Why would you want to read this?
I design software for an airline. Technically my title is Domain Architect, Airline Operations. I don’t like the title Architect because I’m a computer science nerd with a PhD in History, and neither computer professionals nor ancient historians architect the ‘built space’ that surrounds us. Well, I don’t think it’s quite true yet. There have been at least some spaces that are architected with specific aspects of the concrete appearance affected in the intersection of the physical space with the data infrastructure that is required both inside and outside it (think airports, shopping malls, skyscrapers, 5G towers). Yet, the things I build as a software systems designer are more reflected in events and processes and sequences than in fixed objects, so ‘architect’ just seems wrong. What makes events and processes and sequences so fascinating to me is their need to withstand the daily turbulence of logistical operations in a critical environment like an airline.
I specialise (my ‘domain’) in the field of airline operations. I’m writing this paragraph in seat 29D on a 73H with config J8Y168 on a short-haul domestic flight. Down the back is OK, its a bit more sensitive to turbulence, given its distance from the aircraft’s centre of gravity. It was the best aisle seat I could get, given the fare class I’m travelling on and the weight and balance requirements for the flight. Suffice to say, I love the deep arcana of pushing metal around the sky. I’ve started to compile a range of facts, descriptions, and opinions pertinent to programming and systems design for airline operations here.
You can view my social links in the page header including the dreaded linked in profile.
Nowadays I’m writing mostly in Java 11, sometimes with the Akka framework for event and streaming data development. I have also written some GUIs in React.JS. Containerisation of choice is Kubernetes. Version control and more importantly CD pipelines are best done with GitLab.
I like gitlab’s CI/CD process although there are a couple of small annoyances that I have with it. Some of these I’ve coded around in an open-source template project that you can read about here.
If you want to hire me, I might be interested, but only in certain conditions, for example: a small development team in which I can play a vital part; modern development methods; modern technology; scale; interesting business domains; real-world implications; senior roles. This applies especially if you have an interesting aviation-related software design and development project,
What I’m definitely not interested in:
I was awarded my PhD in 2020. My PhD was in the field of Classics and Ancient History. The title of my thesis is Landscape and geographical space in T. Livius ab urbe condita. I do my own translations, as a PhD student is expected. My favourite Latin poets are Ovid and Propertius. I wrote my entire thesis in pandoc/markdown and generated the PDF from that using LaTeχ, bibteχ, and xeteχ using LaTeχ memoir. It was built using gitlab.com ci-runners. I’ve got a complete thesis-build project which I will open source once I extract my actual thesis text from it and make it a little more general-purpose.