About

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Written in Asciidoctor, baked with Nanoc, and hosted on GitLab.

Hi, I’m Harald 👋

My origins are in Vienna/Austria but I live in Stockholm/Sweden.

I have been developing software since the mid-nineties. It is an exciting and interesting job, sometimes also a little crazy, but I still like it. Mostly I am involved in C++ projects on Linux, Windows, and macOS, but I use other programming languages as well.
Recently, I have developed a huge interest in automation and tooling, CI/CD, DevOps, and AI-driven development workflows.

I like to spend my spare time with my family. When I have time left, I am in front of a computer or a book, for fun and for learning purposes. I am also very actively involved in the local C++ developer community, which consumes a huge part of my remaining available time.

Some visible results from my spare time and hobby activities

  • This site, with my blog :-)
    I do not do as much writing as I would like these days, but maybe, and hopefully, this will change.

  • The local C++ meetup group
    StockholmCpp, the C++ user group of Stockholm, by far my favorite hobby. You can find some more information about that topic on my blog.

  • The swedencpp youtube channel
    I learned how to edit videos, and the results can be seen on YouTube. There are also some of my talks among the recordings. I like this kind of activity a lot since it is very different from my programming and other IT-related tasks.

  • The swedencpp website
    swedencpp is a Node.js application with an HTML frontend. This is something different from what I usually do. For me, the site is one of the best places to find information about C++. It lists recent videos and blog posts, and has a calendar with upcoming events.

  • SIS/TK 611/AG09
    SIS/TK 611/AG09 is the Swedish mirror committee for ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG21. I am the convener of SIS/TK 611/AG09 and a member of the local expert group for C++, which makes me a member of SC22/WG21.

  • libsl3, a C++11 interface for sqlite3
    A sqlite3 wrapper back from the time where C++11 was new :-) Still a solid library and an example for how I think a library should look like, unit tests, complete code coverage, and complete documentation. I still update it occasionally because it has users, but I do so slowly, so I don’t fix what ain’t broken.

  • BuildId.dev, a SaaS for numbering
    BuildId is a tiny HTTP service for lexicographically sortable IDs that can include state.
    It’s useful for CI builds, document names, and other cases where this kind of numbering helps.

Archive, oldies but goldies

  • My bitbake tutorial.
    An intro to bitbake, the build engine for the Yocto Project. This page is still among the top search results on Google for a bitbake tutorial.

  • sbbdep, (Slack Build Binary Dependencies)
    The tool for exploring binary runtime dependencies on Slackware and Slackware based systems. sbbdep is a final project, only bugfixes are done. But since some years it is pretty stable.

Besides, I am also an active contributor to other open source projects. Usually when I use some tool, and need some functionality or find some issue, I just fix it and send the result upstream.

If you are interested in what I do for a living, there is more info on my LinkedIn profile, which I try to keep up to date occasionally. Or visit my company profile at Hands Development AB.
Direct contact is possible via harald dot achitz at gmail dot com.