José Carlos Paiva, Developer in Porto, Portugal
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José Carlos Paiva

Node.js Developer

Porto, Portugal

Toptal member since November 1, 2021

Bio

José is a full-stack developer with 10+ years of R&D experience. He earned a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Porto (2025), focusing on improving feedback in automated programming assessment by leveraging students’ past solutions. His work spans e-learning, gamification, recommendation systems, graphs, ML, and mental health. José has led teams in academia and industry, delivering robust, modern solutions with state-of-the-art technologies.

Portfolio

Centro de Inovação Pedagógica do P. Porto
LangChain, vLLM, Nuxt 3, Redis, REST, Node.js, NestJS, Docker, D3.js, Qdrant...
INESC TEC's
JavaScript, GraphQL, REST, Vue, React, NestJS, Swagger, Java, Docker...
Aplynk
Amazon S3 (AWS S3), AWS Lambda, AWS Step Functions, Java, TypeScript, Python...

Experience

  • Node.js - 8 years
  • Java - 7 years
  • PostgreSQL - 6 years
  • React - 6 years
  • Vue - 6 years
  • Docker - 5 years
  • MongoDB - 5 years
  • Amazon Web Services (AWS) - 4 years

Preferred Environment

Linux, Git, Amazon Web Services (AWS), API Integration, Nuxt 3, Next.js, Shell, NestJS, React Native, Docker

The most amazing...

...thing I've worked on is an automated assessment system used worldwide in academic institutions to help programming teachers deliver real-time feedback.

Work Experience

Full-stack Engineer | AI Specialist

2024 - PRESENT
Centro de Inovação Pedagógica do P. Porto
  • Architected and deployed scalable full-stack solutions using Docker, PostgreSQL, and cloud infrastructure, supporting 1000+ concurrent users.
  • Developed and integrated LLM-based components into learning platforms, increasing student engagement and interaction rates.
  • Led the design and development of AI-powered educational systems, improving automated feedback quality and reducing grading time.
  • Developed and maintained APIs connecting Moodle, Directus, and external services, reducing integration latency.
  • Coordinated cross-functional junior teams of 3+ developers, delivering projects on schedule and within scope.
  • Designed and optimized data pipelines and database schemas, improving system performance and query efficiency.
  • Established DevOps practices (CI/CD, containerization).
  • Mentored students and junior developers, improving code quality and onboarding efficiency across projects.
Technologies: LangChain, vLLM, Nuxt 3, Redis, REST, Node.js, NestJS, Docker, D3.js, Qdrant, Vector Databases, Semantic Search, Artificial Intelligence (AI), API Integration, SQL, Full-stack, AI Agents, Large Language Models (LLMs)

Full-stack Developer

2018 - 2020
INESC TEC's
  • Designed and developed an ecosystem composed of several web-based tools for gamifying and supporting programming education.
  • Managed a team of five junior web developers, working on three different apps of the same ecosystem.
  • Containerized the complete ecosystem for development and production using Docker.
  • Developed unit and end-to-end tests using Jest and Cypress.
  • Deployed secure application web servers using Nginx reverse proxy with SSL/TLS termination.
Technologies: JavaScript, GraphQL, REST, Vue, React, NestJS, Swagger, Java, Docker, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Keycloak, JSON/XML Schemas, HTML5, CSS, Redis, Jest, Cypress, Git, HTML, Front-end, JSON, Node.js, API Integration, SQL, FastAPI, Full-stack

AWS Solutions Engineer | Architect

2016 - 2020
Aplynk
  • Designed and developed several cloud connectors to synchronize customer data among multiple eCommerce, CRM, accounting, and ERP software.
  • Deployed and designed an AWS serverless infrastructure to run the data integrations for multiple customers around the globe.
  • Trained and coordinated developers to deliver cloud connectors running on AWS.
Technologies: Amazon S3 (AWS S3), AWS Lambda, AWS Step Functions, Java, TypeScript, Python, Cloud Infrastructure, API Integration, Data Integration, Node.js, HTML, JSON, Zoho Deluge, Zoho CRM, Zoho Creator, Zoho API, Zoho One, SQL, Full-stack, Zoho

Senior Full-stack Developer

2015 - 2018
Apora
  • Developed a quote application for estimating energy costs and created ready-to-sign contracts including electricity and gas. I did the integration with Google Maps API, Zoho CRM, webservices.nl, Nexant API, among other web services.
  • Built a web platform to purchase domains, hosting in AWS, integration with applications in the cloud, with a back office for customers to manage and purchase those same services.
  • Created WordPress themes, landing pages, and online stores for customers around the globe.
Technologies: WordPress, PHP, JavaScript, HTML5, CSS, Vue, React, APIs, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Shopify, WooCommerce, HTML, Front-end, JSON, Zoho Deluge, Zoho CRM, Zoho Creator, Zoho API, Zoho One, Node.js, API Integration, SQL, Full-stack, Zoho

