Trendyol's Journey to Work at Trendyol Front-End Bootcamp: Ömer Buğrahan Çıkan

Omar Buğrahan Çalikan, 4th year student of Computer Engineering at Yıldız Technical University. He participated in the Front-End bootcamp we held with Trendyol and successfully completed it and started working as a Software Developer in the Trendyol team!

We wanted to hear Omer's journey for ourselves!

Can you introduce yourself to us in your own words?

Hello, I am Ömer Buğrahan Çıkan, 22 years old. I am a 4th year student of Computer Engineering at Yıldız Technical University.

When did you meet the software?

Ever since I was a kid, I just wanted to be a Computer Engineer. I was also introduced to software in my high school years. At first I tried to learn by watching classes on Youtube, but then I decided that I needed to get a more professional education. On weekends I took software trainings in various fields at a software & consulting company. These tutorials included C#, Web Programming, Database (SQL) topics. Although it adds a lot to me in terms of knowledge, experience and vision, I can say that I have not been able to go far beyond what I learned both because I tried to write code directly without the infrastructure to build basic algorithms, and because I did not have much time to develop projects to consolidate this knowledge.

During my university years, I developed many projects, mainly in C and Java languages. In particular, learning C has created a solid foundation in terms of being able to build algorithms and understand the basic logic of the software and the principle of operation. I was interested in different areas such as Cyber Security, Backend Development, Mobile Programming so that I could find the area I wanted to continue in my career. Since I was very impressed by my acquaintance with the JavaScript language and discovering what can be done using it, I decided to turn to the Frontend field and JavaScript languages/frameworks.

When did you cross paths with Path.dev? What lessons did you take here?

I was following We Code and bootcamps after a friend mentioned it, I met Patika in April, and I was glad I met:) After reviewing the tutorials, bootcamps and articles in Pathika, I realized that it is a very useful platform. When I saw the Trendyol Frontend Bootcamp event, I immediately applied. I started on the Frontend Web Development path. Here I was able to take Git, Html, Css and Basic JavaScript lessons and then the bootcamp process started.

How was your journey to Trendyol bootcamp, what did you experience?

My bootcamp journey was both a very enjoyable and a very productive process that I will want to experience again and again. Technically, many technologies, topics were mentioned during the 7-week bootcamp process and we were able to nicely reinforce what we learned with the assignments given. I can say that learning the technologies within the scope of Bootcamp directly with the experience of the Trendyol team, being able to ask questions comfortably in the places where we hang out and especially not only stay with theoretical knowledge and hold workshops, significantly reduces the learning curve of our coding with instructors. I would like to thank our instructors very much for giving us the opportunity to improve ourselves with their stories on this journey.

From a social point of view, there are more than one issue I would like to address. With the weekday events, we had the opportunity to get to know Trendyol culture closely and to chat with instructors. These activities made the bootcamp process enjoyable, but also eliminated the classroom environment that was taught only. However, I also found the opportunity to meet and chat with many people.

One of the most valuable experiences I gained in bootcamp was the spirit of teamwork. We made a very good team with 5 amazing friends that I met the first week. We helped each other, learned new things together, chatted, played games and never broke off communication. I can say that we have always supported each other both technically and psychologically. That, in my opinion, was one of the biggest and most important differences between joining bootcamp and learning from different platforms.

Finally, I would also like to thank Patika assistants, who provided a comfortable environment from the first day to the last day, which we did not attract strangers with their energy, sincerity and benevolence.

You have just started working as a Software Developer at Trendyol, how do you feel?

I can say that I am in the happiest and most productive period of my life. I feel really lucky to be able to join the Trendyol team, which admires me with its culture and values, which I really want to be a part of and which is why I work hard, and to experience my first work experience here. Because of my early acquaintance with software, I always wanted to be part of a team and to develop new projects by exchanging ideas together. I look forward to participating in new technologies, new projects full of achievements, without ever stopping to wonder and learn. I would also like to thank the Patika team for giving me this opportunity. I would love to be an instructor at a different Trendyol Bootcamp, which will be organized when I have a sufficient level of experience and knowledge in the future.

What advice would you give to people who want to advance in the software field?

First of all, it is very important to lay a solid foundation. So I can recommend to my friends who are just starting out in low-level languages like C, C++ and learn basic concepts such as algorithm building, data structures, object oriented programming at a good level. Hacker rank, Leetcode They can improve themselves by solving questions on platforms such as, and increase their problem-solving skills. Spending their longest time on these platforms and in these languages will improve themselves significantly, and already from this point on, their adaptation in their transition to different languages will be much faster.

When choosing the area in which they will specialize, they can also identify several titles by conducting a detailed research. They can decide whether to continue in their chosen field by taking online trainings and developing simple projects. I highly recommend the trainings on the Trail in this regard, a very valuable resource built with long work and experience. Having extensive training in such different areas allows you to save time and easily solve the question of how not to follow. The best thing to do when learning a new language or framework is to write as much sample code as possible. Just watching videos and reading documents can make you forget even the simplest points, so it is much more useful to start a project after learning the basic concepts and principles specific to technology.

After determining the area or language they choose, they can do more extensive, long-term projects. It will also be very useful for them to participate in the bootcamps that will be organized in that area. It is very important to be open to innovations in the field of constantly evolving and changing software, to be able to follow. That is why we need to continue on this path by constantly learning, improving ourselves, without losing motivation. Anyone can cope with this task by trying not to lose faith, not to let the size of the software world frighten you.

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If you want to have the opportunity to settle down for work by participating in bootcamps like Ömer, you can apply to bootcamps from here you can browse!