Ben Gottlieb - Freelance Swift Developer for Hire

Lead iOS engineer

1993 - PRESENT

Stand Alone, Inc.

Built and maintained the first and most popular Crosswords app in the store, with over 3 million downloads.
Managed the relationship with Apple's AppStore team to get Crosswords into the store on Day 1.
Maintained Crosswords through 10 iOS versions.
Released Crosswords as Apple & Starbuck's App of the Week in 2012.
Oversaw a transition from Objective C to Swift as our primary iOS language.
Developed numerous internal tools and libraries to assist in iOS development.

Technologies: iOS, Swift, Objective-C, Xcode, Javascript, REST

iOS Developer volunteer

2016 - 2017

5calls.org

Designed and developed the 5calls app iPad interface.
Redesigned the iPhone UI for use on larger screens.
Coded and built out the entire iPad interface.

Technologies: iOS, iPad, Xcode, Swift

iOS Contract Developer

2015 - 2016

PG&E/Leviathan

Built an iPad app to showcase PG&E's Zero-Net-Energy house.
Architected and coded the iPad app, integrating augmented reality, location-awareness, and 3D imaging components.
Implemented a pre-ARKit Augmented Reality experience using the iPad as a virtual window.

Technologies: iOS, Swift, AR, Xcode, Bluetooth

iOS Contract Developer

2010 - 2016

Salesforce

Built the first mass-deployed iPad marketing tool at Zimmer (at the time of its release, it was the largest deployed iPad app in the world).
Designed and coded Salesforce's initial REST toolkit for implementing iOS apps based on their platform.
Built The Home Depot's paint color simulation tool, Color My World, a tap app in the App Store.
Built the Monsanto Seedsman Digital Sales Assistant iPad app.
Built the Allergan, Kimberly Clark, Abbot Vascular, and Diageo DSA iPad apps.

Technologies: iOS, Objective-C, REST, Salesforce, iPad, iPhone

iOS Contract Developer

2011 - 2015

Roger Ebert

Built Roger's iOS Great Movies app.

Technologies: iOS, Xcode, Objective-C

iOS Contract Developer

2013 - 2014

LaPresse

Built the LaPresse newspaper app's Crossword playing component.
Converted our existing Crosswords app into an embeddable library.
Worked with the LaPresse team to embed Crosswords functionality into their existing app.

Technologies: iOS, iPad, iPhone, Crosswords, Objective-C

iOS & Palm OS Contract developer

2002 - 2013

Handmark

Built Handmark's Express software client for both Palm and iOS.
In charge of the development of one of the keynote iPhone apps (Handmark was brought on stage for the initial iPhone SDK introduction for this app).
Built up the Palm client as the initial client for Handmark's Express news service.
Transitioned the client to iOS after the release of the iPhone.
Oversaw Palm and iOS development until Handmark's acquisition by Sprint in 2013.

Technologies: iOS, Palm OS, Objective-C, C++, Xcode, XML

iOS Contract Developer

2010 - 2012

Apple, Inc.

Architected and coded a discussion board component for Apple's internal Apple Store sales tool, Retail Me.
Took existing designs and translated them into working application features.

Technologies: Xcode, iOS, Objective-C, iPad

Crosswords (Development)

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/crosswords/id688876601?mt=8

The first (and most popular!) Crosswords app in the App Store. It's been there since day one, has been featured by Apple, been a Starbucks App of the Week, and won numerous accolades. I designed and build the iOS client.

The Home Depot: Project Color (Development)

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/project-color-the-home-depot/id1002417141?mt=8

I was in charge of the iOS component of this app (though not the actual color mapping). We started with a series of wireframes and comps, and implemented the entire app. I was in charge of application architecture and implementation.

USAToday Crosswords (Development)

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/usa-today-crosswords/id289273523?mt=8

I developed this back in 2009, and they've not maintained it, but, for a while, it was one of the most popular iOS Crossword apps. I designed and implemented the entire application.

Twitter + OAuth (Development)

https://github.com/bengottlieb/Twitter-OAuth-iPhone

Here's an open source library I created to make it easier to log into Twitter via OAuth. I designed and coded the Oauth components that enabled secure login to Twitter's services.

Grablr - Last Minute Deals (Development)

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/grablr-last-minute-deals/id1154517162?mt=8

I was brought in to maintain and update an existing iOS application. I took over an existing codebase, and was in charge of coding and implementing new features.

ASDetect Autism Detection App (Development)

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/asdetect/id1058669141?mt=8

I built the iOS component for this app, including most of the design and all of the coding. I worked with a team distributed over three continents and six time zones to build an award-winning app to help parents detect autism in their young children.

Collusion: Nearby Device Networking with MultipeerConnectivity in iOS (Publication)

https://www.toptal.com/ios/collusion-ios-multipeerconnectivity

Traditionally, connecting devices for peer-to-peer communications has been a tedious task: An application needs to discover what’s around it, open connections on both sides, and then maintain them as network infrastructure, connections, distances, etc. Realizing the difficulties inherent in these activities, in iOS 7 and macOS 10.10 Apple introduced its MultipeerConnectivity framework. Join Toptal Freelance iOS Developer Ben Gottlieb as he explains what MultipeerConnectivity is, and teaches us how to use it.

Languages

Swift, Objective-C, C, JavaScript, C++

Frameworks

Cocoa, UIkit, iOS Frameworks, Core Data, Vapor

Tools

Xcode, Interface Builder

Paradigms

Agile, Prototype-based OOP, MVC Design, UI Design

Platforms

iOS, MacOS, watchOS

Bachelor of Science degree in Physics

1991 - 1995

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute - Troy, New York