
Franco Laiuppa
Verified Expert in Engineering
Full-stack Developer
Prague, Czech Republic
Toptal member since December 9, 2024
Franco is a seasoned full-stack developer with over 15 years of experience leveraging his expertise to help companies of all sizes thrive. He specializes in building resilient, scalable APIs, creating event-driven architectures that handle millions of daily messages, and delivering exceptional user experiences. Primarily skilled in Node.js and React, Franco is eager to learn and adapt to new technologies and challenges.
Portfolio
Experience
- APIs - 16 years
- JavaScript - 16 years
- Node.js - 11 years
- Express.js - 11 years
- Microservices - 10 years
- React - 8 years
- AMQP - 6 years
- TypeScript - 3 years
Availability
Preferred Environment
MacOS, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Linux, Node.js, React, Tailwind CSS, Express.js
The most amazing...
...solution I've built was the login box for Auth0 (now Okta), which millions of users use every day. You can see it, for example, if you log into ChatGPT.
Work Experience
Senior Full-stack Developer
Self-employed
- Developed APIs used by millions for user authentication in a SaaS environment.
- Built websites for various organizations, including enterprise-level clients, capable of handling millions of requests per hour.
- Collaborated with cross-functional teams, including designers, project managers, UX specialists, developers, and DevOps engineers, to develop various features.
- Participated in on-call rotations, handling incident management, post-mortems, and responding to internal support tickets.
- Set up the ELK stack for application observability and alerting, significantly improving uptime by preventing app crashes.
- Developed a web editor based on Visual Studio Code (VS Code) that ran machine learning algorithms using WebAssembly—this project was highly cutting-edge.
- Implemented multiple custom content management systems (CMS) and customer relationship management (CRM) solutions tailored to specific industries, including healthcare, recruitment, and others.
- Established an offshore office for a client, overseeing the hiring process and serving as the team lead and architect.
- Managed a remote team of four across a time zone difference of 4 to 12 hours, with asynchronous work being one of my key strengths.
- Created detailed documentation for APIs and internal processes that continue to be used today.
Platform Engineer
Hash
- Helped develop a high-performance web editor based on VS Code that ran machine learning algorithms using WebAssembly.
- Implemented a dataset parsing feature that enabled users to update JSON or CSV files up to 2 GB in size without causing browser lockups.
- Implemented the file explorer feature, enabling users to manage multiple files efficiently.
- Collaborated with a distributed team across multiple time zones, including the US, UK, and EU.
- Learned from one of the top React developers globally, who significantly contributed to the React source code.
- Worked on data visualization projects using various tools, including Three.js, Chart.js, and Canvas.
Senior Engineer II
Auth0
- Enhanced the login box, Auth0's core product, which was a key factor in their acquisition by Okta.
- Participated in on-call rotations, resolving incidents in record time, creating post-mortems, responding to internal support tickets, and utilizing Datadog and other observability tools.
- Implemented passkey authentication as a service, enhancing security and user experience.
- Collaborated with a fully remote team across time zones with up to a 6-hour difference, focusing on creating impactful technical documentation.
- Leveraged my extensive expertise in Express.js and React to deliver high-quality solutions.
- Helped develop numerous microservices that are still in use within the company.
- Implemented accessibility improvements, significantly enhancing the usability for all users.
- Implemented custom theme design tools for end users, incorporating features like color blindness support, contrast checking, and other accessibility considerations.
- Stress-tested applications by writing scripts using Apache Benchmark (ab) to evaluate performance under load.
- Wrote numerous unit tests, integration tests, and end-to-end tests to ensure system reliability.
Lead Developer
Infinite Leap
- Developed microservices capable of handling thousands of events per second using the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol (AMQP) and RabbitMQ.
- Architected a custom Node.js dependency that interfaced with C to interact with Active Directory (AD).
- Supported the team's growth by providing feedback and conducting code reviews.
- Gained a thorough understanding of HIPAA regulations and data safety and implemented processes to generate anonymized data for local use in compliance with these regulations.
- Collaborated with a remote team across time zones with up to a 12-hour difference without missing a single sprint.
Technical Director
Kounterattack
- Established an office for my client, hired and mentored the development team, and implemented efficient work processes, among other responsibilities.
- Implemented continuous integration and continuous deployment (CI/CD) practices to streamline development and delivery processes.
- Worked extensively on DevOps, including custom HTTP server installations, Linux server management, and other related tasks.
- Built solutions using PHP and JavaScript, working across front-end and back-end development.
- Maintained regular communication with stakeholders, providing daily and weekly updates to keep them informed.
- Collaborated directly with clients to define and establish the project roadmap.
Full-stack Lead Developer
An Online Freelance Agency
- Completed over 100 projects, consistently delivering results to almost an equal number of satisfied customers.
- Played a key role in helping the agency establish itself as the market leader in Latin America.
- Leveraged a variety of programming languages and development paradigms to deliver exceptional results for clients.
- Collaborated with customers and developers worldwide, often across time zones with up to a 12-hour difference.
- Managed a small team of four developers, mentoring them as they grew from junior to senior roles.
Experience
Auth0 Development
https://auth0.comSkills
Libraries/APIs
Node.js, React, AMQP, Stripe, Stripe API, jQuery UI, jQuery
Tools
ELK (Elastic Stack), Notion, Slack, RabbitMQ, Stripe Checkout, Jira
Languages
JavaScript, TypeScript, PHP, Bash
Frameworks
Tailwind CSS, Express.js
Paradigms
Microservices, HIPAA Compliance, DevOps, REST
Platforms
MacOS, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), PagerDuty, Linux
Storage
Datadog, Elasticsearch, MySQL, PostgreSQL
Other
APIs, User Authentication, Passkey Authentication, WebAssembly (Wasm), Front-end, Back-end
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