Denise Nepraunig, working at Volkswagen to keep you connected to your car at all times

Jeroen Leenarts: You should hear me fumble sometimes when I do recordings. So here we go. I'm gonna sit up straight. Hi, and welcome to another special edition of my podcast. I'm sitting here with Denise snip counting. She's from Germany, and she does a lot of things with mobile apps that involves cars. So that's an interesting topic to me. Because nowadays, more often, you see that your car actually has an app attached to it. And I think Denise can tell us a bit more about that. So Denise, welcome. How are you doing today? Denise Nepraunig: Thanks, I'm fine. How are you doing? Jeroen Leenarts: Good. Just getting started in my first week at my new job. So it's a bit crazy. Over here as well. And on Twitter, I read that you had some amazing unit testing going on today, everything passed at the first attempt. So that's interesting. Teach me that skill, and I will be forever in your debt. So um, iOS development, that's probably the main thing that you're working on everyday. Right? Yeah, that's true. Yeah. And and how does your day to day look in general? Denise Nepraunig: Oh, yeah. So I'm working at the big company, so to say. And the thing is, we're also working in a team. So a couple of other developers, a lot of product owners involved and designers. So it's also quite some meetings. And also, inside the developer team, when you want to, to implement a feature, you have a lot of clarifications and talks and stuff like that. So for an engineering job, yeah, it's a lot of talking and soft skills. And yeah, finally, when you get to the code watcher, which I'm really happy about this, we are using Swift UI and combined in production for over a year now. Our deployment target is iOS 14. So it's the latest, greatest things, so to say already for us. Yeah. And what I really enjoy about or code peasant, which brings me back to my tweet about testing is, we have a lot of mocks and stubs and everything going on. So testing is really pleasure. And one thing which she collected, which I really like is all this asynchronous testing, he made it synchronous sort of code rates really, really great. It's still not async await. We're not there yet. But it's still he made the test synchronous and Yeah, yesterday, I had a pretty hard time I forget something too, especially in check this dependency. But today, everything worked like a charm. And I was like, what's going on? That's a quite a surprise today. Jeroen Leenarts: So yeah, you weren't you were a bit apprehensive whether or not you were missing something correct? Yeah, Denise Nepraunig: exactly. I even closed and clear to console because I could not believe the tests were running and still green and stuff like that. And like, what is going on today. Jeroen Leenarts: So and the company that you work at what's the name of it? Denise Nepraunig: Companies called carrier. So it's an abbreviation, it means car, I am digital. And the company itself is new offspring of the Volkswagen Group, so to say. And the main goal is like to bundle all the software engineering efforts into one place, and create 60% of the software by ourselves. So software inside the car, or the ABS or whatever is involved in software development. Okay. And also for the group's I mean, we have Audi and Skoda and things like that, so that they have one unified platform. So like an operating system, and also advice, we are now working towards a unified SDK. Jeroen Leenarts: Okay, and the stuff that you're working on, is that already available and in the hands of consumers? Or is it still working progress and being made ready to ship it at some point in the future? Denise Nepraunig: So I'm pretty happy that our app is shipped. So last year, Fox One released their first electric car, which was built newly from the ground up, it's the platform is called MEP. It's like a platform where you an electric car to say like Lego thingy. The bass is the same forever sing, but you just put another car on top of it, so to say. And the ID three was the first car then was the ID four, which is an SUV. And today they reveal the ID five which is more is say down like if the incorrect word. And yeah, and so last year the app was released. And it's it has customers already in various countries throughout Europe. And yeah, and so especially the Nordic countries love electric cars. So yeah, Jeroen Leenarts: And how long has this app been in development before it was launched? Denise Nepraunig: I think it was also maybe about over almost a year. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah. That's quite an effort, really. And so you mentioned already that you work at Carey at FX said it correctly. Yeah. And how big is the team that you're working? How many how many iOS colleagues are you working with? Denise Nepraunig: I have seven under iOS developers as colleagues. Yep. Jeroen Leenarts: And then all the other designers overhead management. Yeah. Except for a masters. Denise Nepraunig: Yeah. And for us, it's called. So we are working with the safe environment. So it's like Scrum, but for big corporations. So you have the system engineer and business engineer and subject matter experts are the protocols called Jeroen Leenarts: and dealing with, you're dealing with release train engineers, right? Yes, Denise Nepraunig: exactly. It is arts and all those new concepts and words, but yeah, Jeroen Leenarts: yeah. Yeah. The previous job I was in was also working with the safe mechanism. So it's a scalable agile framework. I think it's yeah. So that, but that's like a lot of process and not the technical bits. And that's what we're here for the technical bits. So the integration with a car, of course, people know, like the headline features of iOS, and they are big on announcing that you have this key fob that you can put in your phone. But the folks wagon app doesn't have that yet. Right. Or it has in the middle it has implemented in another way if I'm correct. Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, exactly. So we don't have this fancy car key thing yet. And if you're developing I cannot tell you because NDA and thinks I'm sorry for that. But there was another concept before it's like a digital car key, which they're working on in our app. It's not live yet still developed. But it's one of those features which will be coming because it's like, kind of obvious for an app for a car. Yeah. Jeroen Leenarts: And what kinds of things can you see within the app? Is it like, battery charge level? Duration, that you still need to wait for a full charge stuff like that? Exactly. Turn turning on climate control before? Yeah, Denise Nepraunig: yeah. And also, like, you could like departure times when you know, oh, tomorrow, I need to leave at eight so the car knows when it should charge? And there's also things like, what kind of charge mode Do you want to have? Do you want to use your own electricity or from other charging stations? I mean, it's a complicated topic I never thought you could make So Penny settings inside charging and things like that. And the other thing, which is also important, is finding charging stations when you're on the road. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah. And is it that the car needs to be on on your home Wi Fi network? Or is it calling out through 3g? Or 4g, so cellular, to the to the central surface? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, it has a SIM card inside it. And yeah, that's how the car is connected to like, our cloud, so to say, and our app is talking into our cloud also. So they're communicating this way. Jeroen Leenarts: So I'm telling my wife that the package delivery person is almost there. We'll cut that out. Um, so you have to have a SIM cards in the car, and is it like? So that's that means that there's a central surface that the car is communicating to and that the app is communicating to? And what what are some challenges that you have to deal with? Is it like the typical integration you need to do with a web service? Or what are some typical things that you think you have specifically for car integration situations, compared to what you normally see with apps. Denise Nepraunig: So for us, fortunately, we have a thing in between, which is kind of called backend for front end. So and this is an abstraction layer that's built on top of the car software layer, so to say, and for us, it's basically still like a normal HTTP request. So it's a REST based interface. And also the authentication is stuff like you would expect with OAuth and things like that. So if I want to start climatisation, it's basically it's kind of like a post request to a certain identifier of the car. So like, the unique identifier of the car, and it's just starting. So that is from iOS perspective, really easy. What's more complicated is like testing. So I mean, sure you can have real cars and testing, but always organizing the car As the car software is getting updates, and so you need a reliable environment, or maybe the car is just used for our tests. And it's not like that every engineer has thrown character tests. I mean, that would be a dream. But unfortunately, that's not the case. But for sure, we don't test with only real cars. And we also have like, not to say test accounts and fake environments. But always getting the right configuration there, you know, you have a lot of circumstances like the car is charging and connected, and this and that, and has a certain charged level, and we need to display new legal texts. So yeah, preparing these accounts takes always a lot of work. And, yeah, it's, yeah, it's tedious. So to say that everything is ready. This is what I think a bit more tedious compared to normal development. So it's really super end to end. And if you test end to end, I mean, the car software inside the car could also have a bug and be like, yeah, the process or the thing was not processed or something like that. Jeroen Leenarts: So and is it then that the complexity in the environment that you're working with is mostly in the the number of differences that you can have in the configuration that you're dealing with? So that's, of course, car firmware, has versions, the server has versions? Are there, like a lot of different versions API's you need to deal with? And then, of course, your app needs to be tested against all of that. Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, so that's exactly the hardest complexity of that. So at a certain point, you need to really pin down and say, so this is the version we are testing and the backend, and the app has the versions. And yeah, and then comes regression tests and things like that. Jeroen Leenarts: So, um, so just to switch gears a little bit, because you mentioned something in the introduction, that was very interesting, because I know that software development for automobiles is quite often very defensive. So it's like old tech, old stuff. Making sure that it works is more important than that. It's the latest and greatest. But you are working with Swift UI and combine. So how did that happen? