John Astill

[KatherineKenneally]

More about John in SAP Community

Location (City, Country): Newtown Square, USA
Occupation: BTP Customer Success Partner 

John, tell us about yourself.
Who are you, what do you like to do, what is important to you?

For those that have met me at SAP Events they will have seen my love for technology. I love to tinker around with emerging technologies and build out physical models. Those interests led to my involvement in the d-shops at SAP, our Maker spaces where like minds can collaborate.

What is your area of expertise?
What does a usual day at work look like for you?

I have been a Software Engineer for over 3 decades developing in Java, ABAP, embedded, mobile and many oddities, if you ever meet me in person ask me about Bit Slice coding. Recently I moved from Product Managent into the Customer Success organization where I support customers with their adoption of BTP.

What inspired you to become an SAP Champion in SAP Community?

Becoming an SAP Champion felt like a natural progression from my time as an SAP Mentor and SAP Technology Ambassador. I enjoy being a part of the community learning from and sharing with others. I am excited that we can bring back In Person events.

How do you learn in SAP Community?
What is your daily/weekly routine in SAP Community?

The former Twitter used to be a great aggregrator for me. I would use it to follow the community members that posted content I was interested in. Often that led to a great tutorial or blog, and being curated by those I admired made it on point.

I also follow the ever engaging Developer Relations Team and try to fit Devtoberfest the Developer Challenges into my schedule.

What is your suggestion to get the most out of SAP Community?

Get Involved, be it through answering questions, blogging or taking part in the challenges. The SAP Community has created lasting friendships for me over the many years I have been involved. Those relationships have created opportunities for me to travel and present thay may never have happened had I not been engaged in the SAP Community.

John's question to you: I attended in Innovation Event where a Futurist was talking about Human enhancements and posed the question, “if you it was possible to program your brain like in the Matrix, would you do it?”. Cyborg implants fascinate me, but I feel my conscience needs to remain my own, what woud you do?

[Vitaliy-R]

Wow, that's some tough question @johna69!

I remember thinking about what the ultimate state of the "progress" would be in the 1990s. And I thought it would be a combination of a human and a robot. It was before I watched Matrix. And before I discovered the book "The Singularity Is Near" to learn it would be called singularity.

It's just that I do not see it as the progress anymore.