Full-stack Developer

2014 - 2018
INESC TEC's
  • Developed a web-based system for managing programming contests on the web, including features such as automatic judging of submitted programs.
  • Built unit tests in JUnit to test the various system components as well as automated performance and stress tests using Selenium to simulate massive interactions from users.
  • Created an e-learning web application for formative assessment in massive open online courses (MOOCs) and hybrid courses; the main task integrates all the others, including a gamification REST API; a REST API for sequencing and recommending educational resources.
Technologies: Java, JavaScript, CSS, HTML5, Redis, Selenium, JUnit, Python, R, DevOps, APIs, HTML, Front-end, JSON, React, Node.js, API Integration, SQL, FastAPI, Full-stack

Junior Software Developer

2011 - 2012
Ifthen, Lda
  • Developed several plugins to auto-generate payment references for Joomla, WooCommerce, Drupal, VirtueMart, and Magento eCommerce websites.
  • Built a C# application for geolocation of contacts in Google Maps.
  • Designed and implemented the data model for distinct production planning and control software.
Technologies: JavaScript, PHP, Magento, WooCommerce, eCommerce, MySQL, HTML, Front-end, JSON, API Integration, SQL

Experience

HandSpy

https://youtu.be/3ei51YNT3Pc
An Angular web application powered by a microservices infrastructure targeting the analysis of real-time psychophysiological and linguistic markers of expressive writing by analyzing handwriting traces collected with smartpens and produced texts and measuring electrodermal activity, facial muscle activity, and heart activity. In addition, to fully support the management and replay of the experiments with multiple analysts and participants, it implements several NLP techniques to gather several text metrics and emotions and a pause-burst analysis algorithm to explore handwriting.

Mooshak 2

Mooshak is a system for managing programming contests on the web, including automatic judging of submitted programs, answering clarification questions about problem descriptions, reevaluation of programs, and tracking printouts, among many others.

Mooshak supports different kinds of contests, especially those based on ICPC rules. It also supports IOI and "shortest program" contests and can be easily extended for new types of contests. The system was initially intended for contests, but it is increasingly being used in programming courses: giving instant feedback on practical classes, receiving and validating assignments submissions, and marking assignments.

Lisbon Taxation and Trade

Web application and API for managing data regarding the entry and exit of ships of the Lisbon harbor in the 19th century, including captains, ships, goods transported, and geospatial information about the routes taken between source and target harbors.

Education

2021 - 2025

Ph.D. Degree in Computer Science

University of Porto - Porto

2016 - 2018

Master's Degree in Computer Science

Faculty of Sciences of the University of Porto - Porto, Portugal

2012 - 2015

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science

Faculty of Sciences of the University of Porto - Porto, Portugal

Certifications

DECEMBER 2018 - PRESENT

Certified Zoho Creator Developer

Zoho

Skills

Libraries/APIs

Vue, React, Node.js, Zoho API, vLLM, D3.js

Tools

IDEA IDE, WebStorm, Git, Zoho Creator, Zoho One, Shell, Keycloak, SonarQube, AWS Step Functions

Languages

Bash, JavaScript, GraphQL, Java, HTML5, CSS, R, Python, PHP, TypeScript, Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), HTML, Zoho Deluge, SQL, Kotlin, Go, Bash Script

Frameworks

NestJS, Swagger, Jest, React Native, Nuxt.js, Spring, Angular, JUnit, GWT, Nuxt 3, Cypress, Next.js, Selenium

Paradigms

REST, Microservices, DevOps

Platforms

Linux, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Docker, WordPress, Android, Zoho CRM, Shopify, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Apache Kafka, Magento, WooCommerce, AWS Lambda

Storage

PostgreSQL, MongoDB, JSON/XML Schemas, Redis, MySQL, JSON, Neo4j, Graph Databases, Amazon S3 (AWS S3), Data Integration, PostGIS

Other

eCommerce, API Integration, APIs, Front-end, Artificial Intelligence (AI), LangChain, Qdrant, Vector Databases, Semantic Search, AI Agents, Large Language Models (LLMs), FastAPI, Full-stack, Zoho, Data Mining, Gatsby, Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing (NLP), CI/CD Pipelines, Cloud Infrastructure, Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPT)

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