Thijs van der Heijden, Developer in Utrecht, Netherlands
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Thijs van der Heijden

Verified Expert  in Engineering

Software Developer

Location
Utrecht, Netherlands
Toptal Member Since
December 2, 2021

Thijs is an experienced full-stack engineer who thrives on building robust and scalable software solutions. He prefers to build back ends in Go and front ends in React but will always choose another language or framework if better suited for the job at hand. Thijs has a lot of experience working in startups and enjoys the fast-paced environment.

Back-end DevelopmentBack-endSorting AlgorithmsJavaScriptGitCSSREST APIsTypeScriptJSONAgileGoReactAlgorithmsC#HaskellAMQPReal-Time Ray Tracing

Portfolio

GraphPolaris
Go, Docker, Kubernetes, REST, WebSockets, Redis, RabbitMQ, JSON, gRPC...
Swift Software
Go, React, Git, Web Services, REST, Tax Accounting, Redis, MongoDB, JavaScript...
MediaMonks
iOS, Jira, Scrum, Git, Swift, UIKit

Experience

REST - 4 yearsJSON - 4 yearsMongoDB - 3 yearsGo - 3 yearsMicroservices - 2 yearsRedis - 2 yearsDocker - 2 yearsKubernetes - 1 year

Availability

Part-time

Preferred Environment

Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Discord, Slack, Terminal, Mail, Vim Text Editor, SSH, DigitalOcean

The most amazing...

...thing I've ever built is the Time Spent on Netflix website. It amazed me how quickly I could turn an idea into a working product.

Work Experience

Lead Engineer | Full-stack Developer | Architecture

2021 - PRESENT
GraphPolaris
  • Developed the MVP for graph analytics and visualization startup.
  • Implemented full CI/CD pipelines in GitLab, including automatic testing and deployment.
  • Designed the high-level architecture of the tool, including data flow, RPC's, and message formats.
  • Worked on the front-end application built in React using TypeScript.
Technologies: Go, Docker, Kubernetes, REST, WebSockets, Redis, RabbitMQ, JSON, gRPC, Architecture, Microservices, Web Services, GitLab CI/CD, Git, Scrum, Jira, AMQP, Clean Architecture, Concurrency, APIs, Agile, Data Structures, Back-end, Back-end Development, REST APIs, React, TypeScript, JavaScript

Freelance Software Engineer

2018 - 2021
Swift Software
  • Developed many projects for clients, ranging from static websites to full-stack applications.
  • Built back ends using Go and front ends mainly in React.
  • Registered the company and did all accounting myself.
Technologies: Go, React, Git, Web Services, REST, Tax Accounting, Redis, MongoDB, JavaScript, TypeScript, REST APIs, MySQL

iOS Developer

2020 - 2020
MediaMonks
  • Worked on multiple large iOS apps, including the Tokyo Olympics app and the European Starbucks app.
  • Converted new application designs into UIKit code.
  • Wrote code to interface with Bluetooth hardware, designed in-house.
Technologies: iOS, Jira, Scrum, Git, Swift, UIKit

iOS Developer

2018 - 2019
StuComm
  • Worked on an iOS app used by every Dutch university to communicate with their students about timetable changes, new grades, and submission deadlines.
  • Tracked and fixed bugs using Jira as a reporting tool.
  • Oversaw the rollout of a new app design and helped process user feedback about it.
Technologies: iOS, Swift, UIKit, Scrum, Jira

Alice—AMQP Wrapper in Go

https://www.thijsheijden.nl/portfolio/alice
A Go-based wrapper of the AMQP package, adding more convenience with automatic reconnecting, automatic connection handling for consumers and producers, and much more. It was built entirely by me to be used in multiple microservices we were building at GraphPolaris.

Simple Ray Tracer

https://www.thijsheijden.nl/portfolio/raytracer
A purely Go ray tracer. I built following the 'Ray Tracer in a Weekend' book, with some Go twists. I also added multithreading using goroutines and channels, changed the code to be classless, and use interfaces and structs instead.

Search Algorithm Visualizer

https://www.thijsheijden.nl/portfolio/search-visualizer
A Go-based application that visualizes different search algorithms. It allows the user to draw a maze, add a start and endpoint, and see the algorithm search its way from start to end. It is built using the Gio UI graphics library, which allows for direct rendering.

Time Spent on Netflix

https://www.comparitech.com/tv-streaming/time-spent-streaming/
A React application that lets users see their Netflix viewing statistics. It was built using React, integrated with the open movie API to retrieve and calculate many relevant and fun statistics. It was bought by Comparitech a while later.

Fully-functional Pacman

https://www.thijsheijden.nl/portfolio/pacman
For a university project, we were required to build a game using Haskell, to apply the functional programming paradigm to a real-world application. I chose to build Pacman, a fairly simple game, but with some complex things like ghost AI, and complex map loading.

Languages

JavaScript, TypeScript, Go, HTML, CSS, C#, Haskell, SQL, Swift

Libraries/APIs

React, REST APIs, AMQP

Tools

Git, Jira, RabbitMQ, GitLab CI/CD, Slack, Terminal, Vim Text Editor

Paradigms

Scrum, Agile, Microservices, Clean Architecture, REST, Functional Programming

Storage

JSON, MongoDB, Redis, MySQL, PostgreSQL

Other

Teamwork, English, Concurrency, APIs, Back-end Development, Back-end, Sorting Algorithms, Architecture, Web Services, Data Structures, Algorithms, Statistics, Compilers, WebSockets, Tax Accounting, Discord, Mail, SSH, Gloss, Search Algorithms, Genetic Algorithms, Ray Tracing, Linear Algebra, Vectors

Platforms

Kubernetes, Docker, iOS, Visual Studio Code (VS Code), DigitalOcean

Frameworks

UIKit, gRPC

2018 - 2021

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science

Utrecht University - Utrecht, the Netherlands

SEPTEMBER 2017 - PRESENT

Cambridge English Level 3 Certificate in ESOL International (Advanced)*

University of Cambridge

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