A British boy of Pakistani origin has become the world’s youngest qualified computer programmer at the age of seven, a media report claimed. Muhammad Hamza Shahzad, resident of Handsworth area in Birmingham has been trained by his father Asim Shahzad, who works with an American IT firm. “I want to be Bill Gates,” he told Birmingham Mail. This is not the first time when Hamza has set a world record. Last year at the age of six, he had become the world’s youngest Microsoft Office Professional (MOP) by passing three latest Microsoft Office exams which include MS Word 2013, MS PowerPoint 2013 and MS Excel 2013, The News reported. In an exam, where candidates needed 700 points to get the desirable certificate, Hamza has scored 757, a Microsoft spokesperson said. As a result, his recent qualification authorises him to become a qualified programmer to pass MS exam “98-361 Software Development Fundamentals”. “He can easily create Web App and manages to develop his own basic shopping cart app,” he said. “He has got his hands dirty in Windows desktop App, console App, windows services, Web services and finds it really fun to develop simple console based game applications. “He can explain about heap, stack, memory management, data structures perhaps better than many experienced programmers,” the spokesperson added. Humza’s parents Asim Shahzad and Seemab Asim told The News that computing skills come naturally to their son and they never pressurize him to learn. Humza’s parents said that they were proud, as their son has made a world record. They said they have worked with him to develop his own interest but he takes his own initiatives and comes up with new ideas in the process. Humza, who was born in Lahore in 2009 moved to London in 2011 along with his parents after his father got a job in an IT firm. Speaking about Humza, a Microsoft official said: “He is so skilled at the age of 7 and can easily create all kind of computer applications and manages to develop his own basic shopping cart app. He has got his hands dirty in Windows desktop App, console App, windows services, Web services and finds it really fun to develop simple console based game applications.” “He can explain about object oriented programming, heap, stack, memory management, data structures perhaps better than many experienced programmers,” the official added. Talking about his latest achievement, Humza told The News: “I am feeling ecstatic and making fun with my new skills. I want to be the new Bill Gates one day. I like to watch fiction movies at home, I play games on IPad and laptop and play football with Dad.” Currently, the genius is now working his own computer game. “I want to make a game and that’s what I’m doing at the moment – 30 clicks and you win,” he said.
