Javier Álvarez (Medina)

Hola 7r

I didn’t expect to deceive anyone so soon, my more optimistic cabals pointed to get back to work in March, but honestly this new adventure looks pretty good and gives me everything I’ve been looking for since I left my favorite video game, CARTO.

Help to build something from (almost) scratch, in a small team, multidisciplinary, where any action you do is going to have an immediate impact on the group. And I say group because right now there are 5 of us. I was looking forward to getting back to the Vizzuality era, where a new challenge appeared every 2 months. Freedom to create something unique, we delivered it, happy customer, celebration and the following week we were already struggling facing the next one.

And that’s what is happening in 7r in a certain way. But with some nuances and incentives. This is not a consultancy agency, 7r creates companies. An ingenious idea appears, a client who wants it, and there is where we come in. We give ourselves a deadline to create a first version, validated and supported by the first client. Then a company is created around this project, because it has a future path, a client that has validated it and is economically profitable. And we are ready for the next challenge.

And I speak of challenge because there is no project where we do not have to work with some hardware, with new terminology or use some technology that we hadn’t heard before. And that’s the good thing, the comfort zone is eliminated, because this is about working in 7r, having the adventurous gene awake.

But this adventure has just begun and we need people with whom we can share it. We are looking for another developer with whom I would work side by side to carry out that first phase of the creation of the project. Great base salary + bonus when projects are finished, remote work if you want (although we like to work together some days in Google Campus), no fancy or extravagant perks, transparency, great team environment.

If you have doubts or curiosity, just ping me.

👋🏽 CARTO

I have really abandoned my blog, actually I didn’t comment the big change in CARTO since 2014 or the branding change to CARTO in 2016¹. Whatever, there will be time to explain them, I’ll try to write from time to time this 2018.

Today I wanted to mention something less interesting. One week ago I left CARTO, and I have to admit it was the toughest decision I’ve ever taken. Because part of my life is (and will be) this company, is (and will be) this group of people, is (and will be) to fulfill this illusion.

And you may know, when you experience so many emotions and adventures over 9 years, you need to stop, rest, recharge your batteries and find a new adventure where to help. And this is the way I communicated my leaving to the team (but in tears):

Who loves video games? I do, and it is likely you too. I guess you are wondering, why is he talking about video games now? Because CARTO (previously known as Vizzuality) is like an old great video game, an arcade video game, which I’ve inserted coins every day for almost 9 years.

And I can proudly say I’ve passed several levels (with better or worse results), with its monsters and its rewards included.

Today, unfortunately, I can’t find more pocket coins to insert, I don’t feel the same energy than before to kill those final monsters, to pass that impossible level, to win that precious reward.

But, wait, the countdown to insert a new coin has started, and I don’t want anybody to give up. You are a very good player (don’t have doubts), you have the right weapons, you know the path to the end of the level, and you know how to kill that final monster.

Take your coin, insert it and keep the game on. I’ll be close to you watching how you complete the video game, and if I can help with the Konami code, I’ll be there.

Thanks to all of you, really, thank you. There isn’t (and there won’t) enough time to thank everybody I’d like to, those you are and those you were here.

But a special thank you to @jorgesancha, who has moved land and sky to find me a new position last months. And thanks to @saleiva and @jatorre, because you teach me how to play old nice video games, and now, in the future, I’ll try to find a lost coin in the floor to start a new video game, but not that awesome, maybe the Tetris.

1 - I encourage you to follow Javi Santana’s blog to know more about the last years in CARTO

Five years at Vizzuality

There is no a better moment to start again with my blog, celebrating my fifth anniversary at Vizzuality. After my first years in this wadusfera I can only say thanks to the team and the people who have worked here.

I could say we have done things (some we can’t mention) that we are proud. Lot of projects, with great companies, things that mattered. But this adventure hasn’t finished and we are ready for new opportunities, and this year is gonna be special.

I usually like to remember that we were 5 years ago working in a small room in La Latina, tons of dreams, and today I keep them present. If someone asks me about my future, I’d say the same as before. Keeping the feeling what I do is important.

My gift for this birthday is a small audio player¹², using @luisico’s sounds playing FIFA :D. If you know him, you will know how expressive he is.

Thanks to all the team for the recordings, to @ferdev for splitting the audio files into separate tracks and finally to @damagedgoods for designing something for this purpose :).

So, I hope I finish my website soon, and later a visualization I’ve been developing lately. Writing a post every two weeks, … Let’s see if it is possible.

New year, new purposes.

1 - My favorite luisico sound is this.
2 - Sorry, only HTML5 browsers, problems under iOS :(.

CartoDB ♥ Idealista

Everybody has looked for a house at some point in their lives, and it’s not an easy job. Some months ago was my turn, and I dove into one of the most important real estate portals in Spain called Idealista. Really simple and easy to find a house or flat that fits for you. But (there is always a but) I realized they don’t use any kind of maps to represent the districts and neighborhoods, in fact, they use map images.

Thanks to this I decided to do an alternative using CartoDB and Leaflet. Just a simple interactive example of Madrid districts and neighborhoods.

You can visit the example here. The code, as always, is in GitHub, and the data is available in this CartoDB table (amount on sale or rent houses are bogus).

UPDATED: Thanks for the corrections @javier :).