Full-stack Developer in Victoria, BC, Canada

LearnReact.design is the main portal of my recent EduTech efforts that include video courses, articles and interactive tools. I initiated, designed and implemented the entire solution.

"Learning should be fun."

This is the rationale I've been following and advocating since I started teaching designers how to code a few years ago [1]. I try my best to create delightful, interactive learning experiences that keep both halves of a learner's brain engaged. To explain abstract programming concepts, I use a combination of plain English, quirky characters, metaphors, illustrations and interactive explanations [2][3][4]. I've been exploring new ways, such as spaced repetition, to make learning more effective.

[1]: LearnReact.design: https://learnreact.design
[2]: What is React?: https://learnreact.design/posts/what-is-react
[3]: Smiley in Motion: https://smileyinmotion.com
[4]: Framer and React: https://youtu.be/YnY-6wIx6y4

Mirror consists of an Android client, a standalone desktop UI, an Android Studio plugin, a few command-line tools and a license server. Functionally, Mirror acts like React Fast Refresh and Storybook combined (but it predated both). It reduces the feedback time from a few minutes down to a couple of seconds, which greatly improves the developer experience.

Besides the scope of the project (Android app development, Android's build system, desktop GUI, IntelliJ IDEA plugin development, and server-side development), the major challenge was that Android's build system was not designed to handle the use case I had hoped to support. There was no documentation or sample code to refer to. It was not clear what I had imagined was even possible. But of course, that's where the fun began.