.NET Foundation Campaign: Jay Harris

Why am I running?

I love .NET. I have built a career on the .NET platform, programming on the framework since 2004. I love .NET, and I want to help usher it into the future. The platform is wonderful—.NET Core has only made it better—and I hope to open .NET up to more developers as we approach the 20th anniversary of the .NET platform.

Outside of our ecosystem, there is a perception that .NET is inaccessible. Due to these beliefs that .NET is too enterprise, too costly, or too challenging to learn, many individuals, startups, and educational institutions ignore the platform. Colleges and Coding Bootcamps often focus on Ruby, Python, and PHP. Startups are often the same, using Rails, Django, or Laravel. My goal is to help change these negative perceptions and encourage a renewed interest in the .NET platform.

Who am I?

I am Jay Harris, a programmer, a speaker, and an entrepreneur in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. I have been heavily involved in the .NET community for over a decade as an event organizer, international conference speaking, and community mentor.

As a volunteer, I serve as president of GiveCamp, a non-profit organization of coding-for-charity hackathons to help small, community-level charities. Globally, there have been over 150 GiveCamp events since its inception in 2008. I also volunteer as an organizer for dotNetVegas, a monthly meetup in Las Vegas focused on discussing topics relevant to .NET developers.

I am a Microsoft Regional Director and an eight-time Microsoft MVP focused developer technologies.

Finally, I am the founder and president of Arana Software in Las Vegas. I head the technology side of the business, where we develop software solutions for our clients and partners in .NET, nodejs, and Laravel/PHP.

If you have questions about my candidacy or goals with the .NET Foundation, please reach out to me! I welcome your questions and feedback.

How have I contributed to .NET?

  • I am a regular conference and keynote speaker, having presented over 150 sessions internationally on C#, ASP.NET, Azure, developer burn-out, and other technical- and human-focused topics.
  • I am a regular event organizer, beginning with the Lansing Day of .NET in 2009 through the 2019 Ann Arbor GiveCamp and 2018 Code Camp Vegas.
  • I am a frequent contributor to open-source projects, including the .NET Foundation's Orchard, Nancy, and KuduScript projects.

Where can you learn more about me?