Meet Josh Sommer, Developer Expert for NativeScript

Josh Sommer is a well-known expert on the NativeScript Slack Channel and in the NativeScript community. In this interview, he explains how the current fast-paced market is well-met by the ease of development of NativeScript apps.

This post is the eighth in a series featuring our Developer Experts, community members who represent the best of our products. Read about other featured experts here and meet more TDEs here.

What’s your background, professionally?

I've been a Software Developer for ten years; I graduated from Stark State College. Prior to my current job, I mainly worked for consultant shops building everything from small brochure websites to large CRMs, writing SQL reports and building mobile applications.

Where are you based and why?

I was born and raised in Northeast Ohio and grew up in Carrol County, which is a very rural area. Our closest neighbors lived a half mile away. I've enjoyed computers ever since my family got our first Gateway Computer with a Pentium p60 processor. Now I live in Canton Ohio with my beautiful wife Savanah and my son Ethan, just about five minutes from the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

With whom are you working?

I currently work for Renovo Solutions with a brilliant group of developers and support personnel, working on software that is used internally by the entire company.

What project are you working on now?

Other than my day job, I'm working on two apps. One is a rewrite of an existing Android application I did a year ago in NativeScript so I can re-release it on Android and iOS. The other is a music player that works with subsonic servers.

What’s the most interesting project you’ve done recently?

I was lucky enough to work on the NativeScript Core theme project, and it has been a great experience working with other developers and the community.

What are some challenges you are encountering now in your work?

Right now my biggest challenge is figuring out how to do an SSDP request from iOS. I have it working on Android but I need it working on iOS so I can finish up an integration with a Roku remote. I'm planning on spinning that off into a plugin as long as it can have a common implementation. I would think it should be helpful for IoT-related apps.

Which of our products do you use and why?

I use NativeScript right now. In the past I've also used Rad Controls for Webform applications.

What’s the biggest software pain point, in your opinion, in the mind of your partners or clients?

Speed! Everyone wants something done yesterday and software continues to get more and more complex to write and maintain. That's why I like NativeScript; it allows us developers to create awesome applications in a fraction of the time it would take to write one version for iOS and one version for Android. Add Angular to the mix and you can share code with your web application too. It's really exciting!