My name is Arjen. I am a Cyber Security Consultant for Scyon. I help organisations with their Application Security, Offensive Security and (Cyber) Business needs. Roles that I like to fulfill: (C)ISO, Security Engineer, Engineer Manager, Senior Developer (Java or Rust).
I have been in the software and security industry for almost 30 years and have worked in:
Internet providers (Chello / UPC, Tiscali - NL): Java
Startups (Personify - USA, eBuddy - NL): Java, Big Data
Healthcare and FinTech (Infomedics - NL): Java and dotNet - Managed the IT and Development teams
EduTech (NOVI - NL): Managed the development team building in Serverless, Javascript
Education (Hogeschool van Amsterdan / NOVI - NL): teaching software security and software engineering courses
Cyber Security (Independent): helping organisations with their security posture
In 2024 I completed my Masters’ Degree. My research topic was BiDE, a language and architecture for the creation of bidirectional diagrammatic editors. In essence a way to modify program text using diagrams and text at the same time, allowing stakeholders of different backgrounds to work on the same system at the same time. I worked on this thesis with Bastiaan Heeren (Open Universiteit) and Jurgen Vinju (Centrum Wiskunde en Informatica).
In my spare time I love to explore the cutting edge of software engineering, exploring new languages such as Rust, Clojure and Golang in combination with Large Language Models and their novel applications.
The video I am commenting on below is part of a series called Vibe-coding in het onderwijs. So far, the series has been excellent! It shows teachers how they can create small tools for their class using AI such as ChatGPT and bolt.new. The projects featured had very little actual logic or complexity, and the use of AI was spot-on!
Now, take a look at the following video. If you don’t know any Dutch, Tom is using bolt.new to create an AI chatbot that simulates a difficult HR conversation. How this relates to education isn’t relevant here; the point is that he wants to demonstrate the use of a model with a frontend.
Will software development change? Yes, of course. Will we stop making software? No, we’ll still be creating software, just not in the same way as before.
For the last few months, a lingering question in our industry has been: is there still room for developers in this AI-driven world? My answer is yes, but we won’t be developing in the same way we have for the past 30 years.
My career dates back to my first professional coding job in 1996. Back then, we created software that had to be physically shipped to customers on some form of media. My most ambitious project was the work I did when the Dutch ISP Freeler was created
. We wrote software and then put it on a CD-ROM to ship to customers. Later, the delivery medium became the web, which transformed all our distribution challenges. Programming languages evolved too, shifting from those focused on single platforms and distribution methods to more web-friendly languages.
I am leaving NOVI. Yes, I know, it is sad news. For almost 6 years I have been building and maintaining an organisation that provides the best cybersecurity and software development (Bachelor) education in The Netherlands. In that time I have done amazing things:
Created a short course format for people that want to switch careers. With some back of the napkin calculations I have seen over 2500 students pass through one of the programs.
I lead a team of quality assurance, educational development, EduTech developers and teachers to build an awesome EduTech tool and provide top-notch education.