Pieter van Beek, Developer in Tavira, Portugal
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Pieter van Beek

Verified Expert  in Engineering

Ruby on Rails Developer

Location
Tavira, Portugal
Toptal Member Since
September 8, 2014

Pieter has 39 years of programming experience, including time spent as a software product manager. He is a challenger, an independent worker, and a team player as circumstances demand, and he boasts expertise and skill in a range of topics, including big data, cryptography, and machine learning.

Portfolio

Swift Medical Inc.
Ruby, JavaScript, React, PostgreSQL, Architecture, Snowflake, Apache Airflow...
City of Amsterdam
Azure, GitLab CI/CD, Kubernetes, Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Spark...
City of Amsterdam
Asynchronous Programming, Ansible, OpenStack, OpenID Connect (OIDC), GIS...

Experience

Availability

Full-time

Preferred Environment

Asynchronous Programming, High-performance Computing, Linux, Software Architecture, Applied Cryptography, Python, TypeScript, Clojure

The most amazing...

...thing I've invented and implemented is a platform for verifiably secure data exchange between dynamic groups of people at Lucipher.net.

Work Experience

Principal | Staff Engineer

2022 - 2022
Swift Medical Inc.
  • Drafted a new, distributed, functional microservice architecture.
  • Described the architecture and analyzed the performance of existing, mostly monolithic, main software components.
  • Created support among lead developers for a target architecture that can be worked towards step by step.
Technologies: Ruby, JavaScript, React, PostgreSQL, Architecture, Snowflake, Apache Airflow, Kubernetes, CI/CD Pipelines, Eventual Consistency, Large Scale Distributed Systems, Apache Kafka, Fivetran, Software, Software Development, Project Management, SaaS, Digital Transformation, CTO, Startups, Node.js, TypeScript, PostGIS, Back-end, Technical Leadership, Cybersecurity, IT Security, HL7 FHIR Standard, Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR), Ruby on Rails (RoR), Vanilla JS, Git, Security, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Unix, Docker, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Distributed Computing, MacOS

Senior Developer | Architect

2020 - 2022
City of Amsterdam
  • Automated self-service provisioning of (cloud-) storage, Spark clusters, Kafka, and much more.
  • Maintained Kubernetes clusters through Rancher, as AKS in Azure, and manually.
  • Designed and deployed OIDC-based identity and access management (IAM) using 389ds (LDAP) and Keycloak. Integrated a large number of applications and services with this IAM.
Technologies: Azure, GitLab CI/CD, Kubernetes, Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Spark, Apache Airflow, Data-level Security, Aiohttp, Asynchronous Programming, Flask, REST, Rancher, Databricks, MinIO, LDAP, 389 Directory Server, Keycloak, OpenID Connect (OIDC), OAuth 2, REST APIs, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, SQL, Python, Unix, X.509, Architecture, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Django, Multithreading, Software, Software Development, Project Management, SaaS, Digital Transformation, Node.js, TypeScript, Geospatial Data, PostGIS, Back-end, Technical Leadership, Cybersecurity, IT Security, PKI, Vanilla JS, PostgreSQL, Git, Security, Redis, JavaScript, Docker, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Web of Trust, Distributed Computing, MacOS

Senior DevOps | Architect

2017 - 2020
City of Amsterdam
  • Built advanced, asynchronous, and high-performance RESTful APIs for publication of open data.
  • Designed and implemented federated identity and access management and single sign-on for an infrastructure of 20+ microservices, with seven identity providers crossing organizational boundaries using Keycloak.
  • Selected and provisioned API management tools for access management, versioning, and load balancing.
  • Built a web service plus Python command-line interface for pseudonymization of personal data to allow multiple organizations to exchange and combine datasets without compromising anonymity.
Technologies: Asynchronous Programming, Ansible, OpenStack, OpenID Connect (OIDC), GIS, Kubernetes, Docker, REST APIs, REST, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, SQL, Keycloak, Data-level Security, Python, Unix, X.509, LDAP, Architecture, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Django, Software, Software Development, SaaS, Digital Transformation, Startups, Early-stage Startups, Node.js, Geospatial Data, PostGIS, Back-end, Cybersecurity, IT Security, MongoDB, PKI, Vanilla JS, PostgreSQL, PHP, Git, Security, Redis, JavaScript, Jenkins, Apache Spark, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), MacOS

