Nicholas George Wieland (ngw) resume

last updated:

Contact information

Name:
Nicholas George Wieland
Job title:
Software developer
Address:
21 Capstan Square London, E143EU
Telephone:
+44 7498 379693
Email:
ngw@nofeed.org
Homepage:
Photo of Nicholas Wieland

Skills

I’m an experienced developer with Ruby and Elixir. I know Javascript as well, and I worked in PHP and Python in the past. Lately I got interested in Elm and I've used it very successfully in one of my latest gigs.

I have a lot of experience with RubyOnRails and Sinatra, and I also did some Padrino in the past with great pleasure.

I love design, I can work with HTML and CSS proficiently. I also love studing the subject and I am a strong proposer of accessibility. I’ve conducted some usability tests in the past and I would love to repeat the experience.

I enjoy database systems, and I’ve used most of them during my work life: MySQL, SQLServer, Oracle are just some names. I strongly support PostgreSQL as my DB server of choice. I’m also fond of NoSQL databases, especially Redis, which I used in production.

I can work on any kind of Unix system, and even if I’m not a sysadmin I can also administer them. I prefer working on Linux, but I've been an OS X user for 15 years. Then they started shipping terrible keyboards.

I can operate successfully in an AWS environment.

I do not enjoy working on Windows, so please, don’t be silly and give me an environment I’m productive with.

Education

Liceo Linguistico Redentore

Work experience

Lead backend engineer

IFAD

- Current position

Smart working

I have had the opportunity to work on OPEN, an exceptional Ruby on Rails application designed specifically to efficiently manage all IFAD procurement processes.

The project focused on developing multiple subsystems and improving the overall system performance. My main involvement was in implementing the help system backend and frontend to aid staff in using what is a very complex system. I also implemented file uploads for activities using ActiveStorage, and was involved in improving the internal journal. At the same time, I've corrected many bugs in the system backend.

IFAD is an international organization that operates in different countries. A big issue we faced was dealing with localization and managing multiple currencies. I had to develop everything with the UI in mind, making it available in English, French, and Spanish.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, PostgreSQL database.

Mara

Lead backend engineer

Cabinet Office

-

Smart working

I have built the Data Catalogue web application from scratch, leading a young team of developers.

I developed the backend for the application's main functions. This involves the development of an API endpoint that allows ministries to effortlessly upload their API endpoints and data catalogues using JSON. Furthermore, I also implemented the ability to set up a background job to fetch endpoints and catalogues from HTTP endpoints.

Other than this, I managed to dockerize the application and deploy it on Heroku.

As the most experienced developer on the project, I found great satisfaction in mentoring my fellow developers.

The application was a huge success and, being an MVP, granted the continuation of development.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, PostgreSQL database, Docker and Heroku.

Mara

Lead backend engineer

Mara

-

Smart working

I worked on releasing their MVP on the web, Apple Store and Play Store.

I've worked extensively on some of their microservices. My main focus was the administration service, a Ruby on Rails application that had to authenticate against a SSO server and manage all the other services through HTTP calls. I was also involved in the development of user-serviuce, the microservice used to manage all their users.

We launched and had to respond to a stunning rise in traffic, and scale the services in collaboration with a team of DevOps.

The software was a huge success, effectively giving Africa access to a crypto wallet.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails and Grape framework, PostgreSQL, Docker and AWS.

Mara

Lead backend engineer

Soho House

-

Smart working

I was part of the connect team, helping on a number of projects and services throughout SohoHouse microservice architecture, most notably profile-service, checkin-service and hook.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, PostgreSQL, Docker, , Kubernetes and Github.

Soho House

Lead backend engineer

Department for Education

-

Smart working

I helped to build the Early Career Framework application

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, PostgreSQL, Docker, and Github.

Department of Education logo

Lead backend engineer

Funding Circle

-

Smart working

I was in charge of updating a number of applications managing dependencies and fixing security vulnerabilities.

These applications had to be dockerized and moved into the cloud, scanned to check for vulnerabilities, and updated.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, AWS, Docker, CircleCI and Jenkins.

