Tom

Dowdell

software solutions architect

full-stack + product life-cycle expertise

adaw6w@r.postjobfree.com

Mercer Island, WA

206-***-****

2019i

Team-Oriented

Strong Technical & Leadership Skills

Passionate about User Experience

Very Creative Thinker

History of Creating Solid Products

Excellent Communication Skills

■ timeline

■ skills

languages

C#

platforms

.NET + WPF

C++

Windows

Java

Android

Objective-C

iOS

JavaScript

tools

Visio + UML

web

REST + JSON + WCF

Photoshop + GIMP

ASP.NET MVC

Unity 3D

HTML + CSS

general

UI + UX + MVC + MVVM

Bootstrap + jQuery

Web Services

databases

SQL Server

Reactive Extensions (rx)

cloud

Azure

Agile + CI/CD

Testing

TDD

GIT + TFS

■ education BS in Computer Science Nicholls State University, Louisiana

2016 - Present

Founder Lesarde

MEI Consulting

July 2019 – Present

Micro Encoder (MEI) needed a senior .NET developer with WPF expertise to help develop new software to run their metrology measurement machines.

Highlights

● Performed at a high level by second week.

● Quickly identified major issues and refactored.

● Asked if I would consider joining as full-time employee.

Frogui Framework

April 2018 –

April 2019

Identified a unique market opportunity in the emerging web 3.0. Created a UI framework to supplement Microsoft’s efforts to bring C# and .NET natively to the browser via WebAssembly. Learn more about Frogui and see live demo at https://www.lesarde.com/frogui/.

Highlights

● Reached alpha April 2019.

● Feature-competitive with Angular and React.

● Promotion over past year on Reddit yielded 88% upvotes.

● Uses Microsoft Xamarin team’s Mono for WebAssembly which enables true native .NET execution within browsers.

● Developed in C#, HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

● Creates WebAssembly and Windows (server-side, SignalR) apps.

● Includes 100+ classes, data-binding, dependency object, XAML, visual states, lookless controls, styles + themes, routed events.

Studio IDE

2016 - 2017

Designed a complete development ecosystem, including custom language, to tame the complexities of full-stack development. Goal was to replace dozens of technologies required for full-stack projects. Put this project on hold prior to completion to pursue the project described above, Frogui.

Language

Highlights

● Strongly-typed, object-oriented, imperative and declarative.

● Necessary to bind full-stack components together.

● https://www.lesarde.com/frog-language-guide.

Market Research

● Gave presentations at programmer user group meetings.

● Used Customer Development marketing techniques which included extensive developer interviews to understand need.

Development

● Developed in C#/WPF and custom language.

● Included a full graphical Frog language editor.

● Expression parser for syntax highlighting + Intellisense.

2014 - 2015

Principle Software Solutions Architect VMC

I was brought in to rebuild a software solutions department from scratch by an executive attempting to rebuild the entire company culture. The company, as a quick Glassdoor googling would show, was long overdue for improvements to keep up with the competition.

My predecessors were incurring extreme financial net losses on projects and had significant team morale problems.

Team Mazama

Management

● Provided weekly project status reports to executive team.

● Reviewed hundreds of resumes and interviewed many for development, testing, UX and technical writing positions. Built a team of a dozen members, including several from within the organization.

● Literally always had an open door for team members to discuss their career goals, ideas and problems.

● After several months of missteps and learning, found creative ways to build a culture of trust and enthusiasm; team morale was high, and we were very productive.

● VMC experienced an unexpected major economic loss that resulted in young, not-yet-profitable teams being cut, including ours. Team members wanted to stick together with me as manager for outside opportunities.

Architecture

Architected a full-stack system for VMC’s most profitable team.

● SQL Azure databases consisted of 60+ tables. Used UML design tools to simplify process.

● Azure web services were created on the backend using two-factor authentication.

● Clients were written in C#/WPF and JavaScript / HTML5 / CSS / jQuery / Bootstrap.

Mentoring

● Mentored all team members, instilling a philosophy of efficient design.

● Very exciting seeing two young developers with little or no coding experience become very productive after several months.

2010 - 2014

Senior SDE Microsoft Xbox contract

Worked with Xbox Live enforcement team as senior UI/UX engineer. Created a visually stunning, game-like Silverlight client application, Vulcan. Four years of outstanding reviews.

Vulcan Project

Silverlight Development

● Created Silverlight client using advanced UI techniques.

