I want to be a part of a team working to improve people's lives by solving complex and challenging technological problems.
The Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community (SMSC)
Prior Lake, MN | July 2023 - May 2024
In an agency-like setting I was one of two web developers in charge of roughly 25 websites. We were responsible for the full web stack, from minor copy changes to full site rebuilds. I led the first site rebuild in about 5 years, and helped create the process for new website builds in the future. Part of that process is ensuring that all of the websites are version controlled (with Git) and have automated quality assurance checks and continuous deployment. Most of the websites are running Wordpress, but a couple are older PHP codebases and one is Strapi on the backend with Flutter on the frontend. Some of the most enjoyable projects I've worked on here are the ones where I have to extend functionality of an existing Wordpress plugin like custom logic for WooCommerce coupon codes or hacking Ninja Forms multi-part conditional logic, create new plugins like GraphQL API ingestion for fuel prices and reviews, or collaborate with designers and writers to come up with unique interactive frontend content.
Justin T Jones (Consultancy) | Farmington, MN | April 2016 - August 2023
I ran a web development and IT consultancy with experience in the following: VoIP projects including installation, configuration, and management of the hardware and software involved with a notable multi-site interconnected installation utilizing a cloud based PBX; networking projects consisting of management and upgrades to WiFi, security, and hardwired infrastructure and devices. In the past I had a number of client websites that I managed and updated content for that were written in PHP and handful of Wordpress websites; all of these websites have been handed off to larger marketing based agencies. I do all the work on my own websites and am still in the process of writing a CRM system to stay busy with some backend code.
SAV Transportation Group | Coon Rapids, MN | January 2021 - June 2022
I worked as part of a team of two maintaining a Symfony PHP application that consumes at least a dozen third-party APIs and provides several customer facing APIs itself. My daily tasks included adding new features and API integrations, ensuring proper functionality of existing features and API integrations, writing unit tests and functional tests, ensuring new features have tests and pass existing tests, and migrating features from a legacy Symfony 1 app into modern Symfony PHP code.
Express Image, Digital | Little Canada, MN | August 2017 - December 2019
I started as a developer working on Javascript based kiosk applications using the Mythril frontend framework. Other applications I worked on were written in PHP including several on Drupal 8. I became the company expert on Drupal by working on a huge API and a 750,000 user/month front-end site that consumed it. These projects included many custom Drupal 8 modules as Drupal 8 was still quite new and a very large migration from Acquia to Pantheon. Notable custom modules include storing and serving all assets using a CDN, custom API ingestion, and search analytics export. Search features utilized Apache Solr in the Drupal projects. I was promoted to DevOps Engineer after a time and much of my focus shifted to the AWS backend for the Javascript kiosk applications, while still providing expert opinion and team support for Drupal work. A notable project as the DevOps Engineer include building, deploying, and documenting a multi-platform single sign-on system on top of AWS services including Cognito, RDS, API Gateway, and Lambda. I also maintained, improved, and implemented continuous integration and deployment strategies via custom pipelines in version control platforms and improved Docker based deployment times by up to 80%. I excelled at and thoroughly enjoyed getting third-party integrations to work with existing solutions and I led multiple initiatives for refactoring code, especially code that frequently created support tickets.
Schweiss Doors | Fairfax, MN | July 2014 - August 2017
I led a team of two managing 12 client websites and 8 internal websites, several of them running Wordpress. I managed time tracking and invoicing clients for that work. New web pages were created from Photoshop files and from scratch after conversations with the company owner. I improved a legacy PHP analytics program; reducing load times by orders of magnitude by restructuring the database and adjusting how the data was retrieved and used. I utilized Git to implement a version control system for development work. I was also responsible for the IT management of the entire company including duties such as managing up to 30 user devices running Mac OS X and Windows and 8 servers running Windows and Linux on top of VMWare and a single physical Mac server; configuring and managing network hardware including Layer 2 and Layer 3 switches and Wireless Access Points; outlining and implementing new network infrastructure across the property in and to new buildings with both Ethernet and fiber-optics.
Ridgewater College | Hutchinson, MN
I studied computer programming with C, C#, Python, Java (Android 2.X), Data Driven Web with PHP, MySQL, and Javascript, and generals courses. I became the Teacher's Assistant for an Intro to HTML class. I tutored students in various programming courses including those covering the languages C#, Java, and Javascript, most of the time for classes i was currently taking. I was selected as the Student of the Month for April 2013.