Hello world
Hi, I'm Firesphere, also known as Simon.
I'm a professional software engineer, with extensive knowledge of PHP frameworks, such as Silverstripe, Laravel, and Symfony, and Python & MicroPython.
I am committee member for PythonNZ, volunteer as webmaster/web engineer for the SuperGrans Aotearoa, and as electrical repair guy at the local Repair Cafe.
Most of my software development work is publicly available on Codeberg, and some on GitHub.
The quote in the heading I got from Bill Hunt, photo left by Kristina Hoeppner.
Latest articles
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When self-hosting goes sideways
Mar 29, 2026, 11:09 PM
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👱 Are we human, or are we dancer 🕺
Mar 20, 2026, 9:13 PM
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🖥️ Expanding my view
Mar 20, 2026, 8:46 AM
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🦘 It's in the bag
Mar 13, 2026, 9:28 AM
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🐍 Steering the Snake
Mar 12, 2026, 12:33 AM
Highlights
Some of my best/favourite projects I've worked on over the years.
Stickertrade.me
Stickertrade.me is a personal project of mine, where the goal is to share stickers, ask for stickers and share the love for stickers around the world.
SuperGrans Aotearoa
SuperGrans Aotearoa is the national body for SuperGrans agencies throughout Aotearoa New Zealand. They work alongside the individual SuperGrans agencies promoting and supporting their teams of mentors in sharing their knowledge and skills to people in their communities.
Job Hunt tracker
Keep track of your job applications, add notes, prepare for interviews. All in one place.
CSP Headers
Protecting your Silverstripe website users with Content Security Policies made easy and manageable with reports, management interface, SubResource Integrity generation, and easy set-up of reporting to Sentry or security-header.
Solr Search for Silverstripe
One of my personal Silverstripe modules, where I build from the ground up, a Silverstripe implementation for searching with Solr, using the latest version available of Solr, with compatibility down to version 4.
