Nicu Cristian Taran, Developer in Timișoara, Timiș County, Romania
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Nicu Cristian Taran

Verified Expert  in Engineering

Software Developer

Location
Timișoara, Timiș County, Romania
Toptal Member Since
September 14, 2020

Cristian's worked as a software engineer for over a decade, as a tech lead/scrum master for two years, and as a hands-on engineering manager for three years in a remote global team. Specializing in full-stack web development, he excels on projects involving legacy code, intricate algorithms, and third-party integrations. He learns fast, communicates well, and welcomes a challenge. Passionate about finding simple solutions to complex problems, Cristian always strives to make a positive impact.

Portfolio

ContractPodAi (via Toptal)
.NET, SQL Server 2016, ASP.NET Web API, Optimization, Vue, Authorization...
FOSSA (via Toptal)
.NET, NuGet, Visual Studio, C#, Technical Writing
Texas Legit LLC (via Toptal)
Intuit QuickBooks, .NET, .NET Core, Entity Framework, Full-stack...

Experience

Availability

Part-time

Preferred Environment

SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), Jira, Zoom, Slack, G Suite, Visual Studio, Chrome, GitHub, Postman, Visual Studio Code (VS Code)

The most amazing...

...thing I've contributed to was Sensium: a wireless system for monitoring the vital signs of patients that is currently used, among others, in COVID-19 wards.

Work Experience

Full-stack Software Engineer

2021 - PRESENT
ContractPodAi (via Toptal)
  • Designed and built a custom authorization solution for the web platform using a mix of RBAC and ABAC.
  • Optimized SQL scripts and stored procedures.
  • Trimmed and simplified the DAL and business layer.
  • Optimized search operations with SQL stored procedures and Azure Cloud services (Cognitive Search, Blob Containers, Indexes, and so on).
  • Built a solution for upgrading existing customers to the new version of the web platform using SQL Server Integration Services for data migration.
  • Worked on the new version of the flagship web-based legal platform which included building several features spanning all layers from the database to the front end.
Technologies: .NET, SQL Server 2016, ASP.NET Web API, Optimization, Vue, Authorization, SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS), C#, Scrum, Windows, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Visual Studio, REST APIs, JavaScript, LINQ, Microsoft SQL Server, ASP.NET, SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), Object-oriented Programming (OOP), JSON, Postman, Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Leadership, CI/CD Pipelines, APIs, Requirements & Specifications, Software Architecture, Data Structures, Entity Framework, Technical Writing, Source Code Review, Code Review, Task Analysis, Node.js

Technical Writer

2021 - 2021
FOSSA (via Toptal)
  • Researched and wrote a couple of blog articles around dependency management in the .NET universe with a focus on Visual Studio as a development environment.
  • Managed the dependencies in .NET which included .csproj, .packages.config, project.json, and more. More information cane be found at Fossa.com/blog/managing-dependencies-net-csproj-packagesconfig/.
  • Performed dependency management in Visual Studio for NuGet and Beyond. More information can be found at Fossa.com/blog/dependency-management-visual-studio-nuget-beyond/.
Technologies: .NET, NuGet, Visual Studio, C#, Technical Writing

Full-stack Developer

2020 - 2021
Texas Legit LLC (via Toptal)
  • Helped build a web application used for refined fuel trading.
  • Developed pages that allow mapping of business-specific entities from an input standard to the necessary output standard.
  • Integrated QuickBooks for the creation of customer and supplier invoices.
  • Onboarded a new customer/tenant onto the platform.
Technologies: Intuit QuickBooks, .NET, .NET Core, Entity Framework, Full-stack, QuickBooks API, Material UI, Amazon CloudFront CDN, Amazon S3 (AWS S3), Amazon EC2, Microsoft SQL Server, ASP.NET Core, React, GitHub, Windows, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), REST APIs, JavaScript, LINQ, SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), JSON, Postman, Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Leadership, Semantic UI, APIs, Requirements & Specifications, Software Architecture, Data Structures, Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Management Consultant

