Bruz Marzolf, Developer in Snohomish, WA, United States
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Bruz Marzolf

Verified Expert  in Engineering

Back-end Developer

Snohomish, WA, United States

Toptal member since January 14, 2016

Bio

Bruz is a full-stack developer who has loved building things for the web since he first started doing it over 15 years ago. Bruz has spent a lot of time on the back end building services with Ruby and Elixir and working with databases and infrastructure but has also done substantial work on the front end building apps in JavaScript.

Portfolio

Bruzilla Development
JavaScript, TypeScript, Capacitor, Ionic, Supabase, SQLite, React.js...
Inkarnate
TypeScript, React.js, JavaScript, Elixir, PostgreSQL, SQL, Linux, Docker...
Habit
React.js, Ruby on Rails, Ruby, PostgreSQL, Docker, Redis, SQL...

Experience

Availability

Part-time

Preferred Environment

Git, MacOS, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Terminal

The most amazing...

...project I've worked on involved leading the development of a complex back end that scaled to millions of users, plus working on the sophisticated front end.

Work Experience

Self-employed

2023 - PRESENT
Bruzilla Development
  • Built a mobile app for a niche market, with a beta release to hundreds of users with excellent feedback and a recent launch to production.
  • Developed the mobile app in TypeScript quickly, leveraging React, Ionic, and Capacitor.
  • Implemented a fully offline mobile experience to provide excellent security and privacy while allowing a cloud backup and restore option.
Technologies: JavaScript, TypeScript, Capacitor, Ionic, Supabase, SQLite, React.js, Tailwind CSS, Python

Staff Software Engineer

2019 - 2023
Inkarnate
  • Led all back-end development, including infrastructure, database design, and the API.
  • Built an entirely new API using Elixir to facilitate scaling up the product and enabling new capabilities and seamlessly transitioned a large user base over to it.
  • Developed significant features in the complex front-end app using React and TypeScript.
Technologies: TypeScript, React.js, JavaScript, Elixir, PostgreSQL, SQL, Linux, Docker, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Functional Programming, Back-end Developers, Database Design, Front-end, APIs, Phoenix, REST API, CSS, DigitalOcean, Full-stack, Graphs, Tailwind CSS, Heroku, AWS

Senior Software Engineer

2016 - 2019
Habit
  • Built new features, working across the Ruby on Rails back end and React front end.
  • Implemented a data analysis pipeline used to provide personalized results for users based on their lab results.
  • Added efficient and comprehensive testing methodologies to allow validation of highly personalized user results.
Technologies: React.js, Ruby on Rails, Ruby, PostgreSQL, Docker, Redis, SQL, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Back-end Developers, Database Design, Front-end, APIs, REST API, CSS, Full-stack, Graphs

Freelance Web Developer

2010 - 2017
Fat Cork
  • Built the initial eCommerce site for the business using a framework to quickly get to market.
  • Overhauled the initial eCommerce app to provide a custom back-end interface that better matched their business.
  • Included a high level of unit test coverage for the complex business logic in the overhauled app, and a large end-to-end test suite to provide high confidence when making changes.
  • Proactively monitored issues with the site and fixed them.
  • Managed email accounts and other IT needs of the company.
Technologies: Redis, PostgreSQL, Ruby on Rails, Ruby, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Back-end Developers, Database Design, CSS, DigitalOcean, Intuit QuickBooks, Full-stack

Back-end Ruby on Rails Engineer

2016 - 2016
Clustrix (via Toptal)
  • Optimized memory usage extensively to operate within a relatively small memory footprint.
  • Redesigned various database-intensive operations to greatly improve performance while still maintaining the same simple API.
  • Rewrote a key multi-threaded background process to improve speed and reliability.
  • Wrote and maintained Bash utilities used by customers to maintain their installations.
  • Added an API annotation system that provided both parameter validation as well as API documentation.
Technologies: Bash, SQL, Ruby on Rails, Ruby, Linux, SQL, Back-end Developers, APIs, REST API

Senior Front-end Engineer

2016 - 2016
Luno (via Toptal)
  • Created various new user interfaces in a sophisticated React stack that used state management with Redux, universal rendering, and data fetching.
  • Implemented the form handling system used throughout the app.
  • Supported a new UI with unit tests for the React components.
Technologies: React.js, JavaScript, Front-end, CSS

Senior Software Engineer

2011 - 2016
AmpX²
  • Led the development of the main Ruby on Rails/Backbone.js customer-facing web app.
  • Built 11 Ruby microservices to support various new features.
  • Helped transition to a Docker infrastructure from a monolithic application.
  • Built a service to package microservices with Docker, streamlining the deployment pipeline.
  • Led the development of the web apps for three new rapidly-developed products.
Technologies: AWS, JavaScript, Docker, MySQL, Ruby on Rails, Ruby, Linux, Redis, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Back-end Developers, Database Design, Front-end, APIs, REST API, CSS, Full-stack, Heroku

Lab Manager

2000 - 2011
Institute for Systems Biology
  • Developed and supported web applications for lab workflows, primarily using Ruby on Rails.
  • Created data analysis pipelines using the R statistical language.
  • Built image analysis tools using Java to support novel research techniques.
  • Performed data analysis on data sets for various researchers.
  • Demonstrated strong writing skills, authoring journal publications, grant applications, and internal documentation.
Technologies: Java, R, JavaScript, Ruby on Rails, Ruby, Linux, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Back-end Developers, Database Design, Full-stack

Fat Cork

https://fatcork.com
Created a custom eCommerce app with a sophisticated back end to support the company's champagne club. It's a complex Ruby on Rails (RoR) app with a large suite of unit and end-to-end tests to allow the app to continually improve with high confidence that it will not break existing features.

Moment Prints

Led the development of a service to make it easy to get photo prints monthly by automatically importing and filtering out bad photos. I used React for the front end, Ruby for the back end, and Python-based machine learning (ML) to inform the filtering algorithm.

My Flare

Developed a large-scale cloud storage and collaboration service. Built with a Ruby on Rails (RoR) and Backbone.js front end. I utilized many technologies on the back end, including several Ruby microservices and an AWS-based infrastructure with Docker.
1996 - 2000

Bachelor of Science Degree in Biochemistry

Western Washington University - Washington, USA

Libraries/APIs

React.js, REST API, JavaScript

Tools

Git, Terminal, Capacitor

Languages

Ruby, JavaScript, Elixir, TypeScript, Python, CSS, R, Java, SQL, Bash

Frameworks

Ruby on Rails, Phoenix, Tailwind CSS, Ionic

Storage

PostgreSQL, Redis, MySQL, SQL, SQLite

Paradigms

Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Functional Programming, Database Design

Platforms

AWS, Docker, Linux, DigitalOcean, Heroku, MacOS, Visual Studio Development

Other

Back-end Developers, Front-end, APIs, Full-stack, Intuit QuickBooks, Graphs, Computer Vision, Supabase, Biochemistry

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