code community. So I just started slow, you know, just kind of have some experience with it, because it takes a bit of pressure off yourself. And you get to you see the mistakes, because you will do mistakes. Every time. You you do a talk, you find something new, and it's like, Okay, I will know next time not to do this anymore. And I think that's a that's a great for anybody who wants to join, and do public speaking. Just remember that it's uncomfortable. For a lot of us. I also say, like, feel so uncomfortable a lot of times, and I get nervous, it's getting better every time I do it. So that's it, just have to remember that even if you see a lot of speakers out there super confident during the talks. Behind the scenes is not always like that. It's there's always a

Jeroen Leenarts: 31:46

that's the little secret with public speaking, indeed. Because I also have like the like the five minutes right before I have to like, go time, then I'm like, like completely nervous. And if I'm been interrupted in the wrong way, by the by the wrong person, then it really like it can floored me. And then it's really hard to like get started. But once you get started, it's it's often quite easy, especially if you have done a few talks. So but you mentioned something interesting there. So you started public speaking at local events, local communities, did they offer specific slots to newcomers at public speaking? Or how does that work? Because I reckon every city has these kinds of communities.

Roxana Jula: 32:30

I was actually the ones organizing it. So I had a bit of an advantage there. But it's, I think, if you want to do public speaking, either organize it yourself, there are so many communities you can get involved with. And I'm sure like for iOS development, every city has some sort of community. And actually now with a pandemic, a lot of communities do online meetings. So if you want you to, it doesn't even have to be for your city, it could be for other city as well. And if any of your from your audience wants to test out public speaking, I'm happy to have them as a speaker, the woman in tech, the BI community, just kind of to build that experience. That's a great way to start. And it's First off, it's takes the pressure off, because it's a smaller audience. And it takes the pressure off, because it's not people are not paying for it. I think that's also something that when you know that people are paying for it, it's just the nervous levels are up

Jeroen Leenarts: 33:28

and adds an extra level of tension indeed. So how was the transition for you from, like doing in person in front of an audience presentations to online presentations, because I've heard a lot of people are really struggling with that transition to really get used to doing an online presentation.

Roxana Jula: 33:50

I see it with advantages and disadvantages. It's more comfortable, of course, you're just at your home, you can do your proper preparation before, if you want to just jump around your house before you can do that. It's fine. And after you're done, you can just go and take a nap. So from that sense, it's easier. But I think it's it's a bit more difficult to connect with your audience. And especially when you do a zoom, call it just like you're watching your screen, maybe you don't even see the other people. So sometimes it's like you forget that you're doing this talk for maybe 100 people, which is it's a very weird feeling.

Jeroen Leenarts: 34:27

Now you make me very interested in what way did you prepare yourself for talk when it's online one because you mentioned jumping around.

Roxana Jula: 34:37

I actually read about this tip I don't remember where but I think it was something like if you want to get out of like your nerves out, you could just jump around because it will take your mind off of it or something like that. Yeah, I just like to prepare my setup, just kind of take take some time to be calm. Don't do anything else. Pair like the the water to be close by and all those kinds of things.

Jeroen Leenarts: 35:05

So um, I'm looking at my notes here. So yeah, you did some androids in your during your education's. But then your first role was immediately as an iOS developer at what's now called Monster labs, at some point, monster left opportunity opportunity to move from Denmark to Dubai. So what was the process there? Is it like that monster lab as international offices all around the world? And that's if you indicate that you would like to move around between these offices that that's done just possible or what's the process?

Roxana Jula: 35:41

I've heard of other stories as well where they will switch between In offices, and I think there's definitely a possibility because they do like this idea of you going somewhere else, meeting your other colleagues from a different office, because so often we collaborate. So you might have a team with an iOS developer from the buy an Android developer from Prague, a project manager from London. So it's always good if you want to go in and experience another office, I think, and it's, I think it's a it's a matter of going and just maybe sharing this. If, like wish, if you want to do it, and perhaps there could be an opportunity.

Jeroen Leenarts: 36:24

That's often the networking effect of talking to the, to the right people, which you don't know at the moment that you're talking to them. So yeah, I think we covered most of the things. So you're Roxanna, you're from Romania, then you moved to Denmark, and then to Dubai, all the while doing something with technology. As a woman in tech, is there anything that you'd like to share in a similar position compared to you, What's the best advice that you can give to them?

Roxana Jula: 36:58

I would say, to be mindful of the the importance of community whether that is you joining the local community, as you know, somebody who wants to get knowledge or want to offer their own knowledge and share it with the community. writing articles, again, is amazing. speaking at events, like try to do those things and being involved be because I don't know if this is still the perception, but being a good developer is not just about the technical skills. So don't think that if you just go and do a course, like a boot camp course on how to be a developer, and learn Java or iOS, is going to make you a good developer, just try to, to think of the soft skills also, because that's super important. And being part of those, being part of the communities and doing all those things can help you with that. Of course, when you learn how to write articles, you also learn how to write documentation. When you're doing public speaking, you also know how to communicate, you learn how to communicate with your team, it's, I think it's a great way to kind of bump your skills into being a really good developer.

Jeroen Leenarts: 38:10

It's really great the advice that you're sharing there, because it's, it's fairly generic, and it applies to any developer out there. So yeah, that's really cool. Is there anything else that we forgot or stuff that we still need to mention, or that you want to specifically mention for yourself?

Roxana Jula: 38:29

I'm working actually, a very exciting project is going to be a free tech conference coming in May. And if anybody wants to connect with me on Twitter, they can reach out, I'm always open for AR conversations. Keep an eye out there, because we will, I will announce this conference very soon. So it will be a great source of information if you want and a great place to maybe learn something in network even. And, yeah, I think I think that's all

Jeroen Leenarts: 39:03

okay, I will make sure to add that link to the show notes once it is available. And if I forget, please do remind me. So Roxanna, thank you very much for your time, I really enjoyed listening to you, because you have an interesting journey in that you ended up in in Dubai, that's not like the, the most obvious place to end up as a developer, at least in my knowledge. So and it seems that you're really enjoying yourself there, and that you have a good life in Dubai. And who knows, maybe you'll move back to Europe or some other place around the world in the future. And I really hope that the in person conference presentation in Tokyo will happen as soon as possible for you. Because when you mentioned that your your eyes really lit up and it was it was I was so sorry for you that that's the one thing that really the pandemic has, has messed up for you personally. So here's to the future, and I hope to see a lot more of you online and maybe in person as soon as possible.

Roxana Jula: 40:07

Thank you very much for the invitation. It was a very nice conversation.