2020 - 2020
Cloud Innovations
  • Worked with the tech lead to optimize his time management and increase his efficiency in the context of additional responsibilities.
  • Helped the tech lead to analyze team dynamics and optimize communication and development workflow.
  • Defined and exhaustively described the employee performance review process.
Technologies: Agile Project Management, Team Management, Time Management, Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Leadership, Technical Writing

Software Engineering Manager

2017 - 2020
A Job Board for Freelance Work
  • Led a DevOps team to transform ten products from several companies (OneSCM, SchoolLoop, Nucleus, Northplains, Agemni, Saratoga, OneSpot)—taking it from manual builds to automated CI/CD pipelines and infra-as-code with a focus on top market standards.
  • Coordinated DevOps and engineering with SaaS, QA, and maintenance teams to successfully bring to production two major versions of OneSCM: a SaaS supply chain management solution.
  • Improved the efficiency and quality of teams by applying techniques like KPIs, RCAs, TMS exercises, playbooks and quality bars, simplification of workflows, and automation of recurring activities—resulting in by an increase of 10-20% per quarter.
  • Worked together with the chief architects in the team to understand and resolve complex technical issues that were blocking progress.
  • Coordinated and coached the chief architects in building the architectural model (using the C4 model) of newly acquired products.
  • Executed technical screening of more than 50 candidates with different profiles and seniority, built two teams (of five and ten chief architects) from scratch, and overall managed around ten different teams.
Technologies: Scrum Master, Writing & Editing, Team Leadership, DevOps, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Design Patterns, Leadership, Jira, CI/CD Pipelines, Software Design, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Zoom, Slack, G Suite, C4 Model, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Jenkins, Scrum, GitHub, Windows, SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Requirements & Specifications, Software Architecture, Technical Hiring, Source Code Review, Code Review, Task Analysis, Interviewing, SaaS Operations (SaaSOps)

Senior Software Engineer

2017 - 2017
F&F IT Services SRL
  • Developed features for a web-based service-operator dashboard for ISPI Next—a diagnostic and programming solution for BMW service centers—significantly increasing ease-of-use and responsiveness of the web application.
  • Built features for a WPF-based desktop application for administration of the ISPI Next web platform.
  • Delivered improvements and bug fixes to an online learning platform.
  • Wrote unit tests for C# code using NUnit and Moq and increased overall coverage from 50% to 80% for the online learning platform.
  • Refactored areas of the product to reduce technical debt.
Technologies: Full-stack, Desktop App Development, DevOps, ASP.NET Web API, HTML, CSS, Bootstrap, Desktop App Design, Web Development, Back-end, Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Windows Server, Visual Studio, Agile Software Development, APIs, Microsoft SQL Server, C#, Windows Communication Framework (WCF), ASP.NET MVC, .NET, Scrum, Windows, LINQ, SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), TFS, Data Structures, Entity Framework, Technical Hiring, Source Code Review, Code Review, Task Analysis, Interviewing

Tech Lead | Scrum Master

2014 - 2016
Sensium Healthcare S.R.L.
  • Developed the web application and back-end services for Sensium—a wireless system for monitoring the vital signs of patients—successfully releasing two product versions with new features and improvements.
  • Extended and improved the integration with third-party APIs, including the hospital IT system, ADT, and EMR.
  • Stabilized and enhanced the admin configuration tool using WPF.
  • Advocated for the adoption of an Agile development style using Scrum, got stakeholder and team buy-in, designed and implemented the process, and played the scrum master role for the team.
  • Responsible for improving the technical screening process of new candidates—for C# .NET roles—and involved in the recruitment process.
Technologies: Scrum Master, Full-stack, Team Leadership, Desktop App Development, ASP.NET Web API, HTML, CSS, Desktop App Design, Design Patterns, Leadership, Web Development, Algorithms, Back-end, REST APIs, Jira, Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), CI/CD Pipelines, Software Design, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Windows Server, G Suite, Visual Studio, Architecture, SQL Server 2016, Agile Software Development, Microsoft SQL Server, ASP.NET MVC, ASP.NET, C#, .NET, Scrum, Windows, LINQ, SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), TFS, Software Architecture, Data Structures, Technical Writing, Technical Hiring, Source Code Review, Code Review, Task Analysis, Interviewing

