About
I'm Raúl Roa, I love Coke and Technology. I live in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic which is located on a Caribbean island shared with our neighbor country, Haiti. I've been involved with computers since I was really young, wanting to be a software developer from the beginning. I have a M.S. in Software Engineering obtained at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
I took my first programming steps using VBA & VB5, creating simple routines for Office documents and a couple of replacements for the Windows 98 calculator ;). I later became a Linux power user & open source "fan boy" (eh yeah a MSFT hater!) programming simple stuff mainly in bash script and C. Ironically I was never able to find a job, since in my country Linux has never been famous and people have a fear of adopting it as a commercial solution (at least small companies which comprise the biggest share of the market), which made me consider other options like Microsoft's .NET Framework, to which I was introduced when it was on it's early stages. I first started as a Windows applications developer and then evolved into the Web Applications world where I feel more comfortable and have almost all my work experience. I love all the technologies involved in web development and how the blend together to provide us a fulfilling experience.
From 2005, I've been working as a developer for local and international companies on private and governmental projects mainly on the Web domain. I'm really passionate about learning new things regardless of the language or platform, specially if they help me perform my job faster and improve its quality. I like challenges and solving complex problems.
Its worth mentioning that I have a special bias towards C# and ASP .NET when it comes to Web development & personal likes, but I like porting stuff into other platforms such as PHP in order to practice and stay current in other technologies.
I'm also a native Spanish speaker. I can also communicate in Portuguese & English (obviously), on the former I'm not as fluent as I'd like to be, but I can defend myself.
I've you'd like to contact me feel free to do so by e-mailing to rroa@mrroa.com