Ahmed is available for hire

Ahmed Elkady

Verified Expert in Engineering

iOS Developer

Toronto, ON, Canada

Toptal member since January 13, 2021

Expertise

Mobile App User Interface (UI)User Experience (UX)Scalability App Store Git GitHub iOS Native Libraries Xcode Swift Objective-C CocoaPods Realm Apple Development

Bio

Ahmed has been a passionate iOS developer since his internship days in 2014 while studying computer engineering at the University of Waterloo. He has done six internships, most notably at Compass in New York and LinkedIn in San Francisco. After graduating, Ahmed worked at an edtech company called Top Hat for three years, then moved on to Coffee Meets Bagel for two and a half years. He holds a master's degree in computer science from the University of Illinois.

Portfolio

Slatable LLC

AVFoundation, Swift, Git, Realm, Video Codecs, Alamofire, iOS Animations, iOS...

Dusty

Swift, Firebase, iOS Animations, iOS, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, UX Design...

Coffee Meets Bagel

VIPER Architecture, Model View ViewModel (MVVM), SDWebImage, CocoaPods...

Experience

Agile Software Development - 8 years Git - 8 years iOS - 7 years Xcode - 6 years CocoaPods - 6 years Objective-C - 6 years Swift - 6 years SwiftUI - 2 years

Availability

Part-time

Preferred Environment

Agile Software Development, Algorithms, Git, Objective-C, Swift, iOS, Xcode

The most amazing...

...project I've built is called RichTextView—an open source iOS project starred at least 1000x that can render HTML, Markdown, LaTeX, and YouTube videos.

Work Experience

iOS Developer

2023 - PRESENT

Slatable LLC

Facilitated a major database migration from the v2 version of the app (JSON and plist) to v3 (Realm, now Atlas Device SDK), unblocking a major version upgrade.
Fixed the subscription pricing in the app to be dynamic and introduced the ability for users to restore their purchases.
Added tracking around video sharing and various other issues around the app to debug and fix those bugs.
Introduced support for Bluetooth remote control of the iOS app for script-based auditions.
Debugged missing take videos and AVFoundation errors.

Technologies: AVFoundation, Swift, Git, Realm, Video Codecs, Alamofire, iOS Animations, iOS, APIs, Bluetooth, Audio, iPhone, Mobile Apps, UX Design, iOS UI Design, CloudKit, PHP, Frameworks, Mobile Architecture, Figma, In-app Purchase (IAP), In-app Purchases, Monetization, Mobile App Development, API Integration

Swift/Firebase Developer

2023 - 2024

Dusty

Added support for users to share their roundtables via a share code.
Enabled the ability for special users to create custom topics with custom color tinting and badging for users that join those topics.
Fixed general bugs and updated the project to the latest XCode.

Technologies: Swift, Firebase, iOS Animations, iOS, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, UX Design, iOS UI Design, Social Media Apps, Mobile Architecture, Figma, Mobile App Development, API Integration, Algolia

Senior iOS Developer

2021 - 2023

Coffee Meets Bagel

Delivered the most successful revenue experiment in the company's history by building a new multi-screen upsell flow that increased D7's total revenue per user by 9.5%.
Integrated Twilio into the app to build a robust video chat experience that more than 15% of our weekly users use.
Refactored the app's onboarding flow from Objective-C to Swift, making the code more stable and increasing the app's Swift code by 10% relative to Objective-C.
Worked with a team of five other iOS developers to fix, improve, and build upon the CoffeeMeetsBagel dating app.
Participated in refactoring various app components, such as the "Me" avatar screen, to move closer to Swift and MVVM/VIPER architecture.
Implemented better team processes, including a release rotation.

