How I learned to code and built a dating app for my mum in my thirties.

A while ago I was overseas with my mum for her 60th birthday. While drinking one night the conversation turned to dating and how it becomes more difficult as you got older. While mum had tried the usual online platforms; RSVP, eHarmony, etc. she eventually asked if she should get on Tinder. Anyone, who has been on Tinder knows that it was first and foremost a pick-up app, and unfortunately a lot of that residue still hides there today. In fact, I don’t think I have ever met anyone that doesn’t have a Tinder horror story. Being a loving son, I quickly told her that “no, she shouldn’t”, but it’s what she said next that really stuck with me.

My mother told me that she felt like she had to change her personality. That she felt like her values were too old fashioned and that wasn’t appealing to potential partners.

I was shocked! Here was a woman, in her sixties, who still felt the need to change herself to suit other people. While we all might have done this at some stage in our lives, especially when we were younger and didn’t know any better. But hearing my mum say this broke my heart.

I’m a thinker, therefore emotional responses are not my strong suit. So, I did what I normally do when faced with an emotional problem, I analysed it and searched for a way to fix it.

I thought about times that I had felt the same way and realised that it was only recently that I had learned to accept, and even be proud of my introverted, over thinking nature. I had come to this realisation because I was introduced to the Myers-Briggs personality test. Funnily enough from someone I met on Tinder who had theirs in their profile!

I found a free version of the test online and took mum through it. Just like me, after reading the results she realised that have “old fashioned values” was not a bad thing. It just meant she needed to find someone who matched with her in that area. It also made me realise that I needed to do the same thing. So why was there not an app for this, or maybe there was, and I didn’t know about it?

I went into research mode; I searched the app stores for key words and Googled every phrase I could think of. There were tons of information about relationships and personality types, but no dating apps or websites… cue lightbulb moment.

Skills, who needs skills?

At the time I was working for a start-up, Uber driving, and as a graphic designer. As part of my graphic design work I had done some basic design and coding work on websites. While I couldn’t build a website from scratch, I could work on a template to get the design I wanted. So, I figured the same process could be applied to mobile apps? There had to be mobile app templates available for purchase online, right? How hard could it be to download one and edit it to what I needed? That was just over 3 years ago.

From my experience in the start-up, I discovered that Android apps were apparently harder to code and therefore a good place to start. I bought a cheap, Android dating app template online, got the files open and was greeted by what I thought was gibberish. It turns out there is a reason they are called “coding languages”.  Once I got over the initial disappointment, I started searching for online tutorials, to see if I could at least get the template I had bought working on my computer. What I unwittingly kicked off was months of trawling YouTube, signing up to numerous training websites, and searching for alternative templates. What I found was an amazing looking template, that was built for IOS and Android, in a coding language called React Native. The downside, the template was not cheap, and I was in a start-up and Uber Driving to make ends meet!

But like all things this turned out to be a blessing in disguise and learn from my previous mistake. Besides, what good is a template if I have no idea how to edit it?

Enter Udemy.

Udemy.com is an online tutorial website, what I love about Udemy is you only pay for the course you want. Most other platforms I found charge a monthly subscription fee, and when you are learning part time it can get very expensive. Once I found an instructor and course that I liked there was no stopping me. I found myself doing the tutorials nearly every night after work and even on weekends. What started as a side project, quickly evolved into a hobby. The next year was a rollercoaster of emotions, learning coding and psychology. I’m not too ashamed to admit I shed a tear of joy the first time I got my homemade personality test to run on my phone and give me the correct result.

About the same time, it had become apparent that it was time to move on from the start-up. At first, I started looking for graphic design jobs. But the love for my hobby birthed a crazy idea; “what if I applied for coding jobs”, imagine my surprise when I got one! At this stage I was a 32-year-old male, with no qualifications as a developer, who had just changed careers. From there I vowed to never stop learning, and I never gave up on my app side project. Especially considering I could now afford the fancy template.

The more I learnt in my new job, the more I customised my app. I also became aware of how quickly the world of coding languages change. By the end of 2019 I came to the realisation that this fancy template I had bought was in fact now obsolete. The new code I was adding to it did not work with the old and it was becoming slow and difficult to use. Therefore, I made probably the hardest decision from the entire build. I started a new build from scratch using all the new skills I had acquired.

Quarantine for the win

I’m a strong believer in making the best out of a bad situation and 2020 was no exception. Melbourne Victoria Australia went through 8 months of some of the toughest lock down laws in the world. Everything was closed except for supermarkets, and exercise was one hour a day. I couldn’t go out on weekends, or even during the week, so what better opportunity to smash out as much code as possible.

By the start of 2021 I was amazed to have built a working app. While three years might sound like a long time, the common feeling among people as they get older is a fear of learning new skills. Yet in three years, I learned to code and built a dating app for my mum in my thirties.

Learn more about the growth of Ours as a business here