Welcome to the website “On (Modern?) Software Development – Observations From a 20-Year Journey”.
My name is Alexander Thurow.
I started my journey into the field of professional software development in the year of 2005, in which I graduated as “Diplom-Wirtschaftsinformatiker (FH)” from Leuphana Lüneburg.(*)
(*) German university of applied sciences degree in computer science and business administration
The Idea
The idea of this website is to deliver a “travel journal” related to that, still ongoing, journey.
In retrospect the journey took me to the following (chronologically ordered) intermediate destinations:
- Software developer (at every point in time during the journey)
- Supporter
- Technical trainer
- Consultant
- Team and (interim-)project leader
- “Communicator”
- Mentor (for junior developers)
- Knowledge transfer (Codecamps and After Work Talks)
- Lecturer and speaker
In March of 2025 I founded the sole proprietorship “Alexander Thurow – Software Development & Consulting“. Since then I am available as:
The Motivation, 1st Iteration
The idea of creating this travel journal first came up in 2016. Back then my superior approached me asked whether I wanted to deliver a talk at a german university of applied sciences. The university offered companies the opportunity to present themselves to the students with a talk. The respective talk’s topic was not limited to any predetermined themes.
After thinking about the choice of topic, I decided to bootstrap a talk titled “From Education to Employment: A Requirements-Set for (Modern?) Software Developers”. The key question that I wanted to answer back then was:
“What are the items out of the broad range of software development topics, that I would have rather liked to know about – but did not – when I commenced my career in the field?”
Over the next years I continuously refined the talk as I proceeded on my journey.
The Motivation, 2nd Iteration
In 2021, I decided to redesign the talk in such a way that I would be able to present it to the larger audience of software development professionals during my After Work Talk activities. The new question to be answered back then was:
“What have I been witnessing in the previous 16 years of my professional software development career and what do I deem as ‘important and newsworthy’?”
In October 2022 the ensuing result was the “premiere” of my talk “Thoughts on (Modern?) Software Development – Observations From a 17-Year Journey” at JUG Darmstadt.
Again, I continued to refine the talk over the next years. In 2024 I decided to finally present it at the “ASQF Net Week” conference. On this occasion the (german) talk was recorded, and is now available on YouTube:
And because we all are moving on the timeline into the future…
The Motivation, 3rd Iteration
Mid-2024, I started to design the new talk “Solutions for (Modern?) Software Development – Approximations From a 20-Year Journey“ with the following question in mind:
“How can we nudge the complex system of ‘software development’ into directions, which do not (repeatedly) lead us into dead ends?“
The talk is designed as a logical continuation of the “Thoughts on (Modern?) Software Development“ talk. Whereas the „Thoughts“ talk is documenting the observations during my 20-year career progression, the „Solutions“ talk identifies leverage points for successful professional software development in the year of 2025.
The Future
As of today I will be starting to document my journey through the field of professional software development here. Especially the activities around my talks will be a focal point of this page.
Additionally it needs to be stated that – as everyone knows – the future is “The Undiscovered Country”… which of course directly leads back to my cloudy “Communicator” statement above:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Star_Trek_and_Star_Wars
… my heart is definitely the heart of a Trekkie :-)!
Therefore:
Live long and prosper,
Alex
(aka: The Traveler)