Author: Matt Fraser

10 amazing secrets university never taught you about how to become a truly professional software developer

Last week I was very lucky to be able to attend the YOW! 2016 Conference in Melbourne. I had never attended a major conference aimed purely at software developers before and when I arrived early on the first day I wasn't quite sure if I had the right building. Thankfully within 30 seconds of walking in the door I spotted a man wearing a fedora and I knew I had come to the right place!The conference overall was an extremely well run affair. The speakers were all very good and many were either from high profile companies such as Facebook and Uber or were outright living legends of the industry such as Robert 'Uncle Bob' Martin. There were three talks to choose from during each time slot and they covered a wide range of topics. The hardest bit was choosing which talk sounded most interesting and I suffered from severe 'Fear of Missing Out' syndrome when making my selections.I would highly recommend attending to anyone who is looking to gain a better sense of what's going on in the software industry. Setting aside two whole days to listen to presentations, talk to other developers and generally ruminate about the craft of developing software is a great way to take a step back from the daily grind and spend some time looking at the forest instead of the trees. I picked up a number of things that I'll be able to take back and directly apply in my day-to-day development.I've summarised one of my favourite talks below: