You are on this site because we are sharing the same passion : Software

My name is Sylvain Leroy and I am software programmer, startup founder. My specialty is to save software from all kind of sickness.

What is defining me the most precisely is my passion for Software and coding.

As explained on my company site (byoskill.com), I have three passions :

• Software craftsmanship (SQA)
• Legacy software migration
• and startup environments

I have been doing that from so long

I discovered coding something around 10, on our family Commodore 64/128.

Back in these times, I didn’t know about coding, I learnt how to use it to get what I wanted. Games, interests. I was curious to manipulate and understand this strange creature.

Of course I had normal activities, friends, sports. However this machine fascinated me. We had two big books, in English, a foreign language to me, full of code listing. I spent numerous to painstakingly type them on this computer. Some code were games, some revealed to be funny noise / sound effects, plane engine.

I had the chance to be from the generation who grew up with computers and incredible progresses. We switched one day to x86, a 286 with single coloured screen. I remember the screen was pale glowing in my room at night. I made obvious progresses in Basic, QBasic, Visual Basic (my college passion),  switched to Pascal(Delphi) at 14 during the middle school. At 16, I was efficient in Delphi and I tried the C language without enthusiasm.

I discovered at the same time ASM/Z80 programming to use on my Texas calculator and I switched from Pascal to ASM, with all the set, TASM, TLINK.

The book “the Art of Assembly Language” had a huge impact on me. I printed it with our good old printer in 4 big binders. And started to love it.

I continued until 18 my experience of assembly programming on two fields :

• virus programming
• software cracking using SoftICE, C/C++ decompiler and some tools I could find on the dark net at that time. Internet was so slow…

I finally has switched to C/C++ late 19 using Visual C++. I have been slowly mastering it. I was always tempted to switch to ASM using asm statements. To program with limited resources is so much funnier than with high level languages.

A lucky meeting changed my life and course

I have been following a Computer science diploma in two years at the University of Rennes 1 (Lannion). And then I discovered I could not work in industrial automation because a wrong choice of course. I switched to a general computer sciences Licence (3rd year).

During my master degree, I choose as exam project, a technical project in which we were supposed to write a Java syntactic analysis tool (linter). This meeting with this professor, Francois Bodin, had a influence of my final year of study, and at minimum the next ten years of my life.

Together, under his tutelage, we imagined a research project, a project of company creation, and we launched it. It was Tocea, which lived from 2009 to 2015 before being absorbed by a Software Editor, Metrixware. In my mind; I am and will be eternally grateful, for the opportunity – the seed – Francois offered to me. It has been an  incredible adventure. This environment was totally new for me, my family, my surrounding, given our social origins.

Tocea : my passion, and my initiatory route

Officially Tocea has been created in March 2010 after 3 years of research project and one year of incubation.

We were three at the beginning, and the project was called Navis.

Against, there, Marie-Anne  and Florent, have been of a great help and influenced positively the view of what could be Tocea, both socially and professionally.

A french article here of this period.

Francois Morin, is also important to me, since we brought Tocea to its maturity together. Co-founding a company is never simple. We had to learn from each other, to be able to work together. The stability and the trust of our relationship has been like the warm fireplace that attracts the frozen voyagers. And we simply attract the best to reach together our ambitions as a small software editor we were.

Our company had his life , successes and failures , joy and pain but I remember it as a wonderful social experience. I have seen students coming for their first experience, getting their first job, growing up and becoming our real assets. Tocea has been a success (humanely) thanks our people. They gave us our trust, and we tried together to create something great.

Links :

• http://www.images-et-reseaux.com/fr/blogs/2012/12/tocea-une-jeune-pousse-qui-voit-grand
• https://www.inria.fr/centre/rennes/actualites/tocea-leve-300k-euros-de-fonds
• http://www.techinfrance.fr/membre/tocea

The transition

Tocea ended peacefully to become a more serious business under the acquisition by Metrixware. Fair enough, Metrixware, a well-known software editor specialized in Legacy system and migrations, saved us at that time, our business was in a full transition after some critical mistakes and a hard business year (for the whole sector).

I learnt much from being there about processes, change management and also company culture. Three things crucial for the success of any projects.

Now in Switzerland

I am enjoying my new road, currently in Switzerland.  I have been discovering this great country and particular job environment since the begin of 2017.

I have been since working full time as IT Consultant for large institutions. Recently, I created a small structure www.byoskill.com in which I am providing my experience for dedicated missions.

Each encounter, with either a Software Developer either a team, is pushing me forward to what I love the most :

Empowering people, saving Software and developing great tools.