Experience

• Disney Streaming Services (Disney+)

  Senior Software Engineer Technical Lead

  Aug 2020 – present
  • Technical lead for Web Client Architecture team, serving as one of seven leads on the 50-developer Disney+ web app team. Tackle broad topics including overall architecture for the app and testing strategies and deployment; create proposals and implementations and collaborate with the full team to refine and ship major improvements to the app. Implemented Continuous Delivery and browser-based automated tests. Redesigned Node.js server-side code and refactored client-side startup logic. Wrote library to mock network calls and create fully controlled, isolated tests. Web app provides browser-based access to all features of the Disney+ streaming service, supporting over 70 million subscribers.
  • Analyzed team workflow and identified opportunities for improvement. Wrote proposals to improve software quality, developer productivity, and efficient delivery of features. Collaborate with the vice president of software engineering, web app and DevOps teams to implement plans.

• Walt Disney Imagineering

  Senior Software Developer

  Dec 2015 – Aug 2020
  • Led a team of 12 people (seven developers, two quality analysts, one UX designer, one project manager and one business analyst) building a search engine for over one million media assets. Conducted code reviews, ran dailies and Agile sprint planning and retrospectives. Served as product owner for stakeholders representing general Imagineers and digital archivists. New app is more than 10x faster than previous app. Set new standards for software quality involving unit and automated tests and CI/CD that are now used as a department-wide model.
  • Represented web developers on internal code review committee. Set software quality standards for the Imagineering Technology Studio.
  • Created serverless APIs to support kiosks at six attractions in Disneyland and Disney World where guests share photos and videos via email, Facebook or Twitter. Replaced older system that suffered from capacity and throughput problems with new system that supplies limitless scale and has processed media for millions of park guests since 2018. Included new live system status dashboard and analytics charts.
  • Built internal web app for resource planning. New app is over 10x faster than previous process, saving managers hundreds of hours of time.
  • Designed API to allow guests to save their interactions across Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge land built for Disneyland and Disney World.
  • Built image analysis and automated tests management web app for 3D graphics engine used in the attraction Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run.
  • Developed “Indiana Jones Adventure – The Gifts of Mara” game for Play Disney Parks app, rated 4.7 out of 5 in the App Store.

• Node.js Project

  Core Collaborator

  Apr 2018 – present
  • Manager on the Node.js project and contributor of code into Node.js core. Listed in the Node.js readme: github.com/nodejs/node#collaborators
  • Co-led a team of 12 developers to add support for JavaScript import/export syntax (ECMAScript modules) to Node.js while balancing the needs of many outside stakeholders. Primary author of Node.js ECMAScript modules docs and announcements: github.com/nodejs/modules/blob/master/doc/new-implementation-announcement.md

• CoffeeScript Project

  Leader/Maintainer

  Jul 2016 – present
  • Led 17 open-source contributors to modernize the language and support new JavaScript features. coffeescript.org/announcing-coffeescript-2
  • Review all code submissions, test all versions and publish all releases. npmjs.com/package/coffeescript

• Trailer Park

  Technical Lead

  Oct 2014 – Dec 2015
  • Led a team of four developers to build jurassicworld.com, a site for the fictional Jurassic World theme park. Created optimized single-page app visited by over 6 million people in 2015, including 300,000 in a single day, without downtime. Designed site architecture and implemented responsive design, analytics tracking, social sharing, SVG icons and templates, animated widgets, zoomable map, video and localization. Realistically simulated park capacity, attraction wait times and monorail schedule.
  • Led a team of four developers to build custom content management system web app for new trailerpark.com. Designed site architecture of two single-page apps, a public-facing site and an administrative content management site. Admin pages include drag-and-drop flexible page sections and galleries, authentication, and validation of media dimensions before upload. Agile project with behavior-driven tests.

• Film Finances

  Director of Production

  Feb 2013 – Jul 2014
  • Supervised the productions of bonded independent films including American Hustle, Fury, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl and Passengers.
  • Built web app to track productions’ progress, including interactive graphs, location maps and image galleries.

• New Regency Productions

  Software Developer

  Dec 2012 – Feb 2013
  • Built web app where users can upload folders of files and the app finds and replaces sets of text pairs across Word and Excel documents.
  • Wrote guidelines for digital asset management and document security, used by film productions including Birdman and The Revenant.

• Film and Television Projects

  Producing Team

  May 2002 – Dec 2012
  • Part of producing team for dozens of films and television shows, including Academy Award Best Picture winner 12 Years a Slave; Academy Award-nominated Thirteen and Wanted; Emmy-winning The Mystery of Matter: Search for the Elements and Emmy-nominated Blue Bloods and Damages. imdb.com/filmosearch/?sort=year&role=nm1278634

Proficiencies

• Languages: JavaScript/Node.js (core collaborator), Python, CoffeeScript (project leader), BASH, CSS, Sass, Stylus, HTML.
• Frameworks: Vue, Meteor (contributor), React, Ember, Backbone, Express, Serverless, AWS Lambda, WordPress, jQuery, Twitter Bootstrap.
• Technologies: Docker, Docker Compose, Terraform, AWS, S3, ECS, EC2, SQS, RDS, API Gateway, LocalStack, Google Cloud, MongoDB, DynamoDB, PostgreSQL, MySQL, GitHub, GitLab, Jira, Confluence, Google Analytics, Google Maps API, Handlebars, D3, Facebook/Twitter sharing, WebdriverIO, Cucumber, TestCafe, Puppeteer.
• Methodologies: Agile/Scrum project management. DevOps including continuous integration/continuous deployment. Responsive design. Test-driven development.

Education

• Columbia University. School of the Arts, 2005–2009. Master of Fine Arts degree in Film Producing.
• Cornell University. College of Arts & Sciences, 1999–2003. Bachelor of Arts degree in Film with a focus in Computer Science.