Welcome. I am

Martin Kozub

(aka zubozrout)

I mainly focus on web development, but I’m also passionate about programming, Linux, and exploring technology in general. Beyond IT, I enjoy hiking, drawing, experimenting, trying exotic foods, and discovering new music.

Hi, my name is Martin Kozub, but you can mostly find me on the internet using my nickname zubozrout.

I am from the Czech Republic, though currently not living there. Although I have many interests they mostly involve computers. Nonetheless I also love traveling, hiking, drawing, soldering my little experiments, eating exotic food and fruits and music.

I am also quite fond of tech advancements or generally any human advancements which <spoiler alert>by nature do not involve religion</spoiler alert> and I like reading about them or watching related videos.

When I’m not tinkering with tech, I love traveling, hiking, trying exotic foods and fruits, discovering new music or even sculpturing or drawing something myself. And when I just want to relax, you’ll probably find me building cities in strategy and simulation games — Cities: Skylines is still one of my all-time favorites since its release in 2015.

Skills

  • Web Development: HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript (React, Vue, Express.js, Nuxt), PHP, MySQL/MongoDB, responsive UI
  • Programming & Tools: C/C++, Python, Java; GTK/Qt/Qt‑QML; Blender
  • Linux Admin: daily Ubuntu user, bash scripting, basic server maintenance

Education

  • High School Otrokovice
  • 2 years of Czech Technical University in Prague, Faculty of Information Technology
  • 5 years at Charles University in Prague, Information Technology

The story

Throughout the history I've helped on many projects, like creating and managing the web of the high school I was studying at for several years, or creating and managing a website for a local steel distributor.

I've also worked on my own personal projects among which I am the most passionate about a Czech Ubuntu fan site which I've started working on in 2011 and which was taken and rewritten by a local Linux community member and used as the official Ubuntu Czech site in 2019. But there are also other projects, like an archive page for a Czech branch of an Austrian Interspar brand seller which is a complete rewrite and only utilizes texts and some assets from the old shop pages.

When Steam gaming platform debuted on Linux I wanted to integrate the client to the Ubuntu/Linux desktop as much as possible so I have created Ubuntu themes in both Ambiance and Radiance variants and created a little tool that was able to apply these with ease. Later when I bumped into a binary that was also able to force Steam to use desktop environment window with decorations I utilized that binary and updated the app to a full fledged Qt and later GTK+ app that was able to take care of that bit as well. The project page is still live, but with the current state of Ubuntu Desktop as well as the Steam Client itself these kind of modifications would be harder to manage and would not make much sense anyway.

I was also one of the early adopters of Ubuntu Touch, starting to play with it in winter 2014 on my Nexus 7 LTE (deb) tablet and then also on an official Ubuntu Meizu MX4 phone when received in summer 2015. Back in those days I also got listed on the official Ubuntu page as one of the pioneers, that's now only available in the archives.

To make my phone at least a bit usable I started creating something like a czech "Pubtran" app to search for public transport connections. So there is now an app called Transport that's obtainable through the Ubuntu Touch OpenStore. I've also had a few more attempts on games or other apps but none of these turned out great.

And there are quite a few other projects I've worked on over the years, some of which I am quite fond of. Like my little web tool to display, modify and create new Google Plus posts. Or a video and audio player that is able to show overlays/subtitles and divide the stream into sections. Then I guess there is a long list of projects I lost as time went by.

Before I ever started programming I've had a blog on the local "tabloid" IT news website zive.cz, which I occasionally got paid for. Later I've been writing some of my thoughts or things I've bumped into on a different local blogging platform idnes.cz.

After Covid, a lot changed for me. I permanently moved abroad, started exploring new places, and dived into new interests—while naturally leaving some others behind, including a few I had already been working on. The shift in environment simply didn’t leave me enough time to continue everything.

On the work side, things also became more exciting. I learned and started using React and Express.js, and later expanded my skills with Vue and Nuxt.

The projects

Over the years, I’ve worked on so many things that I eventually decided to take down the original showcase I had here for ages. Much of it was no longer relevant, and times have changed—so by today’s standards, a lot of it would naturally feel outdated.

Right now, my main focus is on private work-related projects. For everything else, feel free to check out my GitLab — that’s where most of my personal projects now live.