I was born in Zaragoza (northern Spain) in 1986, a few months before the Chernobyl disaster. I grew up in Soria and then moved to Madrid to study journalism.

At the same time as I finished my studies, the crisis of 2008 began, so I continued my education in exciting subjects but with little job opportunities: International Relations and Arab and Islamic Studies.

Like many others, I suffered during the following years the ups and downs of the labor market in times of deep crisis. During these years of uncertainty, half forced by the situation and half by a sincere interest, I approached the world of coding and new technologies.

Along the way of the code

My introduction to the world of web development began in the form of a Wordpress to which I wanted to modify the CSS and HTML. After that, I took on a small project that went halfway well and that opened the way for my contact to begin to be trafficked between low-budget and low-demanding projects.

In the absence of formal training, it was all tinkering, learning, battles, insomnia and hours of tutorials at 1.5x speed. At the end of the day, however, the results were accumulating and with each iteration they were a little better than the last.

Up to this point, however, web development had been a mixture of hobby and very part-time work. Everything changed the day I joined my first ambitious project - El Estado Mental magazine.  I accepted, of course, sealing my definitive leap into the world of web design, receiving my first work contract and enjoying my first imposter syndrome (the first of many).

El Estado Mental lasted from 2014 to 2016 and, after finishing, I spent several years navigating the hectic world of freelance work (already full time and working as a front-end developer) until, in 2019, I joined one of the leading Drupal companies in Spain: Metadrop.

The vices and virtues of self-learning

My professional journey has made me reflect on several aspects of self-learning in the world of web development.

Given its good reputation for career opportunities, the web is a sector that is attracting more and more people. It has long ceased to be a sector only for computer engineers, and I think this is good news because we can all benefit from the contributions that people from other fields can make.

Without going any further, one of my passions (typography) is greatly improving web design thanks to the introduction of principles and lessons learned from centuries of printed typography. The same goes for other areas such as color theory, accessibility, inclusive language and so many other issues.

This hybridization is tremendously enriching but also a source of frustration.

For newcomers and - above all - for the self-taught, the world of coding is as exciting as it is terrifying. The myriad of languages, platforms, frameworks and information available can overwhelm the most methodical and the omnipresent "imposter syndrome" can scare off the bravest.

On the other hand, university-educated developers may feel a certain jealousy and consider the new batch of developers as upstarts or their partial and gap-filled training as risky.

The purpose of this website

As a representative of the "imposter" sector of web development, I am guilty of having made and still make each and every one of the typical mistakes of self-learning.

Every post, every tweet or every tutorial that has patiently helped me understand the why of my mistakes as well as the alternatives and existing solutions has been like water in the desert.

On this site I would like to share some of my learnings and reflections with the aim of being able to help those who undertake today, voluntarily or inadvertently, the same path that I started years ago.

And I would like to do it in a didactic, friendly way and, in many occasions, at the same time that I myself learn what I am talking about.

Welcome to IDR.