Overcoming the Challenges of Working from Home

Moving accounts

Unfortunately for me, due to the times, my previous client had to downsize. This has meant I will no longer be returning to site, where I had made lots of friends in and outside of work.

While this did have its downsides, I’m grateful to be able to move onto a new client, where I can gain new experience and learn new skills. My new client is using all the latest technologies. It’s an exciting place to work for and I’m looking forward to being able to travel to meet the team once this is over.

Another perk – transitioning from one client to another virtually was far easier than before. I was swiftly involved in many KT sessions held online and was able to feel like a part of the team from day 1.

​With the short transition, it wasn’t long before I was able to contribute. Just recently, I automated our long daily system tests and will soon be hosting an intro into SpringBoot session for developers.

Learn a new skill

Without being able to see friends or travel, I decided to make the most of it by learning a skill I’d wanted to grasp for a while: Reverse engineering.

Over the course of 2 weeks, I learned to use tools like IDA Pro, ReClass.NET and classdump to reverse compiled apps. This enabled me to test the new skills I learnt on a video game.

This process unveiled a lot of mysteries surrounding software development for me. I learned assembly language, reversing data structures in memory and more surrounding memory management.

I feel this has given me a broader understanding of app security and what to trust the end user with. It also provided insight as to why code is structured the way it is and new methods, I can deploy in my future projects to counter such attacks.

The code for my research is available on GitLab.

Virtual Cafés with colleagues

A great way to keep up with colleagues at work was by participating in midday Virtual Café sessions. These gave opportunity for people to have open discussions about their day, host general chatter and take a break from work.

By keeping the team in communication in a relaxed manner, it helped maintain the human and relationships side to office work. I believe this maintained moral and kept everyone in-the-know about developments to our client and work.

Quizzes with friends & family

Another fun group activity I participated in were group quizzes. Each week, my circle of friends would take it in turns at writing their own quiz for us all to answer, using Facebook Messenger (supports up to 50).

For those looking to write your own, these are some wacky question types that can make them more entertaining:

• Who’s first to spot something in a picture?
• Name the movie a shot in a YouTube LEGO version
• Identify a location from a distorted picture
• Which song lyrics are real/made up by the quiz author?
• Show a complex image for 10 seconds and see who can remember the details

Come Dine with Me

No restaurants, Deliveroo or cooking with friends? Our house solved the dilemma of eating your own boring meals day in and out by starting a Come Dine game of our own! Over several weeks, we’d each have a turn at preparing a meal for everyone where we’d each score each other’s dinner from 1-10.

Not only was it a nice break to not cook and clean for yourself for a day, but it was fun to be competitive and try new styles of meals.

For my meal, I prepared a dish of seasoned Parma-ham wrapped chicken breasts, stuffed with Boursin cheese. After baking in the oven, I served it with white wine, petite peas, asparagus and a creamy chicken sauce (made using leftover Boursin).

Author

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Freddie Chessell