This is another entry that has nothing to do with Iloilo. The mere fact that I don't get to go out often to observe the latest happenings in Iloilo City is reason enough to write just about anything here.

The earliest date that I can remember when I became a programmer was in year 2000. I bought a Visual Basic book with an educational version of Visual Basic 6 CD. Even with the crippled version of the hugely popular (at that time) programming language, I was able to create crude programs like time keeper, screensaver locks and restaurant menu system.

At that time I was managing our financing/installment business. I was really good at excel that I was using it for everything. Learning VB would be a great help in automating daily tasks. I've also learned a great deal about database while interfacing VB with MS Access. However, I have not created a single app for our business using it. Instead, I went to learn C programming language.

It was already early 2001 and I was able to download an outdated but free ide/compiler/debugger TurboC v2 from Borland website. Being a lower level and closer to the hardware, C taught me a lot about data structures and how to go about solving problems on my own. I only have very limited access to internet. My ultimate guide is an old TurboC book. I created a Snake game like the one in Nokia as a school project in Informatics.

I've also taken PERL and played for a while but never gotten to create anything substantial with it which is what Perl is really good at.

Then came Java. Java was the most sought-after programming skills abroad. Just by knowing how to program in Java can dramatically increase your chance of getting hired or immigrating abroad. Taking up Java was easy because I already know C. It's just a matter of unlearning some C bad habits and learning the Object Oriented paradigm.

It's in Java that I finally wrote our business' program. It was written as an intranet application using Tomcat as the container and JSP for scripting. I was still using MS Access as it was readily available.

Even though those programs were written as a hobbiest and hackish at best, I'm still proud of them. They were the labor of my late night hackfests.