Interim CTO

2016 - 2016
MADS
  • Asserted business continuity by analyzing/debugging their systems and implementing basic service/asset management routines.
  • Analyzed software and services, documented the architecture, and planned the most urgently needed upgrades and refactoring.
  • Estimated staffing needs for the next two years and defended this estimation to the board. Then, selected and recruited seven new employees.
Technologies: REST APIs, REST, Linux, APIs, Unix, Architecture, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Software, Software Development, Project Management, SaaS, Startups, Back-end, Technical Leadership, MongoDB, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Vanilla JS, PostgreSQL, PHP, Git, Security, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Redis, MySQL, Ruby, JavaScript, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), MacOS

Consultant

2015 - 2015
ASTRON
  • Designed a high-performance compute cluster that meets the computational requirements of the LOFAR International Radio Telescope.
  • Wrote the technical specifications document of a European public Request for Offer.
  • Took part in the selection committee that evaluated incoming tenders.
Technologies: High-performance Computing, Linux, Unix, Physics, Multithreading, Software, Software Development, C, NVIDIA CUDA, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Parallel Computing, MacOS

Senior Developer

2014 - 2015
Multinational Bank
  • Implemented continuous delivery (zero touch deployment) of Hortonworks Hadoop on a set of DTAP big data clusters, as part of the bank’s data lake strategy.
  • Modified and customized Hortonworks Hadoop to fit the bank's compliance requirements and deployment environment.
  • Customized Hadoop to interoperate with the bank's custom Identity and Access Management systems.
Technologies: Hadoop, Python, Jenkins, REST APIs, REST, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, Unix, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Software, Software Development, SaaS, Digital Transformation, Cybersecurity, IT Security, PKI, Git, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Distributed Computing

Co-founder and CTO

2013 - 2015
Lucipher.net
  • Co-founded the company and successfully applied for a Dutch high-tech stimulation grant.
  • Invented and implemented a new method for public key exchange.
  • Invented and implemented a provably and verifiably secure platform for data exchange within dynamic user groups. The method is to be used in group chat applications and electronic medical records, military, police, and intelligence agencies.
  • Followed the course “Cryptography I” at Stanford University and obtained a certificate of achievement.
  • Experimented with the latest homomorphic encryption schemes.
Technologies: iOS, Android, Encryption, OpenPGP, REST APIs, REST, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, SQL, Data-level Security, Python, Unix, X.509, Architecture, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Multithreading, Software, Software Development, Project Management, Startups, Early-stage Startups, Fundraising, Back-end, Cybersecurity, IT Security, PKI, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Vanilla JS, C++, PostgreSQL, PHP, Git, Security, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Ruby, JavaScript, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Web of Trust, MacOS

System Architect/DevOps

2013 - 2013
Vancis
  • Commissioned a 32-node RHEL cluster with PXE, kickstart, Xen, and Puppet.
  • Deployed Hortonworks’ HDP on a virtualized, multi-tenant compute cluster.
  • Helped design and implement virtualized network topology for multi-tenant compute cluster.
Technologies: LDAP, PXE, Xen, Hadoop, REST APIs, REST, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, Unix, Architecture, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Multithreading, Software, Software Development, SaaS, Startups, Technical Leadership, PKI, Git, Security, MySQL, VMware ESXi, OpenStack, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Web of Trust, Distributed Computing

