Serial Problem Solver, and former Accountant, I have risen from the ashes to become a software & IoT developer specialising in JavaScript/TypeScript, Dart and Python.
After working for over a decade as an Accountant; I realised that it wasn’t for me. I just didn’t really like most of the day-to-day aspects of accounting but loved the data-crunching and systems work that I occasionally got to perform. I felt a yearning to be more creative… and, well, creative accounting isn’t really encouraged for a whole range of reasons! ;-)
So I set myself a goal to become a full-stack developer, specifically a developer capable of building data-driven applications that make life easier, more fun, or just more efficient. The process was involved and took me through many languages and frameworks but eventually I settled on JavaScript/TypeScript (NodeJS, React, NextJS) and Dart (Flutter), amongst various other enabling technologies. I had a problem though… as a middle-aged self-taught developer I didn’t really fit the mold of a junior dev; who was going to hire me?
Risen Solutions was born.
Risen solutions is my own software development house through which I have worked with some amazing clients, as well as built some interesting personal projects. From designing, building and hosting a corporate risk management system; to developing a user application for changing one’s mindset; the journey has been fun, fascinating and eye-opening. Each new project, which are listed in the portfolio below, provided me with new problem-solving opportunities and enhanced my ability to pick up new skills/frameworks quickly.
It’s now time for the next phase of my career which, whilst it still involves building some awesome personal projects, I feel lies in working with a larger team. I believe that I have skills that could add to any dev team and, in return, I could learn a lot too.
Below are some of the main technologies that I have experience working with. Some of these are used on an almost daily basis.
Web app development with NodeJS, React, NextJS, Vue and NuxtJS
Cross-platform mobile development using Flutter
IoT development on Raspberry Pi
SQL (MSSQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL) and NoSQL (MongoDB, Firebase)
MS PowerBI & Excel
Source control, testing and CI/CD Pipelines
E2E with Cypress, various frameworks for Unit/TDD/BDD
Deployment and other services
Docker and Kubernetes regularly used for deployment of workloads
Mostly working with Debian based systems but some experience with RHEL
MS Administrator experience
HTML 5 and CSS 3
Like any design professional, software developers are only as good as their last project. Admittedly my work generally possesses much less 'color' than some other designers; but a whole lot more data wrangling. Most of my work has been in private code bases, but you can see a summary of my recent projects below. You can also view my Gitlab Profile here for a more detailed look at what I can share.