Funding Circle logo

Lead backend engineer

Lawbite

-

Smart working

I was for most of the time the main backend developer in charge of the rewrite of the Lawbite platform.

Work included building several microservices, writing the administration panel for the company's CMS, helping external developers in rebuilding the main portal.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, AWS with Kubernetes.

Lawbite logo

Senior developer

Ministry of Justice

-

102 Petty France, London, United Kingdom

I was for most of the time the only backend developer in charge of the book a secure move API application.

Work included normalizing the data structure, implementing document uploads with ActiveStorage, and implememntig Webhooks.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, AWS with Kubernetes. I also acquired some good experience of Swagger and JSON API.

Ministry of Justice logo

Tech Lead

Vzaar

-

London, United Kingdom

My duties involved maintaining the old application, developing new features and, after the merger with Dacast, work on splitting the two main applications in microservices.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework, AWS and the Serverless framework.

Vzaar logo

Tech Lead

Utelier

-

London, United Kingdom

I was involved in evaluating the old application and move development to London.

My duties involved traveling to Ljubljana to make an evaluation of the software we had in house, then recruiting a developer to move the development to London. I could choose my own stack and mentor a junior developer, but also build the whole system, including rebuilding the AWS infrastructure under the supervision of a senior engineer at The Scale Factory.

The technologies involved were Ruby with the RubyOnRails framework. I also had the immense pleasure to use the Elm language to build the frontend.

Utelier logo

Senior Developer

mGage, a Vivial company

-

London, United Kingdom

I worked in the Payments team developing the main administration interface that manages all their services.
The project is built from the ground up using the Phoenix Framework and PostgreSQL.

As part of my day to day duties I also had to build the authentication layer for all their Ruby API endpoints, and later an Elixir library to let the administration application query these services.

The technologies involved were Ruby and Elixir with the RubyOnRails and Phoenix frameworks.

mGage logo

Developer

The Fool s.r.l.

-

Milan, Italy

I developed many projects pertaining digital assets management, copyright protection and personal reputation.

The most prominent is probably , an application that acts as a gateway layer to collect all user generated contents from all digital properties (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Disqus, Wordpress) managed by the customer at hand, that are then presented via a customized dashboard that lets classify, analyze and manage all the content by any number of moderators and managers.

This application is used by many companies to manage their online assets, just to name a few Banca Mediolanum , Radio24 and Volkswagen.

Engagement Console logo

I do many other things at The Fool s.r.l., where I plan, develop, maintain and deploy several web applications, data extraction tools and services.

The main language involved is Ruby, both plain and with frameworks such as RubyOnRails and Sinatra, and some things have been coded in Javascript.
We use data stores like MySQL and MongoDB for bigger projects and sometimes smaller embedded engines like LMDB or GDBM.
Many projects involve integrating with Elastic Search.

Lead Developer

Antonioli.eu

-

Milan, Italy

During my short stay I helped in the development of their . I was the only developer working for them and I had to manage the project with external developers: the website was very complex as Antonioli is available worldwide and has to take care of the different tax rates and regulations and also have a very thorough administration interface to allow non techinical users to manage the products and the sale process.

I also had to maintain their legacy website, which was a disgraceful mess in RubyOnRails 2.0 developed by many people in the time span of more than 6 years.

The technologies involved were Ruby and RubyOnRails, the new website was built using the Spree framework.

Antonioli logo

Developer

Sportboom

-

Milan, Italy

I worked with the founders to build the website project from the ground up, starting from a website in PHP/MySQL that I was in charge to port to RubyOnRails/PostgreSQL with many new features.
A very important part of the job was to obtain good rankings on the main search engines, and to accomplish this I had to work close to a SEO and implement all the features he needed. The company wanted to build a marketplace for sport enthusiasts were users could find recreation activities to engage at the cheapest price.

I also had to search and hire a designer and a junior developer to help me out as part of the job.

The technologies involved were Ruby and RubyOnRails, with PostgreSQL as database.
I could also use Bootstrap for the first time to build the frontend.