Senior Advisor

2006 - 2013
SARA
  • Developed CoPub, a literature-based keyword enrichment tool for microarray data analysis.
  • Invented, oversaw the development of, and managed BeeHub, a peta-scale data storage and exchange for academic research.
  • Invented, oversaw the development of, and managed the GridAppsPortal, a web portal for efficiently running common large scale computations (e.g., BLAST) on the LHC Compute Grid with tens of thousands of compute nodes and petabytes of storage.
  • Advised and co-developed EsiBayes, a web portal for performing large-scale inverse modeling, machine learning, and parameter optimization on the Dutch Life Science Grid (LSG) and National Compute Cluster (LISA).
  • Ported a computationally intensive tomographic reconstruction algorithm from CPUs to GPUs (NVidia Tesla cards) with NVidia's CUDA and CuFFT toolkits.
Technologies: Storage, Grid Computing, Machine Learning, Big Data, High-performance Computing, REST APIs, REST, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, SQL, Python, Unix, X.509, Sequence Alignment, Bayesian Statistics, LDAP, Intel MKL, LAPACK, Sun Grid Engine, GPGPU, GPFS, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Physics, Multithreading, NVIDIA CUDA, Software, Software Development, Project Management, SaaS, Fundraising, Back-end, Technical Leadership, Cybersecurity, IT Security, MongoDB, Java, PKI, Ruby on Rails (RoR), Vanilla JS, C, C++, PostgreSQL, PHP, Git, Security, MPI, jQuery UI, Sencha Touch, MySQL, Ruby, JavaScript, Qt, OpenPGP, WebDAV, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Web of Trust, Distributed Computing, Parallel Computing, R, MATLAB, LISA

Owner

1997 - 2006
Q-factor
  • Built some of the first eCommerce websites for clients including a large Dutch bookstore chain.
  • Built an online, Flash-based game for the University of Amsterdam and a television broadcasting company (VPRO) that allowed academic economists to observe and experiment with human behavior in tit-for-tat games.
  • Built many high-performance computing applications for parallel compute clusters for clients including the University of Munich, Germany.
  • Conducted big data analysis for the Netherlands’ largest video rental store chain (Videoland) for targeted marketing purposes.
  • Built a system for administration and fiscal dispatching of car mileage logs for the city of Amsterdam in the Netherlands.
Technologies: Vectorization, eCommerce, REST APIs, REST, Public-key Cryptography, Linux, APIs, SQL, Unix, X.509, Software, Software Development, SaaS, Startups, Early-stage Startups, Back-end, Vanilla JS, C, C++, PostgreSQL, PHP, Security, MySQL, JavaScript, Qt, OpenPGP, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Web of Trust

Peta-scale HPC Cluster for Radio Telescope

In the context of a European public request for offer (RFO), I wrote the technical specifications document. This required designing multiple 4-petabyte and 50,000 SpecInt rate high-performance compute and storage clusters with various commodity hardware setups.

Lucid

Invented and implemented a provably and verifiably secure method for exchanging data within dynamic user groups wherein all users can invite new users. The method is to be used in group chat applications and electronic medical records, and also in military, police, and intelligence communities.

Multi-tenant Hadoop as a Service

Designed and helped implement a multi-tenant Hadoop hardware and software infrastructure for Vancis, an internet service provider. The infrastructure used Xen and VMWare for hardware virtualization, Hortonworks, and EMC’s Pivotal solution for long-term storage of cool data.

BeeHub

A peta-scale data storage and exchange for academic researchers.

Rackful

http://pieterb.github.io/rackful/
Confronted with the task of implementing a RESTful web service in Ruby, I checked out the existing frameworks, but then decided to create my own since I couldn't find a framework with all of the following properties:

SMALL. Some of these frameworks are really big. If understanding the framework takes more time than writing my own, then that framework had better be more powerful than what I can come up with by myself.

NO EXTENSIVE TOOLING OR CODE GENERATION. With Ruby, you shouldn't need code generation.

FULL SUPPORT FOR HTTP/1.1 CONDITIONAL REQUESTS. Most libraries’ support is limited to "if-none-match" and "if-modified-since" headers, and only for GET and HEAD requests. For RESTful web services, the "if-match" and "if-unmodified-since" headers are at least as important, particularly for unsafe methods like PUT, POST, PATCH, and DELETE.

