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Tomáš Hykel
Verified Expert in Engineering
Back-end Developer
Brno, South Moravian Region, Czech Republic
Toptal member since May 19, 2020
Bio
Tomas is a well-rounded senior technical lead and back-end developer with a strong track record across diverse project environments and technical stacks. His strongest suits include technical leadership in small-to-mid engineering teams, de-cluttering and stabilizing headache-inducing legacy systems, and API design and development (particularly with Ruby on Rails).
Portfolio
Kwara
Ruby, PostgreSQL, Technical Leadership, Engineering Management, Team Mentoring...
Kwara GmbH
Ruby, Testing, OWASP Top 10, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Fintech, REST APIs, Git...
VidIQ
Amazon Web Services (AWS), Sidekiq, Docker, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Ruby...
Experience
- Back-end - 13 years
- DevOps - 10 years
- Linux - 10 years
- Ruby on Rails (RoR) - 8 years
- APIs - 7 years
- PostgreSQL - 6 years
- Engineering Management - 4 years
- Technical Leadership - 4 years
Preferred Environment
Git, PostgreSQL, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Ruby, Linux
The most amazing...
...contributions I've made come from unprompted quick wins, like improving the efficiency of internal AWS operations through thoughtful UX and performance tweaks.
Work Experience
Technical Lead
2022 - PRESENT
Kwara
- Provided technical leadership of the company's whole fintech software suite, leading to massive improvements in the software stack's security, scalability, and speed of development.
- Led a small team during the development of a new native mobile app.
- Provided regular mentoring sessions to engineers of all experience levels.
- Organized and planned any non-feature maintenance work.
Technologies: Ruby, PostgreSQL, Technical Leadership, Engineering Management, Team Mentoring, DevOps, Git, Leadership, Mobile App Development, RESTFul APIs, Communication, Linux, Agile Software Development, Docker, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Back-end Development, Test-driven Development (TDD), Back-end, SQL, User Experience (UX), Redis, RESTful Development, REST APIs, Unix Shell Scripting, Automated Testing, API Integration, Digital Payments, QA Testing, Integration, Architecture, Payment Processing, Ruby on Rails API, Ruby on Rails 6, Ruby on Rails 7, Event-driven Design (EDD), Event-driven Architecture, CI/CD Pipelines, Back-end Architecture, APIs, Security
Senior Software Engineer
2021 - 2022
Kwara GmbH
- Took over as the lead developer of the company's mobile app suite.
- Introduced engineering processes and tools that increased development and delivery efficiency.
- Provided architectural and people management insights to the leadership team (in the absence of a dedicated engineering manager).
Technologies: Ruby, Testing, OWASP Top 10, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Fintech, REST APIs, Git, RESTFul APIs, Linux, Agile Software Development, Docker, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Back-end Development, Test-driven Development (TDD), Back-end, SQL, DevOps, User Experience (UX), Redis, RESTful Development, Unix Shell Scripting, Automated Testing, API Integration, Digital Payments, QA Testing, Integration, Architecture, Payment Processing, Ruby on Rails API, Ruby on Rails 6, Ruby on Rails 7, Event-driven Design (EDD), Event-driven Architecture, CI/CD Pipelines, Back-end Architecture, APIs, Security
Senior Software Engineer
2020 - 2021
VidIQ
- Took over ownership of a legacy Rails API to take care of the technical debt, along with any new bugs and feature requests.
- Carried out archeological deep dives regularly into the legacy stack to help with the porting of new features into a new API stack.
- Acted as a code reviewer for outside contributions.
Technologies: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Sidekiq, Docker, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Ruby, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Git, RESTFul APIs, Linux, Agile Software Development, Back-end Development, Test-driven Development (TDD), Back-end, SQL, DevOps, Redis, RESTful Development, REST APIs, Automated Testing, API Integration, Digital Payments, QA Testing, Stripe, Integration, Architecture, Payment Processing, Ruby on Rails API, Ruby on Rails 6, Event-driven Design (EDD), Event-driven Architecture, CI/CD Pipelines, Back-end Architecture, APIs, Security, OAuth 2, OAuth
Senior Software Developer
2018 - 2019
EclecticIQ
- Worked on the back-end portion of the product as a software engineer, dealing mostly with automated structuring, normalizing, and packing third-party intel data.
- Helped shape the UX of new features by providing continuous feedback to the UX and UI team.
- Introduced new code standards and practices to the team, which yielded better maintainability of the codebase.
- Added value to the code quality by participating in code reviews even outside the usually required scope.
Technologies: Celery, PostgreSQL, Python, Git, RESTFul APIs, Linux, Agile Software Development, Docker, Back-end Development, Test-driven Development (TDD), Back-end, SQL, Redis, SQLAlchemy, RESTful Development, REST APIs, Automated Testing, API Integration, QA Testing, Integration, Architecture, Ruby on Rails API, Ruby on Rails 6, CI/CD Pipelines, Back-end Architecture, APIs, Security
Systems Development Engineer
2016 - 2018
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
- Helped raise the quality bar of the management service behind relational database service (RDS) as one of the authoritative design and code reviewers—leading to a much more reliable service.
- Proposed and implemented new improvements regularly to the RDS management service, which resulted in receiving positive feedback from dozens of internal service users.
- Handled over a thousand operational issues with RDS as a part of the real time on-call rotation team.
- Held group meetings with management service users across the globe—collecting feedback and forming requirements.
