Hey, world!
This time I asked a few questions to another one of our Rustaceans — Jakub!
Who are you, Jakub?
A guy, who likes to understand “how it works”. FOSS supporter and privacy advocate. My programming journey started at primary school, where I was writing HTML pages as extra assignments in CS classes. Fun fact is… At the time, I didn’t even have an Internet connection at home, so I was spending a lot of time learning at Internet cafes. The next years followed with grasping the basics of Pascal, then properly learning C++. At university, I learned C, assembly. First programming gigs were actually browser-based applications written in Node/React and Python. After a couple of years as a C++ developer and with a pinch of Dev ops work on a side, finally, I found a job that allowed me to learn Rust — full time. As languages are actually just tools, this one is my favorite one since then.
What do you do in Confio?
I’m working as Rust Smart Contract Developer. Initially, I was responsible for contracts for our Tgrade dApp. Later then I was reassigned to another project that is a fruit of collaboration with Osmosis — Isotonic.
Could you describe what your work is like at Confio?
I work from home, on my own machine powered by Linux. I’m making sure that the code is solid and well tested. That no extra database reads or writes are performed, and unnecessary operations are simplified. Performance is crucial, but correctness is still a top priority. Most time I implement features in contracts but sometimes design them on my own — depending on needs. I also made contributions to Open Source projects. In our contracts, we rely heavily on crates from `CosmWasm/cw-plus`, which we also maintain. We open-sourced a lot of Tgrade contracts under name of `confio/poe-contracts`. In all those implementations I use the Rust language daily. I also work with shell scripts — for example, in order to create containerized end-to-end tests using Docker. Since I like challenges, some time ago I started looking at CosmWasm implementation in Go. Or at `cosmos/cosmjs`, to play with blockchain in real-time using JavaScript.
What have you learned with Confio?
When I joined Confio, I only knew the bare basics of how blockchain works. Now I understand foundations very well. I dug a lot in CosmWasm internals. I understand how Smart Contracts work and how they are executed. I was able to work on a small blockchain network with one node, where I was uploading and instantiating each contract manually, as well as describing each interaction between them. I even crashed our whole testnet once, when I was trying to upgrade a contract on a live network — it later turned out to be incompatible, and as a conclusion, we improved our process. You can read about the incident here — Tgrade Testnet 3.
What do you like about working at Confio in General?
Working in a small company surrounded by experienced and reliable people. In some aspects we are pioneers, and work is exciting. When you assign yourself to a task, you are simply trusted to finish it. There are no additional constraints, unnecessary processes, or forced bureaucracy. We all are pushing in the same direction. We believe in our products and everyone is helpful.
Anything else you want to share with people?
Every time you are presented with some convenience, ask yourself — what is the price.
Wanna join us?
Do you want to be part of something bigger? We’re looking for bright and driven people just like you. Find out our open positions here, and tell us your story.
