This is the most valuable and memorable project I have ever worked on. It is also the very first project that inspired me to become a software engineer when I was young.

In 2014, I was a 13 year old boy with a deep interest in science, especially space. My room was filled with stars, the moon, and all the planets in our solar system. I never enjoyed reading books in general, but if the topic was science, I could read endlessly.

With that passion, my parents gave me a very special gift for my birthday, a domain name called Saturn.mn. When translated, my name becomes Saturn, which is also the name of a planet. That moment inspired me to start building my own projects and shaped my path toward software engineering.

After receiving the domain name, I became very curious about how to build a website on it. The first thing I searched on Google, with my limited English, was “How to create my website?” As expected, many ads appeared at the top, but I did not know that back then. I clicked on the first result and started following the instructions.

It took me almost a week to understand and finally manage to display the word “Hello” on the website. But it worked, and that moment felt amazing. The tool I used was a no code website builder called Joomla, which was quite popular among web developers at the time.

On December 13, 2014, my very first website was launched under the name Saturn.MN. It was an incredible feeling and one of my first major achievements. I began writing blogs about space, reading articles on the NASA website, and translating them into Mongolian. That was when I realized I could provide small educational content for space enthusiasts. It took me a couple of months to figure out the right format for the blogs.

A few months later, I discovered another no code web builder called WordPress, which had many features. It was a game changer for developers, offering a variety of templates and plugins I had never seen before. I felt like I could create anything with it. I even added a snow effect for the New Year period.

Once my website was fully live, I formed a team to work together on educational content, organize space-related events, and more. That was when I founded my first non-profit organization, Saturn Cosmonautics of Mongolia.

Then we wanted more. Even WordPress could not do everything we needed, so I began my journey to learn coding. I started with the basics of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for the frontend, then learned PHP for logic and MySQL for the database. I also studied AJAX and jQuery to create a more reliable and real-time frontend.

It took me almost a year to complete a full project. I taught myself using YouTube tutorials and blog guides. At first, it was challenging, but over time I began to enjoy it and even stayed up all night learning. Finally, I have released Saturn.MN v2.0

My First Inspiration

With the new version, SaturnMN became more educational and fun for learning about space. It included:

• Saturn News: Daily articles about science and space.

• Saturn Wiki: A knowledge base about space.

• Saturn Eclipse: Users can watch live eclipses happening around the world from their devices with full control.

• Saturn Media: High quality images of space, planets, stars, and more.

• Saturn Journey: A virtual rocket that travels from Earth to the edge of the solar system, providing useful information along the way.

And many more features!

In April 2017, we had nearly 10,000 active users on our platform and social media. This gave me even more inspiration to keep improving. At that time, our users shared feedback saying they really enjoyed reading our articles.

After a few months, we faced financial challenges because we were a non-profit organization, and we concluded the journey with many proud moments. This experience inspired me to lead more meaningful and impactful projects in the future. Thank you!