William Fridh

I like to see myself as a well-structured problem solver with great determination and a love for innovation. Funny enough, a very similar view I share with my friends. These trails combined with my experience as a producer and project leader have made me who I am today. Someone who wished to keep developing, to lead teams of gifted people, and someone who can see a thousand solutions to any problem.

My goal in life, apart from good health and happiness, is to have a positive impact on the world. I want to know that I left the world a better place by the time I’m done.

My Journey As a Developer

My journey as a developer started at around the age of 14 when I learned how to create custom maps for Blizzard’s game Warcraft 3. I felt like sharing these creations of mine with the world, so I started looking into creating a website.

With no experience in the field, I explored the options where you didn’t have to write code and landed in WYSIWYG Web Builder for my first websites. However, one day a relative recommended me to look into writing the code myself. This recommendation led me down a rabbit hole I’m still exploring the depths of, and I wouldn’t leave even if I could.

I started learning HTML, CSS, PHP, and MySQL. Noted how I didn’t list JavaScript? That came later, alongside good old jQuery. With these tools, I built many different things, such as:

• A CMS with support for posts, pages, plugins, and themes.
• A platform that offered free hosting for HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and images, accessible via a custom subdomain (intended for educational purposes).
• A platform for creating, and managing digital quotes.
• An order management system (collab).
• And so on…

As time went by I kept the developer side of me as a hobby and tried my luck in other industries. Then, in 2021, I decided it was time to fully heartedly join the IT industry. So I started by reading up on TypeScript, React, Redux, and Firebase and managed to get some certificates on Codecademy.

I started applying for jobs and quickly started getting responses. However, during an interview, the representative for the company said something unexpected. He said that I needed a greater challenge than they could offer. And I felt like this was true.

The next thing I knew, I had my eye on a Bachelor! This required me to read up on Maths and Physics, as well as doing well on the Swedish Scholastic Aptitude Test on my first try (as I was eager to start and didn’t wanna wait an extra year). Fortunately, everything went as smoothly as a CSS animation.

Soon I was a student in the bachelor’s programme in Information and Communication Technology at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm Sweden. A program that gives you a deeper understanding of things such as:

• Mathematics
• Computer Programming
• Engineering and Communication
• Digital Electronics
• Modern Software Development
• Computer Security
• Industrial Economics

And this is where I am to this day. At a university where I can learn not just how to write better code, but why it should be written in a certain way, how to improve further, and most importantly: the way of the engineer.