I'm Sebastian Bechtold, a software developer from Heidelberg, Germany. Due to my curiosity and need for variety in what I'm doing, I'm a rather generalist programmer with a broad range of IT-related interests and skills. You will notice this when you read my blog articles, which cover quite different topics.
I studied applied computer science at Heidelberg University, Germany, and graduated with a M.Sc. degree (after I first did my B.Sc. at the same university a few years earlier). Due to many years of work at a geoinformatics company, I have broad knowledge and experience in processing of geospatial data and building of web-based GIS applications.
Another focus of my interest is 2D and 3D computer graphics/visualization and video game development. I do a bit of this in my free time, but don't consider myself an expert in this field (yet?). In the past, I also did a lot of web design and PHP programming, so I possess the "classic" web developer's stack of skills, although not fully up-to-date with current trends and technologies (however, who can still claim this in the age of framework fatigue?).
I'm a passionate user of the Linux operating system, the K Desktop Environment (KDE) and other open source software. My favourite and mostly used progamming languages are Java, Python, C# and PHP. Recently, I have also learned to love TypeScript as an actually very usable alternative to JavaScript, with which I never became friends due to its practically non-existent code maintainability / refactoring support. Finally, I also worked a lot with C and C++ at university, but I rarely use these languages in my professional or hobby projects.
Apart from programming, I'm interested in space flight, astronomy, philosophy and other scientific topics. I also like playing computer games, but I rarely find the time to do it. Last but not least, I love spending time outside, exploring the world around me by bicycling, inlineskating or hiking. For many years, I also did a lot of digital photography, but sadly, my interest in this has mostly disappeared.
HELIOS: A Multi-purpose LiDAR Simulation Framework for Research, Planning and Training of Laser Scanning Operations With Airborne, Ground-based Mobile and Stationary Platforms (ISPRS 2016 Conference Paper)
A Multi-Purpose LiDAR Simulation Framework for Research, Planning and Training of Laser Scanning Operations in Geoinformation Science (M.Sc. Thesis, 2015)
Rollouts of Fine Ware Pottery using High Resolution 3D Meshes. (EuroGraphics VAST 2010 Conference Paper)