I make hard-to-change software maintainable.

Turning prototypes into code teams can own

Vibe-coded projects prove an idea quickly. I turn them into systems people can read, test, and change: clear names, real boundaries, dependencies under control.

Rails upgrades across monoliths and services

Upgraded Gusto's two Rails monoliths to 8.0 and 8.1, and raised the extracted services to a 7.2 minimum. The oldest had been sitting on Rails 6.0.

A maturity model for technical debt

Built scorecard tooling to campaign and track repo upgrades across Ruby, Rails, Rubocop, Sorbet, Appraisal, and related standards, with an automation plan for Ruby and Rails EOL windows.

Service separation and safer rollouts

Contributed to monolith extraction and GraphQL federation for centralized feature flags, service decoupling, and progressive delivery.

Software craftsmanship without mystique

Mentor small cohorts of apprentices through code review, pairing, fundamentals, and honest career advice.

Big upgrades on systems people depend on

In 2021, migrated Kadenze from Rails 4.2 and Ruby 2.3 to Rails 6.1 and Ruby 2.7. In 2024, led MemberSpace's Rails 6 and Ruby 2.x modernization toward Rails 8 and Ruby 3.4.

"Joe has a real talent for diving into complex challenges and finding effective solutions."

I'm at my best on tangled, important problems that need real judgment, not a quick patch.

"His reliability and drive made him a key part of our team."

People have trusted me with production infrastructure, data security, upgrade paths, team protocols, and systems that need to keep working.

"He built our custom web app from scratch."

That product served tens of thousands of users across more than 100 countries, with separate paths for students, mentors, judges, volunteers, and administrators.

"Joe always had the needs of our users in mind."

That meant rural and remote access, low-income communities, children, and users at very different levels of technical comfort.

"Standby revert PRs being open and ready before each deploy was a small but high value choice."

My upgrade work comes with rollback planning, timing updates, and real-time triage when production changes ripple across services.

"He took the reins and drove the project forward."

Peers highlighted initiative on feature flag GraphQL work, generator tooling, service extraction, incident response, and tricky codebase problems.

"I consistently learn from you in our interactions."

Feedback repeatedly mentions patience, helpfulness, pairing, documentation, and making Ruby and Rails work easier for product engineers.

"Joe is an asset to any team."

What it adds up to is maintainable work: readable code, practical architecture, careful refactoring, and systems other people can understand and change.