About Me

  • Email: admin@sol3.me
  • Hobbies: Hardware
    PC Gaming
    Travelling
    Guitar
  • Location: Birmingham,
    West Midlands,
    United Kingdom

Hi I'm Ben!

I'm a self taught Full Stack Software Engineer based in the centre of Birmingham. I'm passionate about tech, I love contributing to projects and trying out new things!

Feel free to email me or get in touch via LinkedIn, be sure to check out my GitHub profile and follow along.

Skills & Knowledge

  • C#, ASP.NET Core, Entity Framework, Razor & Blazor
  • Typescript w/ React, Next.js, Vue, Node, Express etc.
  • Terraform, Azure KeyVault, Config & Feature Flags
  • SQL, Cosmos/MongoDb, File/Blob Storage
  • Event Sourcing, MassTransit
  • Azure DevOps, Azure Portal
  • CI/CD Pipelines
  • Microservices
  • Docker & Kubernetes
  • Command Queues
  • Azure SB, WebJobs & Functions
  • Twilio, SendGrid
  • MVC, SPAs, PWAs
  • TDD, Unit & Integration Testing
  • HTML, SCSS/CSS
  • Git, TFS, Monorepos
  • JIRA, Trello, Slack, Teams, Google Suite etc.
HTML5 JavaScript Vue.js Sass Azure DevOps C Sharp .NET Core Microsoft Azure Microsoft SQL Server Node.js Visual Studio Code

Projects

The Livestream Console

A web app made with Node, Express and Handlebars. Which I created to help manage YouTube live streams. The app is hosted on Render a free tier and will take some time to boot after a cold load. I'm looking at re-writing this app as a static react site instead, for 0 downtime.

I went through the process with Google to add and verify the app, it uses OAuth 2.0 and social login to authenticate. It implements the YouTube Data API v3 with basic CRUD operations for livestreams.

Originally inspired by a need to improve a church livestream service during the pandemic.

DECLASSIFIED - Interactive Map

A fun side project I found online, I joined in and collaborated open source to help improve the javascript. I ended up contributing a lot, moved the app to Netlify and took advantage of the CI/CD tools available. I enabled pull request previews, automatic deployment and webhook notifications to our discord server.

DECLASSIFIED - Challenge Tracker

Whilst working on the interactive map portion of DECLASSIFIED, I came up with the idea to also track in game challenges. With help from a designer friend we came up with the challenge tracker and a plan to make it mobile first. It uses state history to keep the URL updated whilst not refreshing the page unless necessary.

The Javascript Playground

A very basic educational site I quickly created using flat HTML, CSS and published to GitHub pages. This was out of a need to have frequent topics of discussion with students available at an instant. Used primarily for their own personal study reference.

Work Experience

  • Today

  • Software Engineer

    Full-Time

    ASOS - Sep 2022 - Present

    I'm currently working in one of the payments teams in Birmingham, helping migrate existing functionality and extend the capability of the cards platform. Our squad is completely backend facing, focused specifically on API integration with 3rd parties within the payments space. As we need to handle such high throughput, work is strictly TDD with extra effort going into ensuring that all possible cases are covered.

  • Full Stack Engineer

    Full-Time

    Boomin - Mar 2022 - Sep 2022 - 7 Months

    I worked as a Full Stack Engineer within my squad to add value primarily to the agent facing CRM of the site as well as contributing to other areas when and where needed. Work was heavily test driven (xUnit), it involved Event Sourcing, Docker & Kubernetes, Pact Testing, Terraform etc, all hosted in azure and using core services like Cosmos & SQL DB Hosting, ASB, Key Vault, Feature Flags and more.

  • Full Stack Developer

    Full-Time

    Joblogic - Apr 2019 - Mar 2022 - 3 yrs

    I worked on the field service application Joblogic, developing & maintaining the core web application and supporting applications in an agile environment as part of a team in the UK & internationally. The primary technologies include C#, .NET Core, Entity Framework & SQL. This also included a supporting mix of architectures; Micro-services, pub/sub using Azure service bus, Azure Webjobs and functions. As well as these, SQL Server, MongoDb and Azure file/blob store were used for the data management. I have had continuous exposure to Azure Portal, using it for application deployment, maintenance and more. I have used Azure DevOps to create and maintain CI/CD pipelines for company resources, we also use it for source control and pull requests.

  • Substitute TA & Online Tutor

    Part-Time

    2U - Feb 2020 - Present

    A part time substitute Teaching Assistant & Online UK Tutor, helping students complete a 6 month full stack development course. From May 2020 I also extended my role into coaching UK students 1 to 1 as part of 2U's tutoring service to go alongside the course. I have been involved with 6 cohorts, helping over 100 students individually.

  • Junior Developer

    Joblogic - Jul 2017 - Apr 2019 - 1 yr 10 months

    As a Junior developer I oversaw one of the business processes for digitising customer requested "Forms" to be used on any engineer's mobile device. This process involved customer interaction to gather requirements, managing sprints, design & testing documentation, creation, peer testing and then releases on a weekly schedule.


  • And More...