Hello, World!

I'm a backend software developer in Portland, Oregon. I've been working in Ruby—mostly backend Rails—since 2006. I have Opinions about automated testing, refactoring, and object-oriented design. (Hint: they mostly align with Sandi's.)

Over the past decade or so, I've become rather specialized in cleaning up legacy codebases so they can be sustainably developed for years to come. After so many years of Ruby, I've seen (and committed!) most of the common Rails blunders, and I love helping people learn how to recover from them.

I'm currently employed full-time, and not actively looking for a change. Still, feel free to contact me—there's a chance I'll know someone who meets your needs.

Attention, Recruiters: READ THE FAQ.

While I try to reply to all inquiries, my time is limited, and I have stock answers to the most common questions. It'll save us both some time if you go there first before emailing me.

Also, before you send me to your calendar to schedule "a quick call," please read What I Look For. If it doesn't answer most of the questions you'd go over in that call, let me know.

Origin Story

I stumbled into a programming career by way of Microsoft Access 97. After a few years building tools for small workgroups, I went back to school and got a computer science degree. Since then, I've mostly been writing web applications using Ruby on Rails, specializing primarily in back-end work. All along, I've found a great deal of satisfaction in automating drudge work so people can spend more time doing interesting jobs.

Me, Elsewhere

I've greatly enjoyed mentoring in various forms: onboarding an experienced software developer who was new to Ruby and web development; advising code school students; helping out small groups in "single serving" environments like user group meetings or training workshops. At larger scales, I've also done a bit of public speaking, made a screencast or two, and written a rather popular site about version control software.

I used to be a regular panelist on the Greater Than Code podcast, so you'll probably learn a few interesting things about me by listening to that. :)

Obviously, there's LinkedIn.

Most of my work lives in private Git repositories and secured Rails applications, so my public GitHub profile is rather sparse. That said, here are some of the more memorable and/or amusing things I've written over the years: Hypercuke, Cordon, Memonymous, Medievalistic, Ladd's Graph, Scotland Yard, and HighlandAR. (And yes, that last one is a joke. I mean... most of my work includes jokes and/or puns, but that one is 100% tongue-in-cheek. There's no way for me to know if HighlandAR has ever been used in a serious project, but if it has, nobody's told me about it...)