mike
hodnick

About

family2 I currently live in Chaska, MN. I have a wonderful family and have been married to my wonderful wife Nicole since August 10, 2001. On August 18, 2005, our beautiful daughter Eva was born.

Career Bio

Back in 1996 I got hooked on the web. While studying Industrial Engineering at the University of Minnesota Duluth I also learned as much as I could about web programming. Deep down I wanted to be a programmer and bought books and did as much hands-on tinkering as I had time for.

In college I cut my teeth writing code for MUDs. I loved playing MUDs and sought out admins who were starting up their own MUD servers. They needed devs to build up the MUD worlds and I loved being able to exercise both creative and technical skills to create something.

For a year I developed and maintained the web site for the Industrial Engineering department at UMD. I created the site from scratch and did everything from the layout to the graphics.

Upon graduation I started working in the Industrial Engineering department of United Parcel Service in Minneapolis. I actually worked there as a web developer, developing internally-faced web apps built on classic ASP and SQL Server 6.5. While the technology was not the greatest, it was here that I was introduced to business-scale programming and the life of a programmer.

After a year and a half I decided that I really wanted to get back to my engineering roots and took a job at a circuit board manufacturing company in Hopkins, MN called Advanced Circuits. I was a line engineer and was responsible for improving the production of photo-resist application and stripping processes in the plant. I lost a lot of weight on this job - crawling over machinery and countless laps around the shop floor. Soon I realized I missed programming...

In 2001 I got a job at Alto Consulting in Edina, MN. Unfortunately I joined when the economy was slow and there wasn't much work to be done. I did a little bit of classic ASP and SQL, but .NET was in beta at the time and its release was just around the corner. I was laid off from Alto that fall, found some temporary full-time work and really, really hit .NET hard in my spare time.

In early 2002 I started working at Nextel Partners in Eden Prairie, MN. My job was to develop internally-facing web apps based on ASP and SQL and act as a lead developer. Along with another enthusiastic programmer on the team we convinced our manager to allow us to adopt .NET and ASP.NET on our projects. Over two and a half years we developed a dozen ASP.NET applications that supported HR, operations, management, trainers, the help desk, you name it.

In late 2004 I joined Inetium (now named Avtex), a consulting firm in Bloomington. I'm still employed with Avtex, and I've been fortunate to work on some great projects with ASP.NET (web forms and MVC), Silverlight (web and out-of-browser apps), WPF, Windows Phone 7, Azure, and Kinect just to name a few technologies.

To this day I still love doing web development. I certainly don't limit myself to "the web" when it comes to programming, but the web is my sweet spot. End to end, I love doing it all. My experience has mostly been on the Microsoft stack of technologies, but I try to stay sharp by diving into other platforms. I find that spending time on other stacks gives you some fresh perspectives on how to approach the things you do every day.

Obscure Facts

  • I graduated from Duluth East High School in 1994
  • I graduated from the University of Minnesota Duluth in 1998 with a BS in Industrial Engineering
  • I developed the first ever Industrial Engineering departmental web site at UMD (the site has changed dramatically since it was first created). Some of the original faculty profile pics I took are still up there though!
  • I'm an Eagle Scout
  • I'm a Minnesota Wild season ticket holder
  • I love camping
  • I love traveling
  • I love the Halo video game franchise
  • I've performed in works by Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich with the Duluth Superior Symphony Orchestra (DSSO)
  • I've played in the orchestra pit with the DSSO for Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker
  • I used to work for United Parcel Service as an industrial engineer
  • I used to work at a circuit board factory as a manufacturing engineer
  • I secretly dance while my code compiles
  • I have a strange infatuation with llamas, alpacas, wombats, and robots
  • I love the music that you hate
  • I can make a paper cup out of a 8.5" x 11" piece of paper that holds water for about a minute

Top 5 albums

These are the albums I'd keep with me if I were stranded on an island. An awesome island, I hope:

  1. Betty, by Helmet

Actually, that's probably the only album worth bringing.

Top 5 movies

  1. Ghostbusters
  2. Army of Darkness
  3. UHF
  4. Fight Club
  5. The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

Top 5 Places I've Visited

  1. Santa Cruz, CA
  2. Rocky Mountain National Park
  3. Florence, Italy
  4. Grand Marais, MN
  5. Gerle Creek Campground

Top 5 defining moments in my musical listening history

  1. Neil Peart on Exit Stage Left
  2. Tony Williams on Four and More
  3. Mr. Bungle
  4. Sepultura
  5. Edgey

There are actually more like 50 defining moments...

Top 5 things to eat

  1. Chocolate
  2. Malt powder
  3. Turkey and cheese sandwich
  4. BBQ pulled pork sandwich
  5. Waffles with Eva

Top 5 pet peeves

  1. Whining about the weather in Minnesota
  2. Whining about the weather in general
  3. Weather reporting on the news
  4. Over-emphasis of temperature averages
  5. Pick-up game athletes with big egos