Valentin Staubmann

IT-Engineer @ iqoqi.at

My journey into the world of technology began when my mother gifted me a Commodore Amiga 500 during my childhood.
However, my first real encounter with computers was at my cousin's house, where they had a Schneider with a green monochrome display. Their setup came with a manual that resembled a book. Back then, we would painstakingly write our own games line by line from that book into the computer to play them.

As I progressed, I explored PCs—the 286, 386, and the impressive 486 with its turbo button. Initially, I worked with DOS, later transitioning to Windows 1.0, which we launched from DOS. I still remember the necessity of typing "park disk" to protect the hard disk's reading head before shutting down safely. In school, we learned to create our own boot disks on 5.25" floppies since the computers lacked hard drives.

After school, I bought my first personal computer: a Pentium 1 running at 333MHz. It was also when I encountered my first computer virus, which unfortunately erased the board’s EPROM, rendering it unusable.

Then the internet arrived.

In the late '90s, I connected to the internet for the first time using V90 technology. I still vividly recall the experience. A friend helped me set up a modem with my Pentium computer. After a symphony of connection noises, we were online. With no Google available, he introduced me to Altavista and said, "Now you can search." I remember feeling lost—search for what?

I quickly adapted to this new world of information, becoming curious about how websites were created. I began copying code, modifying it, and gradually learning the intricacies of web development.

Although I trained as a mechanical engineer, it took me several years to transform my passion into a career. Since then, I've worked with basic HTML, web development using JSP, and even Java app development for early smartphone prototypes, along with system administration for Oracle clusters in hospitality software.

Reflecting on my journey, I’ve realized that there are countless technologies that essentially achieve the same goals. My aim has been to streamline the variety of technologies and systems to simplify training and maintenance. The evolution of personal computers and their applications over the past few decades has been remarkable, and I’m grateful to have witnessed this transformation firsthand. It's especially fascinating to consider how far we've come since those early days of computing—now, even this text has been proofread by artificial intelligence, a testament to the incredible advancements we've made in technology.

It is difficult to say what is impossible, for the dream of yesterday is the hope of today and the reality of tomorrow.

Robert H. Goddard
US physicist & pioneer rocket engineer (1882 - 1945)