System Designer

2011 - 2014
Canon Production Printing SRL (Formerly Known as Océ Software SRL)
  • Analyzed requirements, designed features, built architecture models, and wrote technical and functional specifications for PRISMAdirect: a print workflow management solution.
  • Created the work breakdown of the design as input for the development of three major product versions. Coached ten developers on detailed technical decisions during implementation.
  • Designed cost estimation, quotation, and print features—covering both internal component interaction and external integrations, including MS Excel, Adobe libraries and APIs, printer drivers, and other proprietary tools.
  • Helped to define the concept of a multi-job order and its behavior in all the connected use cases.
  • Designed and built the prototype used for data migrations between different product versions; it was built using Windows Forms.
Technologies: ASP.NET Web API, HTML, CSS, AngularJS, Bootstrap, Design Patterns, Leadership, Web Development, Algorithms, Back-end, REST APIs, Jira, Software Design, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Windows Server, Microsoft 365, Visual Studio, Architecture, Writing & Editing, Documentation, Enterprise Architecture, Requirements & Specifications, C#, Windows Services, Windows Communication Framework (WCF), ASP.NET MVC, ASP.NET, Web Services, Windows, LINQ, SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), TFS, Software Architecture, Data Structures, Technical Writing, Technical Hiring, Source Code Review, Code Review, Task Analysis, Interviewing

Senior Software Engineer

2006 - 2011
Canon Production Printing SRL (Formerly Known as Océ Software SRL)
  • Worked on PRISMAdirect—a print workflow management solution for small and large print rooms—designing and developing features and providing maintenance and refactoring.
  • Built a WinForms desktop app to enable detailed system configuration and customization. The app was used extensively inhouse (increasing speed of development and testing for new features) by clients to customize the solution for their own print room.
  • Developed a Windows service that uploads documents asynchronously effectively unblocking the job submission workflow. This helped customers increase their conversion rate by reducing average job submission time.
  • Built a file attachment component (WinForms), showing live status of attachment pre-processing steps (upload, merge, convert to PDF) plus aggregated job status—increasing transparency of job status and thus efficiency of print room operators.
  • Focused on increasing the accuracy of the print intent therefore making the output accurate for complex printing requirements, which as a side effect raised the customer base and revenue of print shops.
  • Refactored the core business model applying composition, inheritance, and IoC while adding a built-in integrity check and self-repair option. This highly increased the overall application stability and resilience.
Technologies: Desktop App Development, Desktop App Design, Back-end, Jira, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Windows Server, Microsoft 365, Visual Studio, Microsoft SQL Server, CSS, HTML, JavaScript, C#, ASP.NET, ASP.NET MVC, Windows Communication Framework (WCF), Windows Services, Web Services, Windows Forms (WinForms), SQL, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), TFS, Source Code Review, Code Review

Sensium

https://www.sensium.co.uk/solution/
Sensium is a wearable, wireless system for monitoring the vital signs of patients. It scans and reports heart rate, respiration rate, and axillary temperature providing data every two minutes.

Data is collected from patients roaming within a medical ward via wall-mounted LAN bridges (connected to the hospital IT system and the Sensium server). The server receives the data, curates it, and stores it in a database. From there, data is conveyed to the clinical staff via web and mobile apps. The apps display filterable lists of patients with their latest vital signs, recent trends, and alerts if vitals are deteriorating. The system also offers a set of notifications and alarms configurable for each vital sign.

My focus was on the web app and the server (WCF, MSSQL, ASP.NET MVC). I extended the data model, implemented the business logic and the presentation layer to support more complex views of the data (e.g., recent trends, history). I also improved the handling of bad data and recovery of the state and also resolved tens of high-priority maintenance issues. I then designed and coordinated the implementation of a Windows installer for the server. I also drove the shift to Scrum within the team and then acted as a scrum master.

Flask-Social-Login

https://github.com/ctaran/flask-social-login
A prototype for combining single sign-on using social networking services (Google, Facebook, and so on) with internal user management.

