I was working at a bank (as a contractors) and some coworkers and I were working on a HA project for MySQL at the moment (to use it at work). Once I got laid off, I focused on it to the point that it became quite useful, and at some point, someone from Israel reached out with questions.
I answered with a lot of delay, and when I explained that was due to me being out of a job and not able to afford a permanent internet connection, he offered to hire me and also set me up with a permanent connection with a contract paid by him.
If you’re reading this, thank you Aric, I’m forever grateful for that chance!
Curiously, last year I switched jobs and during the interview process it turned out the hiring manager had been a user of my project back in 2003 or so, which definitely helped with the interview process.
The project’s name was mysql-ha, later renamed to highbase due to a Copyright infringement notice from Sun (who were good about it and gave me a free 1 year subscription to Enterprise MySQL when I renamed the project). I abandoned it around 2008 as better things became available around that time .