I Don't Like Talking About Myself
I'm Maksims Ivanovs, but just call me Max. Easier for you anyway. I've been building for the web for over 10 years: full‐stack, self‐taught, and always curious. I didn't come from a bootcamp or a CS degree. I learned because I enjoyed it, and I got good because I stuck with it.
My first job gave me a shot with zero experience. Within weeks, I was working on real client work. That experience set the tone for everything since: figure it out, deliver, repeat. Whether it's frontend, backend, servers, or that weird API no one wants to touch, I usually dive in and make it work.
I've done a lot of e‐commerce, but I don't box myself in. I've worked across platforms, stacks, and teams. Some projects were solo, some had big roadmaps and bigger meetings. I care about writing good code, but I also care about not wasting time pretending simple things are complex.
Outside of code, I'm a husband, dad of two, occasional gamer, and the kind of guy who builds his own PC just to run local AI models. I've been on Windows, macOS, and Linux. I speak all three fluently.
I like building things that work and saying things that make sense. If you're looking for a dev who will overcomplicate things for the sake of sounding smart, I'm not your guy. But if you want someone who can break it down, build it right, and tell you when your idea needs a reality check, I might be.
Where It All Started
I grew up in a pretty modest household, which meant fixing things and getting creative with what I had. I remember melting toy cars back together with a soldering iron and building stuff out of whatever parts I could find. One time, a friend had this flashy backpack with speakers in it. I couldn't get one, so I made my own using desktop speakers, an old amp, and a Sony Ericsson phone battery. It ended up sounding better than his.
My first computer showed up when I was 10. By 12, I had already taken it apart. Reconnecting the front panel was a nightmare, but I got there eventually. Then I tried installing Windows XP by myself and wiped the whole drive by accident. Good times. But that's how it went: try, fail, fix, repeat. It never felt like failure, just part of the process.
I started playing with Linux, flashing firmware, unlocking phones, modding my PSP, upgrading Androids past what they were meant for ‐ anything that let me dig deeper into how things worked. That curiosity stuck with me and built a kind of muscle memory for solving problems.
I messed around with programming a bit in high school. Made a basic browser in Visual Basic, learned some HTML and CSS, built a few static sites. But I didn't fully commit to it back then. Sports and gaming were more interesting at the time. After school, I studied computer systems and networks and thought maybe I'd run a computer repair business. I actually started by fixing machines for friends and neighbors.
Then a friend told me about a job opening ‐ an actual programming position, no formal experience required. There was a test: one task in HTML/CSS, one in jQuery, and one in PHP. I did the first one solo. My friend helped on the jQuery part and walked me through it. For PHP, we tackled it together. I didn't pretend I knew it all ‐ I just made it clear I wanted to learn.
That honesty worked. I got hired. And that was it ‐ the start of everything that followed. Five years later, I had real experience, solid skills, and a deeper understanding of what being a developer actually means.