Internship at Opera

From Opera Fan to Opera Employee - Hans Joachim

By Elina SerkedzhievatheEli. Friday, February 17, 2012 3:29:59 PM

Hi,
my name is Hans Joachim and I work as a Systems Developer at Opera. Prior to getting a full-time position I have also worked here as an intern.

Why Opera?
Primarily because I consider it my main web browser, which it has been since I started using it some years back. It is shipped with so many great features. The speed dials, built-in RSS feed reader, and Dragonfly to mention some. And I use these features all the time, so it is nice they are available out of the box.

Also, I have to admit I'm both proud and amazed that Opera is a Norwegian company which are able to compete in a global market. That is certainly inspiring.

About the internship(s)
I have had two internships at Opera. The first one spanned three months during the summer of 2010, and I was allowed back for a second internship last year. I worked in the Core Department and mainly focused on writing test cases. I found this interesting because I learned about new parts of the browser I didn't even knew existed, and got to write tests that made sure it worked as expected. Being interested in software quality (and things which work), this was a fun challenge. It was also valuable to know that the work I did would be used in the future to ensure that the browser continued to work as intended even after my internship was finished.

When I came back for my second internship, I had graduated from the university, and got the opportunity to stick around in a full-time position. I am currently working on the internal systems responsible for testing Opera, which makes sure each new build works as intended. This includes running a large series of tests with the build, which among other things includes the tests I have written earlier.

What I have learned
I have learned many different things working at Opera, both as an intern and as a regular employee. Obviously a lot related to programming and technology in general, including learning a lot about the web and how it is evolving. However, just as important (or more, even) I have met a lot of awesome people. While there are obviously a lot of Norwegians working here, I have also met and worked with people from all over the world. It's really nice to see that all these people with wildly different backgrounds are all working together to make a better browser and improve the web. It also results in interesting discussions during lunch.