Darren Li
Verified Expert in Engineering
Back-end Engineer and Developer
Vancouver, BC, Canada
Toptal member since January 10, 2025
Darren has 15+ years of software development and database design experience, with exceptional analytical, troubleshooting, and problem-solving skills. He has extensive experience with Go, Python, C++, Java, JavaScript, Rust, Ruby, MySQL, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, and SQL. Darren is detail-oriented, self-motivated, and a quick learner. He also has technical lead experience in development, communicating with stakeholders to efficiently prioritize work and meet deadlines and KPIs.
Portfolio
Experience
- Python - 10 years
- SQL - 10 years
- JavaScript - 10 years
- Linux - 10 years
- PostgreSQL - 10 years
- MySQL - 10 years
- MongoDB - 10 years
- Go - 7 years
Availability
Preferred Environment
Linux, MacOS, Cloud, AWS IoT, Google Cloud
The most amazing...
...thing I've done from scratch is build and implement a next-gen distributed system for a retail intelligence cloud service.
Work Experience
Senior Software Engineer
- Built an API for the Google DRM cloud service, a licensing service for video producers to encrypt and decrypt videos for customers.
- Scaled the video fraud management service by breaking down the large central database into a dated database to increase performance and efficiency.
- Developed the dashboard and alert system to monitor license and provisioning requests.
- Added an algorithm to increase the license service's security level.
Senior Software Engineer
Outreach Inc.
- Built Go microservices to decompose a monolithic application. Decomposed authentication and user management components from a monolithic Rails application to an independent Go microservice.
- Scaled the service to a large user base. Built an API proxy service to break down legacy API to routing to microservices and partitioned the central database based on geolocation to boost performance.
- Built SCIM service for enterprise customers to manage users (Go service employing the SCIM protocol to streamline user provisioning and management for Outreach).
- Developed an SSO service for the Outreach application. Built a microservice to manage user authentication and authorization for accessing different services in Outreach.
Senior Software Engineer | Tech Lead
Retailstat
- Designed and implemented a next-gen distributed infrastructure application. Built next-gen event-driven microservices to replace the legacy application for better performance and productivity for new features.
- Led the development squad by choosing technology stacks, handling code and design reviews, and meeting the milestones dates.
- Coordinated with stockholders and project managers to deliver the app on schedule.
- Gained hands-on DevOps experience (setting up EC2, SQS, and MongoDB).
Software Engineer
Sage
- Built Sage Business Cloud Accounting services. Developed a Sage Business Cloud Payroll service. Helped with transferring a monolith application to microservices.
- Separated the front end from the Rails app with React. Integrated numerous third-party apps with Sage Accounting services.
- Led hackathons and projects. Mentored junior engineers.
Experience
Next-gen Distributed System for a Retail Intelligence Cloud Service
I built next-gen event-driven microservices to replace the legacy application for better performance and productivity of new features. I also led the development squad—choosing the technology stack, conducting code and design reviews, and meeting milestone dates—and coordinated with stakeholders and project managers to deliver the app on schedule. Additionally, I had hands-on DevOps experience setting up Amazon EC2, Amazon SQS, and MongoDB.
Education
Master's Degree in Computer Science
Dalhousie University - Halifax, NS, Canada
Skills
Libraries/APIs
React, Node.js
Languages
Go, Python 3, SQL, JavaScript, C++, Java, Ruby, Rust, Python
Paradigms
Database Design
Platforms
Linux, MacOS, AWS IoT, Kubernetes
Storage
MySQL, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Google Cloud, Redis, Databases
Frameworks
Ruby on Rails 5, gRPC
Other
Cloud, Algorithms, Back-end Development, Software Development, APIs, Full-stack, Front-end
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