RESOURCE-CENTERED. Some libraries claim RESTfulness, but at the same time have a servlet-like interface, which lets you implement method handles like doPOST(URL), in which you have to find out what the resource is posted to, depending on the URL. This library lets you focus on your server–side resources and their representations.

Online Game

Built an online, Flash-based game for the University of Amsterdam and a television broadcasting company that allowed academic economists to observe and experiment with human behavior in cooperative games.

GridApps Portal

A web portal for efficiently running common large-scale computations (e.g., BLAST) on the LHC Compute Grid with tens of thousands of compute nodes and petabytes of storage.

EsiBayes

Co-developed a web portal for performing large-scale inverse modeling, machine learning, and parameter optimization on LSG and LISA.

OmniMatch

http://www.nwo.nl/onderzoek-en-resultaten/onderzoeksprojecten/76/2300140976.html.
Ported a computationally intensive tomographic reconstruction algorithm from CPUs to GPUs (Nvidia Tesla cards) with Nvidia's CUDA and cuFFT toolkits. This was while working at SARA, the Dutch National Supercomputer facility, in collaboration with the University of Utrecht, Netherlands.

CoPub

Co-developed a literature–based keyword enrichment tool for microarray data analysis.

Languages

Python, SQL, Ruby, JavaScript, C, PHP, LISA, Bash Script, C++, R, GraphQL, TypeScript, Clojure, Snowflake, Java

Frameworks

Vanilla JS, Sencha Touch, Apache Spark, Hadoop, Ext JS, Qt, Spark, Flask, OAuth 2, Django, Ruby on Rails (RoR)

Libraries/APIs

REST APIs, Node.js, BouncyCastle, jQuery UI, MPI, FFTW, LAPACK, OpenMP, BLAS, Intel MKL, React

Tools

Web of Trust, Git, Torque, GIS, Ansible, Jenkins, Sun Grid Engine, Sencha UI, MATLAB, GitLab CI/CD, Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Apache Airflow, Keycloak

Paradigms

Distributed Computing, Parallel Computing, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), High-performance Computing, REST, Metaprogramming, Dynamic Programming, Design Patterns, Asynchronous Programming, Functional Programming, GPGPU, Eventual Consistency, HL7 FHIR Standard, Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR), Parallel Programming

Platforms

Unix, Linux, MacOS, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Docker, Kubernetes, OpenStack, NVIDIA CUDA, iOS, Android, Xen, KVM, Azure, Rancher, Databricks, Apache Kafka

Industry Expertise

Cybersecurity, Project Management

Other

OpenID Connect (OIDC), X.509, Security, Public-key Cryptography, OpenPGP, WebDAV, Architecture, Software Architecture, Applied Cryptography, APIs, Identity & Access Management (IAM), Multithreading, Software, Software Development, SaaS, Back-end, IT Security, PKI, LDAP, Sequence Alignment, Petri net, Physics, Startups, Early-stage Startups, Grid Computing, Storage, Encryption, eCommerce, PXE, Machine Learning, Bayesian Statistics, Big Data, Vectorization, VMware ESXi, Game Theory, Cryptography, Algorithms, Data-level Security, Aiohttp, MinIO, 389 Directory Server, CI/CD Pipelines, Large Scale Distributed Systems, Fivetran, Digital Transformation, CTO, Fundraising, Geospatial Data, Technical Leadership

Storage

PostgreSQL, Redis, MySQL, CXFS, GPFS, TSM, HDFS, PostGIS, MongoDB

1993 - 1999

Bachelor’s Degree in BioMedical Sciences

University of Amsterdam - Amsterdam

SEPTEMBER 2016 - PRESENT

Algorithms: Design and Analysis, Part 1

Stanford University

FEBRUARY 2014 - PRESENT

Cryptography I

Stanford University

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