Developers on Stellar: Elliot Voris, ElliotFriend

It’s time for another edition of Developers on Stellar — and this one’s a bit different because our spotlighted dev became a Stellar Development Foundation employee today! Elliot has been a huge part of the Stellar community for a while, and we’re so excited to have him on the DevRel team. Read on to learn about his developer journey!

Elliot Voris learned to love technology from his father, who was often found navigating life with a calculator attached to his belt. Instead of teaching his son how to change a tire, Elliot’s father taught him how to change a graphics card. Not saying that Elliot doesn’t know how to change a tire. He probably does. Anyway. Elliot’s passion for technology followed him throughout his life and various jobs, even the ones that seemed void of anything tech-related. As a pastor, he did almost more automation and scripting than his actual job. Without any formal education in programming, it was often Elliot’s curiosity and problem-solving skills that helped him succeed.

During COVID, Elliot, like many others, had a “What am I doing with my life?” moment and decided to pursue a tech career more aggressively. He had learned about crypto through Keybase and started to dabble in trading bitcoin and ether with some not-so-good results. This experience taught him that the future wasn’t about token speculation but understanding and using the underlying technology. Remembering a Stellar airdrop from 2019, Elliot decided to check out Stellar, thinking it would be simpler and less expensive to play with than Ethereum. He found a link to Stellar Quest, thought it looked interesting, and the rest is history — Elliot has been a self-proclaimed Stellar fanboi ever since.

After playing Stellar Quest, Elliot worked to cram as much Stellar and blockchain knowledge into his noggin as possible while also becoming active in the Stellar community, specifically through the Stellar Quest Discord. He found the community to be comprised of some of the most helpful, friendly, and welcoming people he’d met online, encouraging him to contribute his ideas and advice.

Elliot became an official Stellar contractor in January 2022, mainly focusing on community relations and Discord support. This was a perfect role, as connecting with other developers and helping them with their problems is something he finds motivating. I know from experience that Elliot has a fantastic ability to explain complex topics in writing, which he’s been able to do in spades as he also writes for Stellar Quest Learn and Stellar Quest Live. Most recently, Elliot worked tirelessly on Stellar Quest Live Series 5: Soroban, where he composed the README files that helped explain the theory behind each quest. This task taught Elliot a ton about Soroban, and he was able to translate his learnings and experimentations into educational content for others.

Outside of writing quests and Discord moderation, Elliot pretty much takes on any task SDF’s Tyler van der Hoeven dreams up. One of Elliot’s favorite projects he’s built is the badge checker for Stellar Quest, which is not only the most polished and full-featured web app he’s made but the first one that’s interacted with blockchain technology. Check out the project by visiting the badge checker website or repo.

Outside of work, Elliot’s problem-solving skills also help him repair various household items for his wife and three kids. He doesn’t touch electrical, though, per his wife’s instructions. Elliot is also an amateur woodworker and has sold some pretty sweet desks to every corner of the country, plus Hawaii. Check out his Etsy site!

Thanks for being an incredibly valuable member of our community, and welcome to the SDF team, Elliot!

Keep your eyes open for more editions of Developers on Stellar and, as always, keep up to date on all things Soroban and Stellar in the Stellar Developer Discord.