Tasks Accomplished:
• Developed a Flask REST API with endpoints for internal and external authentication plus user management.
• Built a React app with a login page, registration page, and landing pages for different roles (admin and user).
• Implemented internal authentication, authorization, and user management via flask-jwt-extended
• Implemented external authentication for Google using the google-auth library.
• Reconciled the two using flask-jwt-extended and by explicitly creating a JWT token and associating it with a new or existing internal.
• Built the REST API using Flask-RESTful and stored data using an SQLite database via Flask-SQLAlchemy.

OneSCM

https://www.onescm.com/
OneSCM is a SaaS-based supply chain orchestration platform that integrates with the existing IT infrastructure and supplier services to allow complete supply chain management from a single portal. It is a complex solution built on the .Net stack (ASP.NET MVC, WCF, EF, MS SQL) with a web-based UI. The product had recently been acquired by the company so the challenge was to ramp-up quickly and start making progress on the existing roadmap.

I led a team of senior .NET engineers and our job was to:
• Build a fully automated CICD pipeline.
• Write and/or update product documentation (functional specs, arch. docs, and so on).
• Fix open critical customer issues.
• Progress the development of high-interest product features.
• Deliver and release new versions as per the existing roadmap.

My additional responsibilities were to:
• Oversee a separate team writing unit tests for core modules.
• Coordinate the QA team in writing test scenarios and test cases.
• Manage a QA team in the creation of automated tests.
• Work with the maintenance team to fix critical issues quickly and efficiently.
• Collaborate with the SaaSOps team to plan and execute on deployments.

Toptal React Academy

The Toptal React Academy is an exclusive learning program that teaches the React framework to select members of the Toptal network. After a month of study, all graduates are tasked with completing a 30-40 hour final project to build and deliver a React app from scratch. The above is a walkthrough of my final project.

Languages

C#, Python, SQL, JavaScript, CSS, HTML

Frameworks

.NET, ASP.NET MVC, ASP.NET, ASP.NET Web API, ASP.NET Core, Windows Communication Framework (WCF), Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Flask, C4 Model, .NET 4, Bootstrap, AngularJS, Material UI, .NET Core

Tools

Visual Studio, G Suite, Jira, Postman, Slack, Zoom, GitHub, TFS, Jenkins, Amazon CloudFront CDN, NuGet

Paradigms

Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Scrum, Agile Software Development, Agile Project Management, Design Patterns, DevOps, Unit Testing, Agile, Desktop App Development

Platforms

Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Windows, Windows Server, Amazon EC2, Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Other

Back-end, Technical Writing, Source Code Review, Code Review, Microsoft 365, Software Design, Windows Services, APIs, Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Web Services, Writing & Editing, Team Management, Architecture, Reading, Active Listening, Public Speaking, Web Development, Leadership, Desktop App Design, Full-stack, Authorization, Technical Hiring, Task Analysis, Interviewing, CI/CD Pipelines, Algorithms, Semantic UI, Requirements & Specifications, Enterprise Architecture, Documentation, Software Architecture, Data Structures, IIS, Task Management, Workflow, Team Leadership, Time Management, Scrum Master, Intuit QuickBooks, Optimization, SaaS Operations (SaaSOps)

Libraries/APIs

REST APIs, Windows Forms (WinForms), Entity Framework, Flask-RESTful, React, SQLAlchemy, LINQ, QuickBooks API, Node.js, Vue

Storage

Microsoft SQL Server, JSON, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), SQL Server 2016, SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS), SQLite, Amazon S3 (AWS S3)

Industry Expertise

Project Management

2001 - 2006

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science

Politehnica University Timisoara - Timisoara, Romania

OCTOBER 2021 - OCTOBER 2022

English Level C1

TrackTest | shorturl.at/xAFK7

DECEMBER 2020 - PRESENT

Toptal React Academy Graduate

Toptal, LLC

SEPTEMBER 2020 - PRESENT

Python (Intermediate) Certificate

HackerRank — https://www.hackerrank.com/certificates/6d31e3f66043

MAY 2020 - PRESENT

Problem Solving (Basic) Certificate

HackerRank — https://www.hackerrank.com/certificates/b4508f5ab54b

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