Sportboom logo

BDFL

StyleJam

-

Seattle, WA

I obtained a seed fund from H-Farm to develop an idea I had while at my previous job.

I implemented the whole again from the ground up.
The startup was a reinterpretetion of the old CSS Zen Garden where designers could enter their personal data and style with CSS a common page with their data and their own designs, pretty much like Carbonmade meets the CSS Zen Garden.

StyleJam logo

I also wrote on the blog, took care of public relations, marketing, sales, accounting, system administration, and pretty much everything you can eventually think someone can do in a company.

The tecnhologies I used were Ruby and RubyOnRails with MongoDB. The portfolios were static websites hosted on S3 very cheaply and composed by a service I built with Goliath.io.

Code available for review

Ask me and I'll give you rights for the BitBucket repository

CTO

Zooppa

-

Treviso, Italy,
Seattle, WA

I developed the from the ground up, caring about the implementation, maintenance , architecture, and taking every technological choice from the very beginning.
Zooppa generates high quality video and graphic design content for advertising campaigns. Marketers and agencies from the world’s top brands use Zooppa’s crowdsourcing platform to connect with an online creative community of over 350,000 members.

I managed the product for clients like Google, Microsoft, Sun, AT&T, Samsung, Fiat and many others, interacting with their development teams on a daily basis.
I also built the development team from the very beginning hiring the developers, designers and system administrators I needed.

The tecnhologies involved were Ruby and RubyOnRails on a MySQL RDBMS.

Zooppa logo

Developer

Hotchalk

-

Campbell, CA

I helped the team to startup the company, rewriting a Java application in Ruby on Rails. The rewrite was a huge success, the codebase was completely covered by tests so we’ve been able to release a product with very few defects and a reduced / cleaner codebase.

leverages data and technology to support all phases of the student life cycle, and enables industry-leading student retention and graduation rates. The site had more than 30k registered users on the first day, and is now helping hundreds of schools to keep pupils, teachers and parents connected.

The tecnhologies involved were Ruby and RubyOnRails on a MySQL RDBMS.

HotChalk logo

Developer

Assembla

-

Needham, MA

I worked with the Assembla team to the initial implementation of their , a website very similar to what Github became years later, but based on svn and trac, and aimed at helping developers hosting their source code and manage the whole development team.

Initially, Breakout was written in Ruby and RubyOnRails on a MySQL RDBMS. It also used extensively Subverision and Trac.

Assembla logo

Author

Apogeo

-

Milan, Italy

I authored a chapter of the first book in italian language about Ruby Ruby per applicazioni web, explaining how to use databases in Ruby. The book is still around and I find mentions of it pretty much everywhere on italian IT groups.

Ruby per Applicazioni Web cover

Developer

*.*

-

Italy

After my first work experience I wanted to gain as much experience as I could, so I started to work as a consultant for many italian companies while working myself on some free software projects like the Application Server Zope.

My customers included Monte dei Paschi di Siena (they still has some of my systems in production), Telecom and many others.

I wrote everything I could, from websites to client software for Fax Servers. The languages involved were mainly Python, PHP and to a minor extent Java.

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Developer

Neato Europe

-

Mantua, Italy

At neato I built their e-commerce, their CRM systems and I administered their servers.
It was my first working experience and I learned a lot.

The e-commerce site was in PHP, ported from an ASP3 site. The CRM in Zope. Their 3 servers were using FreeBSD and hosting some internal services.

Neato logo

Other projects

CEO

PetsWantPats

- Present

Italy

I always loved animals and dogs in particular, and I wanted to build something to help stray dogs find a new home.

I developed the website to help people in search of a new dog to find the perfect match.
PetsWantPats is a search engine that lets dog shelters list their dogs for adoption.

The entire project is financed by me and is a nonprofit.

The website is in RubyOnRails with some Javascript. I wanted to experiment a bit and learn in the process, that's why the whole frontend is in HAML.
The DBMS is PostgreSQL and the search engine is built around Elastic Search.

PetsWantPats logo

Code available for review

Ask me and I'll give you rights for the BitBucket repository