Technologies: Amazon Web Services (AWS), JavaScript, Python, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Ruby, Git, RESTFul APIs, Linux, Agile Software Development, Back-end Development, DevOps, Microservices, CSS, Test-driven Development (TDD), Back-end, SQL, Redis, Java, RESTful Development, REST APIs, Unix Shell Scripting, Large-scale Distributed Systems, Automated Testing, HTML, API Integration, Ruby on Rails API, CI/CD Pipelines, Back-end Architecture, Security, Site Reliability Engineering (SRE)
Software Developer
2015 - 2016
Artin
- Helped improve the reliability of the Mavenir Message Controller: an SMSC server widely used in telecommunications.
- Participated in sprint planning and task triaging while using agile principles and Jira.
- Analyzed a large amount of legacy code without any available prior tribal knowledge or documentation.
Technologies: SS7, C++, C, Git, Linux, Agile Software Development, Back-end Development, Back-end, SQL, Automated Testing, Back-end Architecture
Research Assistant
2014 - 2016
Brno University of Technology
- Architected and developed about one-third of the functionality of RINASim, a simulator framework for a new type of internet architecture.
- Implemented tools to achieve automated unit and functional testing.
- Participated in technical discussions frequently with academic researchers from all around the world.
Technologies: TCP/IP, OMNeT++, C++, Git, Linux, Agile Software Development, Docker, Automated Testing
Systems Engineer
2013 - 2014
Seznam.cz
- Developed a set of apps related to distributed systems management behind Sklik, the biggest Czech PPC advertising service.
- Co-operated frequently with software developers in the release and maintenance of the software behind Sklik.
- Held a challenging 24/7 pager duty as the service administrator, handling all operational issues.
Technologies: Python, MySQL, Debian, Git, RESTFul APIs, Linux, Agile Software Development, Back-end Development, DevOps, Microservices, CSS, Back-end, SQL, Unix Shell Scripting, Large-scale Distributed Systems, Automated Testing, Back-end Architecture
Systems Administrator
2012 - 2013
Netwings Solutions
- Developed a set of apps to help manage data feed ingestion for the company-hosted online stores.
- Managed the IT assets of the company, like hardware fleet, operating systems, and network) and hosted cloud services, such as domains, email, web hosting, file hosting, and more.
- Oversaw the IT networks of multiple small companies and provided technical support for the same.
- Held 24/7 on-call duty as the sole person responsible for the company's IT assets.
Technologies: Hardware, PHP, MySQL, Linux, Git, Communication, Back-end Development, CSS, Back-end, SQL, Unix Shell Scripting, Automated Testing, HTML
Experience
Kwara Banking App
https://kwara.com/appA native mobile app backed by Ruby on Rails API. I led the development team behind the app, designed and developed most of the API, and regularly contributed to product design. I also mentored the software developers working on the project.
Internal Customer Communication Interface for AWS Relational Database Service (RDS)
https://aws.amazon.com/rds/A Rails-based control panel used by Amazon system engineers and software developers to reach out to customers about any events or issues happening around their database instances.
I defended the architecture, implemented both the back end and front end, and developed a set of templates for customer-facing communication.
I defended the architecture, implemented both the back end and front end, and developed a set of templates for customer-facing communication.
EclecticIQ Platform | A Cyber-threat Intelligence Platform
https://www.eclecticiq.com/platformAn analyst-focused platform for collecting, analyzing, and disseminating cyber-threat intelligence data with a tech stack based on Python, Flask, JavaScript, and several kinds of data storage.
I was one of three back-end developers responsible for the automated structuring, normalization, and packaging of 3rd-party intelligence data. Some of my projects included optimizing PostgreSQL data queries or refining parsers of unstructured data.
I was one of three back-end developers responsible for the automated structuring, normalization, and packaging of 3rd-party intelligence data. Some of my projects included optimizing PostgreSQL data queries or refining parsers of unstructured data.
RINASim | A Simulator Framework for a New Internet Architecture
https://omnetpp.org/download-items/RINASim.htmlAn implementation of the Recursive InterNetwork Architecture (RINA) for the OMNeT++ simulation framework.
I was the owner and developer of part of the architecture that deals with multiplexing and routing of data flows. I co-authored several research articles that provided a detailed examination of RINA and RINASim.
I was the owner and developer of part of the architecture that deals with multiplexing and routing of data flows. I co-authored several research articles that provided a detailed examination of RINA and RINASim.
Education
2009 - 2013
Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science
Brno University of Technology - Brno, Czech Republic
Skills
Libraries/APIs
REST APIs, Ruby on Rails API, Stripe, SQLAlchemy, Sidekiq
Tools
Git, NGINX, Celery
Languages
Python, Ruby, C, C++, HTML, CSS, SQL, JavaScript, PHP, Java
Frameworks
Ruby on Rails (RoR), Ruby on Rails 6, Ruby on Rails 7, OMNeT++, OAuth 2, Ruby on Rails 4
Paradigms
Automated Testing, Test-driven Development (TDD), Back-end Architecture, Agile Software Development, Microservices, Testing, REST, DevOps, RESTful Development, Event-driven Design (EDD), Event-driven Architecture
Platforms
Linux, Docker, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Debian, Mobile
Storage
PostgreSQL, MySQL, Redis, MongoDB
Other
APIs, Back-end, RESTFul APIs, API Integration, Integration, Architecture, Unix Shell Scripting, Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), Back-end Development, Technical Leadership, Engineering Management, Leadership, Mobile App Development, Communication, Digital Payments, QA Testing, Payment Processing, CI/CD Pipelines, Security, OAuth, AI Tools, User Experience (UX), Large-scale Distributed Systems, Data Processing Automation, TCP/IP, SS7, Hardware, OWASP Top 10, Fintech, Team Mentoring, Software Development, Computer Science, Computer Networking, Network Architecture, Simulations
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