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, I think maybe this was a real push from the developers. So like, they want to do the latest, greatest thing. Unfortunately, I was not there yet. So I joined a year ago, and the app is a bit older. But also, I think, maybe if people are buying the latest, greatest car, like an electric vehicle, you kind of can assume that they have also modern phone. So it would not make sense to spend 1000s of euros on expensive current and only few bucks on the phone. So yeah, I think this was a good opportunity to combine latest, greatest things. Yeah. And I mean, it was a main selling point, that they're using Swift UI and combine and they have customers and things like that to try and the company. Jeroen Leenarts: So which say that when you were looking for a job, like about a year ago, that it was on your shortlist that were using Swift UI and combined. So that would be it would have been a big plus, for the companies that you were looking for. X. Okay, cool. And how has the experience been doing combining swift UI? like full on in production? Since probably iOS 13? I guess? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah. I must say, it was a really pleasant thing. So I mean, I cannot share a lot of concerns about so people on the internet are more like, yeah, you cannot use Swift UI in production. I mean, for us, the app bits, if you look at it not super complex, so to say you have certain buttons and text fields, and you're sending HTTP requests, so it's serving us super well. And we have very few UI kit components. So we hardly ever deal with Swift UI bucks, honestly. So for us, it's working fine for our use cases. And the other thing combined turned out to be pretty stable. And so everything is reactive. It's it's hard to wrap your head around. So I've haven't been on the RX swift train before. So for me, it was like completely blowing my mind. But this was very pleasant and was very stable. Jeroen Leenarts: Oh, that's good to hear. Because I've heard stories that were like at the other end of the spectrum as well, and you reflect it quite well actually. That's, for some reason. There are things that that also for me, it's quite easy to do in UI kit. But then if you want to do it exactly like that in Swift UI, at least visually that you have the same visual results. That's quite often doesn't work out as you would have wanted. But if you have like a greenfield situation like with the app that you're working on, I can imagine that, well, if there are some challenges that you run into that you can't that you can't develop it exactly the way that you want, then you can work with a designer to massage the design in a way that it does fit in Swift UI paradigm, I guess. Denise Nepraunig: Exactly. And we have very picky designers to be honest Lego the machine measuring every pixel here and there. But in the end, we were always able to fix it and satisfy their needs. It's just as you said, if something would be completely unreasonable, or you could solve it, otherwise, you would do that. But swift UI has never been the problem. I mean, we had a tiny bit, that was like some scroll animation, which seemed like super easy peasy, but that somehow pretty messed up something yesterday, like versus animation and stuff like that. That was a couple of weeks. Really effort just to make a text scrollable. This was one of the first things I really felt like, Oh, my God, okay, I did not work directly on it. But I paired with a colleague on that, and I feel like, that's really weird. But I think now we got it. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah, one of the issues that I ran into was with, if you if you have like a list, and for instance, you have a UI TableView you can have like sections in your list. And doing that in Swift UI, up till I think iOS 14, it was quite tedious to get sections in in a ListView to get it working in a way that it was also performance. Because everybody is used to the Fetch Results Controller, which can just give a key path and it just does everything automatically for you. And it performs reasonably well. But somebody told me Yeah, then, but then you just need to model your data differently. And then it's quite easy. And maybe I'm just not getting swift UI yet. So um, so but just to switch gears a little bit, um, you live in Germany? What city are you in? Denise Nepraunig: I live in Berlin. Okay, so Jeroen Leenarts: that's the capital of Germany. Right? And what's it like living in in Berlin? Denise Nepraunig: Oh, yeah, it's kind of hard to tell, because we're in the middle of the pandemic, so you don't go out that much as you would like to. But in general, for me, I come from rather small towns, like with 10,000 or 15,000, inhabitants up to 100,000. And Berlin has like 4 million if I'm correct. And it's it's different. It starts from the foods you can order. So you have much more different foods. But it's also like a lot of different tech companies are here in Berlin. That's also very exciting. And yeah, it's very multicultural, and very open. And I say so for people like LGBTQ ia plus, it's very friendly for that. So as Lynn was the first city ever, so like girls holding hands, and you feel like God it really together and stuff like that. So I enjoy the city a lot. Jeroen Leenarts: And have you been living in Berlin? For long? Or? Denise Nepraunig: I just moved here last year? No, before I lived in a small town in Valdosta, which is the headquarter of SAP. Yeah, because I worked at SAP otherwise you would not lift there on purpose. Yeah, but I've been in Germany for seven years. And I originally from Austria. But also the job from SAP brought me here and now job at carry. It brought me to Berlin. Jeroen Leenarts: And it's a good move to make, I guess. Because SFP is quite a