● Praised by management, still running 24x7 today.

● https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5-YWjA1b8E&t=171s.

UX and Design

● Project required strong UX, design and art skills since it is intended for users more tuned to Xbox games than Windows.

● Worked closely with end users to ensure needs were met.

● Communicates with backend via RESTful calls.

● Architected part of backend services using ASP.NET, REST and SQL Server.

Web Application

● Uses HTML5, JavaScript, ASP.NET MVC, C#, REST and JSON.

● Communicates with backend via RESTful calls.

Agile

All development done in agile sprints.

2010

Owner Lizardtap

Started Lizardtap, a company dedicated to creating mobile apps for Android and Apple’s iOS.

Cartoon App

Overview

● Service-oriented application.

● Entertainment app for iOS and Android.

● Forced to abandon due to year-long family matter.

Development

● iOS Client Used Xcode, Objective-C and Cocoa Touch.

● Android Client Used Eclipse, Java and Android SDK.

● Service Layer WCF/JSON; Database SQL Server on Azure.

Hoops App

Overview

● 5-on-5 2.5D real-time basketball game.

● Sold for over four years in Android Marketplace.

● Not a very fun game but I learned a lot.

Development

● Eclipse, Java and Android SDK.

● Touch and AI to control players, designed custom game engine.

● Multiple threads are used to keep frame rates high.

2009

Senior SDE Microsoft Automotive contract

The position leveraged my deep framework and UI design skills. I quickly won the respect of the senior team members by using creative and efficient solutions for a user interface SDK for cars. Asked to interview for fulltime position.

SampleLib Demo

Development

● Create this library to simplify the creation of custom Silverlight user controls, bringing dependency properties to C++.

● Reduced the amount of C++ application code to 1/3 of original.

Projekt2 Framework

Development

● Projekt2 was designed by Icon Incar, a German firm who works with the likes of Audi and VW on interfaces.

● Developed three-project solution (Silverlight, Silverlight/C++, Silverlight/CE, shared XAML) on time.

Mentor

Mentored several junior developers.

2008

Senior SDE Microsoft Office contract

Contract with Microsoft Office team working on Office Starter 2010. Manager regularly mentioned that I “far exceeded our expectations for a contractor.” On my final review, was given 4s in every category (on a 5-point scale). Was honored with the crown jewel development effort. Asked to interview for fulltime position.

Ad-Supported Office

Ideation

● On sub-team composed of people from four disciplines: PM, design, test and development. Of the many ideas I introduced, it was suggested by team members that two of those ideas were potentially patentable.

● Proposed significant revisions for Microsoft adCenter’s SDK, a third party. The changes were accepted and implemented.

Mentoring

Mentored two developers.

Leadership

● Joined a months-old project team and quickly became a leader.

● Successfully improved team-inclusiveness.

● Strong working relationship with all team members.

1999 - 2006

Owner Intuitive Edge

Started Intuitive Edge, a company whose mission was creating C++ frameworks in UI, Database, Language and integration tools. Managed two employees.

Research

Graphics

● Visual tree manager.

● Tunneled and bubbled routed events.

● .NET-like properties that affected layout in real-time.

Database

● Optimizes storage container selection depending on row length, fixed or variable sized, indexing options.

● Out-performed Berkeley DB (MySQL file engine) by 20%.

● Up to 70 TB of storage per file).

● High-performance page-based collection storage for database.

Datatypes++ Framework

Development

● STL, MFC, ATL competitor created in C++.

● Extensive 3-tier model of collections (collection, container, allocator) – superior to STL design.

● Rich atomic datatypes (e.g. text, numerics).

Marketing

Formed partnerships with Microsoft and Borland and ran ad campaign.

Testing

Over 10,000 tests run on a variety of platforms (Win 95, 98, 2000).

1990 - 1996

SDE Lead Microsoft SQL Server

One of the original Microsoft SQL Server Developers. Started in test, promoted to development.

SQL Server

Testing

● Designed Microsoft’s first automated server-based UI test system.

● Lead a team of six engineers.

Development

● Sole developer for 4 of 5 client development frameworks.

● Annual Performance Review by SQL Server Group Manager:

“You write solid code and during the 6.0 timeframe, few regressions were introduced. You pay good attention to detail.”

“You are a strong bug basher – with good instincts and problem-solving abilities.”

“You are conscientious and are willing to do what it takes to meet your commitments.”

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