Welcome, Brian Demers

I’m excited to announce that I’ve joined Okta’s Developer Relations team! I’ve been working on Okta’s awesome Developer Experience team for the last couple years so I’m not exactly a new face around here. 😉

Who is Brian?

As a young kid, I took things apart. Either to see how they worked or just see what was inside. This habit was made worse when I found computers and started fixing them. Anyone else miss the ol’ days of setting IRQs manually with dip switches? Nobody?

Around this time, two things happened: I realized most computer problems are software related and that Internet thing was getting big. Instead of taking apart physical things I started taking apart digital ones; scouring HTML sources and creating silly web pages.

After a false start trying to teach myself C++ with one of those “Teach Yourself in 21 days” books, I ended up in college and my love of software development really took hold.

Oh, and I’ve taken up beekeeping in the last couple of years as a way to force myself outside. But what has really happened is I just spend more time than ever on YouTube, searching out beekeeping techniques.

Java

The majority of my career has been in and around Open Source projects in the Java community. I’m a committer for Apache Maven and on the PMC (Project Management Committee) for Apache Shiro. These may seem like they’re on opposite ends of the spectrum, a build tool and a security project, but that just goes to show you how security touches every aspect of software development.

What is next?

Joining Okta’s Developer Relations team means I’ll have more time for the social side of software development: writing blog posts, attending events, and contributing to various Open Source projects. Don’t worry, I’ll still be helping out with Okta’s Java libraries too.

I can be found on the Interwebs on Twitter @BrianDemers and GitHub bdemers. Reach out to me if you have questions or just want to connect!