Wallace Sidhrée
Senior Frontend/Fullstack Engineer
...but first a Yoga Monk for about 10 years
Yep, no kidding! The video... I couldn't stop myself from doing it! 😅
Education & Programming
Although I only have "High School" as my formal completed education, this doesn’t fully reflect my educational background.
I am a drop-out Philosophy student who chose a different path. At 19, I decided to become a Yoga monk, leaving Brazil two years later to pursue this calling (in 1996). After graduating as a monk 1.5 years later, I served as a missionary in Europe — first in Portugal and Spain, then Romania for 4.5 years, and finally Norway. That’s how I ended up here.
During my time as a missionary in Romania I was in-charge of an orphanage, a social relief project we ran at a village next to Bucharest (Domineşti). After getting a laptop donated, I started learning how to code while the kids were asleep, at night.
In 2003 I left monastic life, married my wonderful wife (we’re still together), and began my professional journey as a web developer. I am mostly self-taught in software development, although I have taken a few courses along the way.
Despite not having a relevant computer science degree, I have consistently delivered complex applications and helped clients and companies succeed in the browser throughout my 23 year career as a web developer.
Priorities & Motivations
My career and my success in it has been shaped by what I do on a daily basis. Of course there has always been a sense of direction, curiosity and drive towards certain aspects over others, but I've always managed to align my goals with the opportunities presented to me. Whenever I felt that opportunities started to diverge too far from my goals or skill set, I've moved on, but it hasn't happened often.
I aspire to be an all-round programmer that develops for the browser. I am passionate about both frontend and backend: the frontend as the interactive interface between the user and what's being presented (be it a product or an idea) and the backend as the interface between the frontend and the data repository. I'm not particularly attracted to "backend-backend", the one that doesn't interface with the frontend.
Complexity is one of the aspects of programming that really interests me. When faced with a question like "what would it take for us to achieve this or that?" I am truly in my elements. I like to find the motivation behind the question, the need that it is trying to express... Once we've cleared what that is about, we are then free to unpack the problem and understand the implications around it. What are the pros and cons? Are there caveats? Do the negative implications surpass the positive ones? How long would it take for us to find out if we are in the right path? Are there different ways to find that out? Could we simplify the outcome? Is it possible to add value incrementally? Should we run an experiment to test our assumptions?
I am often recognized for my ability to break down complex problems into clear, understandable terms for my peers — whether through discussion, coding, or collaborative brainstorming. This enables them to take well-informed decisions, fully aware of the available options and their technical implications.
This is one of the most important contributions I've made in my later roles.
I am a hands-on senior programmer who takes on the most complex coding challenges and delivers clear, effective solutions, tailored to fix the problem at hand. My primary goal is to add value – whether through improved code, new features and actionable insights.
I'm a programmer but my main motivation is to provide a good experience to the end users, so that they may find what they're looking for and take informed decisions with as little friction as possible; hopefully converting into owners of products or simply happy users that got what they came for.