Technologies: VIPER Architecture, Model View ViewModel (MVVM), SDWebImage, CocoaPods, Teamwork, Agile Software Development, Git, Swift, iOS, Xcode, SwiftUI, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, LiveStream, Streaming, iTunes Connect, Alamofire, AVFoundation, Video Codecs, Realm, Video Streaming, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Lottie, Lottie-iOS, Firebase, Figma, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, Subscriptions, Apple Subscriptions, Apple Pay, Core Data, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Architecture, OpenAI GPT-4 API, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Entertainment & Leisure, GitHub, TestFlight, Stripe, PSD to Swift, Swift 4, SDK Development, Scalability, Abstraction, REST APIs, AVPlayer, App Design, iOS Native Libraries, iCloud, iOS Animations, Twilio, Video Livestreaming, TokBox, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, CI/CD Pipelines, Social Media Apps, CallKit, gRPC, Frameworks, Mobile Architecture, In-app Purchase (IAP), In-app Purchases, Monetization, Mobile App Development, API Integration

iOS Developer

2021 - 2021

Liven

Converted the remainder of the app's Objective-C code to Swift, moving it from 88% Swift (and 10% Objective-C) to 98% Swift (and 1% Objective-C).
Fixed bugs and crashes, improving general app stability.
Participated and contributed to long-term discussions about the future of the iOS codebase.

Technologies: Swift, Objective-C, iOS, iPhone, Mobile Apps, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

Mobile Team Lead

2020 - 2021

Top Hat

Expanded my responsibilities by taking on a leadership role within the Android and iOS teams, growing the number of direct reports under me to seven in total.
Responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by rallying the team to build support for our new virtual classroom experience on iOS and Android, enabling professors to continue to deliver lectures to their students remotely.
Transitioned the mobile team from OKRs as a way to do project planning to the shapeup and cycle process as part of a department-wide effort to transition all the engineering teams.

Technologies: VIPER Architecture, Nimble-Snapshots, SDWebImage, PromiseKit, SnapKit, CocoaPods, Teamwork, Agile Software Development, Git, Swift, Xcode, Team Leadership, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, LiveStream, Streaming, iTunes Connect, Alamofire, AVFoundation, Video Codecs, Realm, Video Streaming, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Firebase, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, App Store, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Architecture, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Sockets, Socket.IO, Networks, GitHub, TestFlight, PSD to Swift, Swift 4, SDK Development, Scalability, REST APIs, AVPlayer, App Design, iOS Native Libraries, Sensor Data, iOS Animations, Video Livestreaming, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, CI/CD Pipelines, CircleCI, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

iOS Team Lead

2019 - 2020

Top Hat

Managed and mentored a mix of junior and senior developers as well as remote contractors in a team of three iOS developers.
Delivered an all-hands speech in front of the whole company highlighting the progress we made in the iOS app rewrite, specifically the classroom experience.
Rewrote the entire guidebook experience and analytics architecture on the iOS app, making the code more scalable, maintainable, and stable.
Created Top Hat's first iOS open source project (Richtextview.com), an iOS UI TextView (UIView) that properly displays LaTeX, HTML, Markdown, and YouTube/Vimeo links, amassing 200 stars and 8 forks within the first week of the first release.

Technologies: Open Source, VIPER Architecture, Nimble-Snapshots, SDWebImage, SnapKit, PromiseKit, CocoaPods, Teamwork, Agile Software Development, Team Leadership, Objective-C, Swift, Git, Xcode, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, iTunes Connect, Alamofire, Realm, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Firebase, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, App Store, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Architecture, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Sockets, Socket.IO, Networks, GitHub, TestFlight, PSD to Swift, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Swift 4, SDK Development, Scalability, REST APIs, App Design, iOS Native Libraries, Sensor Data, iOS Animations, APIs, iOS, iPhone, Mobile Apps, CI/CD Pipelines, CircleCI, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

Senior iOS Developer

2018 - 2019

Top Hat

Participated in an entire iOS app rewrite, moving 30% of the project's code to Swift within the first six months.
Championed a week-long project to streamline and standardize our dependency management system, moving from a mixture of Carthage and static dependencies to CocoaPods, removing approximately 100,000 lines of code in the process.
Contributed to the rewrite of the entire question experience on iOS to Swift, improving the app's weekly crash-free rating from an all-time low of 96.5% to 99.5% and the App Store rating from 3.2 to 4.5 stars out of 5.
Established the team's accessibility standards and Swift code style guides.

