Hi there. I’m Jason Andersen and I am very happy to be here with MI&S covering application platforms, developer technologies, and services. I’d like to thank everyone who has been so welcoming to me since the announcement. It makes me even more excited to be focusing 100% of my attention on software development.

You see, I’ve been doing software from the very beginning. Before I knew what words like “career” even meant, I was busting out code to pass the time (like a lot of you who are reading this). For the last few years, I had to split my focus between software and hardware platforms, but given my background I was always biased towards my company’s software achievements.

And now I’m home—100% focused on the technologies that are my foundation. Here’s why I couldn’t be happier to be back collaborating in the developer space.

• Developers show us the way forward — We are in the early stages of the next step function in computing history. And while the current and future infrastructure is super impressive, it’s developers who unlock that infrastructure’s potential and make it all consumable and usable for people. The killer app for AI, ML, quantum, HPC, edge, or whatever comes next is not even here yet. That is why a few months ago I started talking with Patrick Moorhead about working with him, because I knew that I wanted to get back into the dev world. I believe adding my voice to this already great team will give our clients and the industry at large a unique perspective on the changing world of tech.
• The rise of the citizen developer — I am also particularly intrigued by low-code and no-code platforms. This is for two reasons. First, I started out on the OG citizen developer platform Lotus Notes in the 90’s, so I have always geeked out on the space. Second, in the early 2000s I got to see the very beginnings of broad and complex middleware and service-oriented architectures (from JBoss and IBM) give way to PaaS efforts such as OpenShift. Having all these technologies converge was a game changer for allowing people with more diverse skills innovate at high speed—and it still is.
• Automation and AI —It wouldn’t be a tech list in 2024 without AI in it, right? While I was on a sabbatical the last few months, I had the chance to take some classes on AI and no-code development. (I can recommend this when you get a once-in-a-lifetime break from your day-to-day professional duties.) I was very impressed with how AI and specifically generative AI can accelerate rote processes and help people learn. But I think that in the developer space, the whole “Tell the computer what to code” use case may be overhyped. What I am more excited to see is how machine learning can increase the efficiency of the dev toolchain or reduce technical debt. Or how about letting generative AI draft your documentation and test scripts? I believe that AI is not here to replace us, but to make us better and more focused on what we love doing.

So, that’s where I’m coming from as I launch into my work as a principal analyst for Moor Insights & Strategy. Thanks again to everyone for the kind words so far. (And as for the title of this post . . . IYKYK.)

Onward!