different company to I imagine where you're working right now, even though it's part of the Volkswagen Group. So just to switch gears again, I just want to like, go back a little bit in your history. What was the first computer that you got your hands on? Denise Nepraunig: Oh, it was a horse to process called 486. Was it correct? Yeah. And was 75 megahertz, Intel thing and Windows three dot 11 and Microsoft DOS. Jeroen Leenarts: And did you did you use that computer a lot? Or was it more like some games or some text editing and that's about it. Denise Nepraunig: For me, it was I think everybody did this. I used to paint a lot like to scribble around. I really loved this. I was also writing stuff down and But made mostly games and kind of really enjoyed doom. My older cousins showed this to me. So I needed to have Saturday like this. Jeroen Leenarts: So I'm very good at playing do more. Denise Nepraunig: I always used to cheat codes. I don't know when I for me when I was young. So the 3d environments and everything in my head, it didn't make sense, everything looks the same. Now that I'm older, I have an easier time. But back then I don't know. But I still enjoyed the music. And whenever I hear it, I feel I feel happy. Jeroen Leenarts: Good memories. And and so but was, was that experience with that computer? Was that like the start of your interest into computers? Or is that something that you developed later, when you had to make some big choices in your education, and also the career that would follow on top of that? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, it's an it's an interesting thing. So I had this computer at home. I think I was 10 years old when I got my first computer. And my parents, so my mother was a secretary. So she was working with computers, basically. And when I was younger, I was also allowed to visit her in the office. And so I saw it computers are great, and always reminds me of this time was my mother. But the thing was, my parents were never like fans of computers to always like, Ah, you and your computers and stuff like that. So, you know, it's kind of I liked it, but they didn't like it. And when you spend time at the computer, they kind of made you feel bad about it. And yeah, when I was 15 years old, I made my first experiences with programming, because I had no one around to show me this. And I mean, Internet, and YouTube basically did not exist the way it is today. Yeah, I wanted to pursue something with computers, but my parents were kind of against it couldn't really support it. And yeah, so then I settled for becoming a secretary. Because I'm sitting in front of the computer. And when I was a secretary, I was using the office products from Microsoft a lot, and especially Microsoft Excel. And then I think our automated everything, as soon as I discovered Visual Basic for Axel. And it was clear, no, I want to become a developer and whatever cost it is, I need to pursue that. So and Jeroen Leenarts: so is it the case that you did like a formal education in to become a secretary? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, exactly. So I left school early, so to say and took an apprenticeship as a secretary. So no higher education. But then I felt like, no, I need to become a developer. And then I had to look at the job offers. And I felt like, Okay, I need to attend a technical school or go to study or university. And yeah, so I had, like a second career, so to say, I was going to school in the evening, to be allowed to go to the university and then finished my master's degree also, while working. Jeroen Leenarts: So you still had to make sure that you were able to pass the the entry exam of the education that you wanted. Exactly, exactly. Wow. So how many years did it take for you to really get through this entire process, like getting the entry, and graduating with a master's degree. Denise Nepraunig: So for for getting the entry certificate, I took three years instead of four, I was lucky to be able to skip informatics. So because I knew how computers and stuff worked, and I could make a website and things like that. And for studying, it was like three years bachelor, and then there was one year break, because I was studying how to say next to my job. And then for one year, they didn't have enough participants for the master while working your job, so yeah, I think it was like nine years then in the end. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah, that's, that's quite an investment timewise that you did? How many years ago? Did you graduate? Denise Nepraunig: Oh, that's a good question. I think about I think I graduated in 2012 when I'm not wrong. Jeroen Leenarts: So um, you've since you're, like, graduated in 2012. I can imagine that once you had the bachelor's degree, you were already active on the job market and then doing the Masters next to that. Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, so for me, it was like in 2008, I left my secretary job and joined another company. So they were dealing with SAP implementations. And first I started as a kind of a secretary there too. But then I told my boss after I think one or two years like Hey, I I'm studying informatics part or part next my job. And I felt like, hey, I want to be a developer. And he was like, okay, cool. We had another developer on the team. And he let me just try this out. And that's where it gets started. Because when you are not experienced, it's a chicken and egg problem. Everybody wants to have your experience, but nobody's hiring you to get experience. I was facing this. Yeah. Jeroen Leenarts: And so how many years did you work for SAP? Denise Nepraunig: for SAP itself? I worked seven years. Yeah. And the company before was just implementing, I mean, just it's a hard task. But there were using as a PR was working for years and in between the consulting company for one and a half years. Jeroen Leenarts: So So was it? Was it sap that you made the switch from, from office work to development work? Denise Nepraunig: Exactly. Jeroen Leenarts: So you could say that your job at SAP? Or does your engagement with SAP was very much instrumental in making your switch in the end? Denise Nepraunig: Exactly, yeah. And it was also like a coincidence, I haven't heard SAP before. Because it seems like for enterprise, and you normally don't touch this as an end user. And when I started my studies, I was sitting to a person, and he was works at Pargo they are making this fruit chooses. And he will, he was telling me all about the SAP system and how they automated production and everything. And he even showed me on his laptop and things like that. And I only knew excellent things and how to automate things, you know. And then he was like, Ah, see, tomorrow, I want to have, I don't know, 10,000 bottles of orange juice are so and the system calculated, okay, you need so and so long, and so much bottles, and so much will be scrapped stuff like that. And I was like, blown away. And then one of the professors we had this university was working at this company and where I started, yeah, so it was a very lucky coincidence. Jeroen Leenarts: And, and looking back, would you say that? If you wouldn't have worked at SAP would, would you have had a harder time making the switch? Or did you think it would have worked out anyways? Denise Nepraunig: I think, yeah, working at SAP itself was really a very valuable experience. Because before I joined sa P, I mean, you were like a developer, where you worked with one or two other developers before. And this is a completely different focus. So you don't have a built environment, you, you don't have that many tests, you, you don't release things you, I don't know. Totally different then than joining SAP, then all of a sudden, you're like in a professional software development company, you have seven other colleagues or so you're writing unit tests, you're, you're planning your releases, translations, accessibility, whatever. It was like, yeah, it brought me to a whole new level of development. How to say professional Listen, working at SAP itself, yep. Jeroen Leenarts: Okay, cool. And at what point? Did iOS development became a thing for you? Denise Nepraunig: At SAP, we had a partnership was apple, and I was switching departments. And for me, it was the correct time to pick it up. Because also Swift was released during this time. And I remember it was way back then I wanted to do iOS apps. I even bought a Mac Mini. And then I had a look at the Objective C book. And I was kind of skipping reading through it. And there was like, memory management and things like that. And the syntax was so weird. And I was like, No, I'm not doing iOS development. Yeah, just didn't get Jeroen Leenarts: it. You felt some objections with Objective C, I guess. Yeah. Denise Nepraunig: So. So language wise, I mean, I was not developed. I was not how to say, a developer with that much experience and syntax and manual memory management. I've never done this before. And I just couldn't grasp it. And all the things like setting up certificates and deploying it to your phone. Every single so complicated. When I when Swift was there, and then I had a look at the slides. And they looked at swift for like, Yes, I can write iOS apps. I get this now. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah. Yeah, I hear that quite often from people that that Swift was like a big language reset that actually allowed people to reconsider investing themselves into iOS development. But you you mentioned that you switched departments? Was it like a choice on your part? Or was it just a reshuffling of of people? Because they were needed elsewhere? or So was it like your choice to get started with iOS development, or Denise Nepraunig: it was a lucky coincidence. So when you work at big companies like SAP, so it's a great company to work for. But sometimes it's very political. And a lot of things get reorganized. And this work is giving to those people and things like that. And all of a sudden, your your should do work, which you're originally not signed up for. So I was not interested in this topic. Then I was looking for another job. And then I heard that they are going to do iOS development, but like, oh, yeah, I want to do this. Yeah. And even if I didn't have the experience, there were other people there who also were not iOS developer, but their architect was experienced. I was developer so we learn together. That's what's really great. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah. So you had like, the the company is so big, they have an internal job market. So if you want to, yeah, totally. Yeah, I can I I've, I've seen those things in the past three and a half years as well, my previous job. It's like, software development group. That's like 1000 people, not as big as SAP. But still, you can fill an office building with them. So you got started with iOS development, because you, you went to another job internally to SAP and how much time that you need. When you really got started with iOS development that you started to feel on top of things so that you had like a feeling that you knew what you were doing, because I know, switching into a new paradigm, a new language and new IDE. I've done it a couple times in my career as well. It's it's, it's hard. Denise Nepraunig: So yeah, totally. So for me, it was like I was previously besides doing there's an SAP language called abab, which is mainly backend and making front end was also a total different, but then I had web development. And then came iOS. Yeah. And yeah, as you said, getting up with the IDE, I mean, people underestimate this, but it's really hard to use this things was a gazillions of buttons and what you're doing. And I really felt like it took me at least over half a year to really feel like okay, I kind of know what I'm doing. And when you build your project and all derive data, and oh, I should clean this and Dad, it's it's really hard. I was very lucky at SAP, so we had to pick Nerd Ranch. They were giving a training. So like an advanced training. It was maybe too advanced for me, but it was a good outlook, and also getting to know other people. That was really, really great. Jeroen Leenarts: Yeah, that's correct. Did they did those trainings. So does boot camps have them? They did? In Europe, right? Yes. So he actually went to one of them. Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, they so they came to us. Better? Yeah. Jeroen Leenarts: So who was your trainer then? Denise Nepraunig: I think he was called Steph. Stephen. Stephen. Yeah. I think I Jeroen Leenarts: think I think I spoke with him. At some points like years ago, because that sound WWDC there was this guy with a with a big hat on. So that's like Aaron Hilla gas. And I think he was like written right next to him. And I said, like two or three things to him. And that was it. So yeah, but the Big Nerd Ranch that when I got started with iOS development, that was one of the trainings I wish I could have done at some point, but there was never the opportunity for me. That's also one of the advantages of big companies. Sometimes they they can just get the training to you instead of having to go to some thread, who knows where. So you got started with iOS development took you like half a year to really get confident and comfortable with it. Really? And and then what because at some point, you decided that you want to leave SAP and start working for Gary yet? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, so the thing is, I mean, at SAP, they were pretty early on building their own SDK. So for us internally, so that SAP, we could develop our own apps with it, and also for the customers outside. So for me at certain point, after I got the basics of iOS development, it was more or less trying to use our own SDK, and how to put those things together. So the SDK did a lot of things automatically. So our backend was in head OData. So this is on top of rest with But suffix vocabulary like, top and filter and things like that. And those things were happening automatically. So the hardest and also offline handling, everything was already done automatically. So the hardest part was just sticking our things together. And I felt like Yeah, but if I really want to improve my iOS development and architecture and testing and whatever, I need to go somewhere where it's pretty new. And I mean, the good thing about SAP is like, yeah, okay, it's kind of hard to get in. So back then during, like training, so so they cost a lot of money, you just don't do this on your side. So I was already in. But it's also hard to get out, you have such a specific knowledge. And like big companies, they always invent their own things. It's not like you use Firebase Analytics. No, you have your own thing. It's not like using GitHub actions. No, you have your own built infrastructure. And you're kind of stuck in the systems. And that's makes it's also super hard to get another job outside of it. So yeah, it took me quite some time to get that. Honestly, Jeroen Leenarts: and, and work in getting out. Was it more, you had to skill yourself up in certain areas? Or was it more like the, the apprehension of like, okay, I want to leave but then actually doing it is it's another thing really? Denise Nepraunig: I think so. Like, it probably would have been hard to get into a company, which totally relies on that you're already fluent with those things and can do things like that. That's one part. But also another part is like, I mean, which is kind of unfortunate or lucky, I don't know. So SAP itself, and this whole ecosystem pays really well. And you're, you're in a certain standard. So if I want to leave and get to an iOS company, and they pay me only half of the money, which would have been realistic, it's also like, Yeah, is this really worth it? So at a certain age, I mean, I'm, I'm sort of six to say, I'm not 25 for you maybe can do this or live with your parents or whatever. So I have bills to pay, things like that. It was also a big consideration. And then, I mean, there's only a way up, like trying to get into Fang companies, which is super hard, because you need to be an expert guru on whiteboarding interviews, which I'm not honestly, or you ended up really lucky with was Fox Bang, which is kind of the same structure like a big company, and they see, okay, you're an engineer. We think you can do this. And was a lucky coincidence. Jeroen Leenarts: So what so just to dig into that a little bit, what was the hiring process like when you when you submitted your resume to carry it? Denise Nepraunig: It familiars was quite surprising, I must say. So for me, it was like your Volkswagen first, I didn't have it under radar. It's for me a company like yeah, to make cars and not software. But through some connections, it was interesting for me and I submitted my CV. And then I must say, I was really surprised. So they did an initial