Technologies: Carthage, VIPER Architecture, Nimble-Snapshots, SDWebImage, SnapKit, PromiseKit, CocoaPods, Teamwork, Agile Software Development, Objective-C, Swift, Git, Xcode, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, iTunes Connect, Alamofire, Realm, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Firebase, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Architecture, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Sockets, Socket.IO, Game Development, Gamification, Networks, GitHub, TestFlight, PSD to Swift, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Swift 4, SDK Development, Scalability, Abstraction, REST APIs, App Design, iOS Native Libraries, Sensor Data, iOS Animations, iOS, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, CI/CD Pipelines, CircleCI, Frameworks, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

iOS Developer

2017 - 2018

Top Hat

Led the technical planning around re-architecting the entire student classroom experience on iOS.
Participated in a complete overhaul of our iOS network engine, moving from Objective-C and RestKit to Swift, Codable, and PromiseKit.
Championed a week-long project to standardize and streamline our UI/UX process on mobile, including colors, font sizes, and images.
Worked with the rest of the department to bring a vast array of web features to our iOS app, including tournaments, Top Hat Test, and third-party questions.

Technologies: Carthage, VIPER Architecture, Nimble-Snapshots, SDWebImage, SnapKit, PromiseKit, Teamwork, CocoaPods, Agile Software Development, Objective-C, Swift, Xcode, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, Alamofire, Realm, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Firebase, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, Mobile, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Sockets, Socket.IO, Game Development, Gamification, Networks, GitHub, TestFlight, PSD to Swift, Swift 4, SDK Development, Scalability, Abstraction, REST APIs, App Design, iOS Native Libraries, Sensor Data, iOS Animations, iOS, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, CI/CD Pipelines, CircleCI, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

iOS Developer

2016 - 2016

Compass

Worked with a team of three developers to manage five iOS applications for the luxury homes market, developing features that led to an 80% engagement rate on our apps.
Utilized polygon drawing and correction algorithms to enable users to draw custom boundaries on a map, in order to filter particular regions in a real estate search.
Architected major portions of the agents app, adding the ability for agents to see and interact with their clients, as well as view their own listing and search history.
Strengthened the Swift API layer in our apps to better communicate with and translate Thrift data structures coming from our servers.

Technologies: Model View ViewModel (MVVM), Nimble-Snapshots, SDWebImage, SnapKit, Carthage, Teamwork, Agile Software Development, Objective-C, Swift, Xcode, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, Alamofire, Realm, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Google Maps SDK, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, Core Data, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, GitHub, TestFlight, PSD to Swift, Swift 4, SDK Development, REST APIs, iOS, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, CI/CD Pipelines, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

iOS Developer

2016 - 2016

Worked on the messaging portion of the flagship iOS app with eight other iOS developers and approximately two dozen other developers, project managers, and designers.
Developed a feature that allowed LinkedIn employees to message their coworkers and add them to group conversations, working with an Android and back-end developer.
Enhanced the messaging experience by enabling users to see the content of URLs sent in the app by showing a basic image, title, and description along with inline YouTube videos.
Enriched the user experience by modernizing the loading animation across messaging.

Technologies: Model View ViewModel (MVVM), Teamwork, Agile Software Development, Objective-C, Swift, Git, Xcode, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, UI Animation, Core Animation, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Apple, Core Data, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Instant Messaging, PSD to Swift, Swift 4, SDK Development, Scalability, REST APIs, iOS Animations, iOS, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, Social Media Apps, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration

Mobile Application Developer

2015 - 2015

Autodesk

Used iOS Objective-C, Lua, and C++ to develop a contest feature for Sculpt+, a 3D-intensive social media app where users could share self-created 3D models.
Updated the Android app to be Gradle-based, reducing build speeds by up to 50%.
Improved the internal Kalpana 3D framework which was used by multiple Autodesk apps.