coding interview. And I was like, Oh, my God, what do I have to do invert binary tree? I don't know. No, but it's actually really pleasant, like I did TDD was a person together and really talking through the problem. And this was like, Yeah, and it was not like hyper official problem was kind of a real problem. So this was the initial screening, and they have done the concept of a pairing day where you work with three different engineers as the like two engineers in your area of expertise. So for me, it was iOS. And one was a totally different area. And this was for me, like Android and Kotlin. So I never touched us before and the thing was, like there really opened up the backlog and we're like, hey, let's implement this feature together. What do we need to do? And we really worked with them on a real thing and you really had an idea and to open up through IDE you see Oh, to have decent these dependencies how they're working harder signs looking like to this was really super pleasant experience at I would not have expected this from a company like this as I said, they're making cars in my mind they're doing more but yeah. Jeroen Leenarts: So and then you had like that that was like really the the the technical screening and like the cultural fit also all packaged in one because working together closely for an entire day with different people, they they get to know you a little bit. And we're like other interviews after that before you get came to the offering face. Denise Nepraunig: Oh, yeah, we had Then HR interview? And yeah, it's things like compliance or how you're solving conflicts? Or did you have problems as a woman in tech or things like that? They're asking that. And that was also went really, super well. It was not like this too stupid, like, where do you see yourself in five years and tell me your weaknesses, things like that. It was really a good talk. And I really enjoyed it. Yeah. And at the very beginning, before I came to the technical interview, my future manager, she told me what they are doing, and if I would be interested in that, so it was really a pleasant experience. And that's, Jeroen Leenarts: that's so great to hear. Because you wouldn't expect that from like a big multinational, like, like Volkswagen, if you like, look on the outside, because it's just a big, big company that does like sounds of things and has big factories all over the world. Exactly. So yeah, it's it's much better that, and I hear that more often nowadays that as like, well, let's just say that there's no decent interview processes in place and more and more companies. And, yeah, I think I think the place that you work should really be commended for the way that a they set up this process, if I might say, um, is there anything that we forgot or anything that you say like I, we definitely need to talk about that? Denise Nepraunig: Students thinking maybe you need to cut this. But no, I mean, I think working at a company like this, it has kind of a startup character, but it's a really, really big, and if you have software delivered already, it's it's not like a startup. I mean, you have customers, you need to test. So it's not like that's super super hl. It's like safe, we have like safe for big companies. But I think it's a super exciting opportunity currently, because everybody's switching to electric mobility. Volkswagen is doing trying to do a lot of software on their own. And it's kind of a sweet spot. It's like they're in the beginning, they cannot invent every single selves. So for me, another part was like when I learned using like GitHub actions in her project, I felt like, Oh, my God, when can I start? Like you using industry standards, you can Google that. And that, that's for me. Super, super exciting. And also the team, I work with the other developer, like, around my age, they're different nationalities. So we speak English all the time. So it's a really great experience for me. And I can highly recommend this book environment. Yeah. And the salaries are also good. So what's also interesting point, because when you switch jobs, I mean, it's hard when you would get less money. But yeah, Jeroen Leenarts: it's always good to to, like, discover that test and appreciation for your skills, and that it's actually higher than what you were getting before. So, with that, um, how can people find you online? Denise Nepraunig: Oh, you just need to Google my name. So I'm mostly active on Twitter. I also accept requests on LinkedIn. And I tried to do a bit of photography on Instagrams also my, my name so Denise Napoleonic. If it will be listed, a lot of things come up. But yeah, I'm mostly active on Twitter. Jeroen Leenarts: Okay, yeah, that's, that's also where, where we met initially. Exactly, yes. So um, yeah. But that's, I will make sure to link those things from the show notes. And if people have any questions, they probably can reach out on Twitter. And who knows? It's always good to interact online, I think in a meaningful and decent manner. And, yeah, I'd like to say thanks for your time. And I think yeah, for both of us, it's it's evening now. So enjoy the rest of your evening. And who knows, maybe we can meet up at a UI calm for in the future or something when, when this whole Corona thing is, is history? Yeah, that would be nice to meet in person at some point, because where you live and where I live, it's not it's like six hours or something apart. So maybe, who knows? Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, really, look, they're looking forward to that. Okay. Jeroen Leenarts: Thanks for your time and talk to you later. Denise Nepraunig: Yeah, thank Unknown: you.