Technologies: Gradle, C++, Lua, Objective-C, Xcode, Java, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, UIKit, Core Image, iOS Frameworks, Mobile, Mobile Applications, Android, iOS Camera, Camera API, Android SDK, Entertainment & Leisure, Metal, Mobile Apps, Mobile App Development, API Integration

Software Developer

2014 - 2014

Metroland

Used the Appcelerator framework to work on the Save.ca hybrid mobile application, part of Canada’s largest online shopping savings and deals ecosystem.
Used JavaScript, HTML, CSS, Android Java, and jQuery to develop a new method of favouriting flyers and redesign the camera module, increasing the app’s rating by 0.3 stars over the course of my employment.
Performed routine bug fixes and updated the app to iOS 8 and Android Lollipop.

Technologies: Appcelerator Titanium, Hybrid Apps, Java, Mobile Development, iOS SDK, Mobile App, Mobile, Android, iOS Camera, Camera API, Android SDK, eCommerce, Mobile Apps, Mobile App Development, API Integration

Experience

RichTextView

https://www.richtextview.com

This is an iOS open source project that takes any kind of text—HTML, LaTeX, Markdown, and even YouTube/Vimeo links—and turns it into a UIView that can be used to visually display these different kinds of "rich text" properly.

As the sole developer, I was involved on the ground floor of this project, from creation to deployment to maintenance, as well as putting it in the CocoaPods Specs repo so that anyone can integrate it into their projects.

Interactive Computer Graphics Course Project

http://www.ahmedelkady.xyz/uiuc-cs418-aelkady2/

This is my end-of-course project for my interactive computer graphics course for my master of computer science degree. It is a WebGL webpage that includes a rendering of a teapot and a plane that uses geometry processing, smooth per-pixel shading, diffuse reflectance, specular highlights, surface texture, reflective surface, procedural texture, and bump mapping.

Personal Website

http://www.ahmedelkady.xyz

This is a website I built using JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. It showcases both my professional and personal aspects, giving a full picture of who I am. I focused mainly on responsive design to ensure its compatibility across all devices.

Education

2021 - 2022

Master's Degree in Computer Science

University of Illinois Urbana Champaign - Remote

2012 - 2017

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Engineering

University of Waterloo - Waterloo, Canada

Skills

Libraries/APIs

CocoaPods, PromiseKit, SnapKit, SDWebImage, Alamofire, Core Image, REST APIs, iOS Native Libraries, Nimble-Snapshots, Google Maps SDK, Core Animation, Apple Subscriptions, Camera API, Sockets, Socket.IO, Stripe, WebGL, Lottie-iOS

Tools

Xcode, Git, GitHub, TestFlight, iTunes Connect, Figma, CircleCI, Gradle, Appcelerator Titanium, AVPlayer, TokBox, CallKit

Languages

Swift, Objective-C, Swift 4, Java, Lua, C++, JavaScript, HTML, CSS, SQL, PHP

Frameworks

SwiftUI, iOS SDK, UIKit, iOS Frameworks, Core Data, Cocoa Touch, Cocoa, Android SDK, Metal, CloudKit, gRPC

Paradigms

VIPER Architecture, Mobile Development, Agile Software Development, Model View ViewModel (MVVM), Gamification, UX Design, iOS UI Design

Platforms

iOS, Firebase, Apple, Mobile, Twilio, Android, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Algolia, iCloud

Storage

Realm, Database Management Systems (DBMS)

Other

Teamwork, Mobile App, User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), App Store, Mobile Applications, Architecture, SDK Development, Scalability, Abstraction, APIs, iPhone, Mobile Apps, Frameworks, Mobile Architecture, Mobile App Development, API Integration, Algorithms, Carthage, LiveStream, Streaming, AVFoundation, Video Codecs, Video Streaming, UI Animation, Subscriptions, Apple Pay, iOS Camera, App Design, iOS Animations, Video Livestreaming, Minimum Viable Product (MVP), CI/CD Pipelines, Social Media Apps, In-app Purchase (IAP), In-app Purchases, Monetization, Open Source, Team Leadership, Hybrid Apps, Compilers, Computer Graphics, Data Visualization, Data Cleaning, Lottie, OpenAI GPT-4 API, Game Development, Entertainment & Leisure, Networks, Instant Messaging, PSD to Swift, Web UX, Full-stack, Sensor Data, Google Analytics 4, eCommerce, Bluetooth, Audio

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