Resume
Aaron Sherman
Senior Systems Engineer and Tool Developer
89 Prospect St
Somerville, MA 02143
Email: ajs_ajs_com
WWW: http://web.ajs.com/
Status
Recruiter contact not solicited.
Areas of Expertise
Roles
- High level language programming and toolsmithing
- Revision control / release management
- Production Internet infrastructure management
- Manager of small teams of systems administrators/DBAs
- Security/capacity/contingency planning
- Web/database application performance analysis
Key Technologies
Languages:
Perl (v3-5, library/module design, Perl 6 development), Python (including sqlalchemy, django), Java, HTML and HTTP including RESTful APIs, XML, C, C++, SQL, Shell scripting
Systems Admin / Security:
Linux (RedHat/SuSE/Slackware), Android, MacOS and various flavors of UNIX
Applications Administration:
Subversion, git, Perforce, Bugzilla, Puppet, Apache and Nginx Web servers, Security/firewall tools including Linux iptables. Databases including Oracle, Sybase, MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQLite.
Extensive use and modification of: MediaWiki
Publications
- Contributor: "Web, Graphics & Perl/Tk: Best of the Perl Journal", ISBN 0-596-00311-0
- Author: Perl Journal article, "Image Manipulation with Perl and The GIMP"
- Contributor: "Perl Resource Kit: UNIX Edition", ISBN 1-56592-370-7
- Contributor: "Perl Resource Kit: Win32 Edition", ISBN 1-56592-409-6
- Contributor: "Programming Perl: 2nd Edition" ("The Camel Book"), ISBN 1-56592-149-6
- Author: Daemon News articles:
- The Very Long Night of FreeBSD (archived: The Very Long Night of FreeBSD) and
- The Penguin's Council (archived: The Penguin's Council)
- Author and/or Contributor:
- Modules included in the core Perl distribution
- Plug-ins (e.g. glowing steel, among others) included in the core Gimp distribution.
- Early work on Perl 6 Synopsis 29: Builtin Functions specification
Work History
Tech Undebt Consulting
Founder/Consultant
Ongoing
Personal consulting business, focused on technical debt elimination, especially with respect to legacy Perl and Python systems.
Cogo Labs
Senior Software Engineer
Mar 2012 - Aug 2018
Software toolsmith, focused on writing reporting-oriented tools for a user-base of Web analytics-focused internal users. Some git management duties coupled with Python-based UI and back-end design. Most work done using Linux and MacOS.
Transitioned to subsidiary startup, EverQuote.com, maintaining and expanding the reporting system that I had designed for them.
AJS.COM Consulting
Software Engineering Consultant
Oct 2011 - Mar 2012
A combination programmer, release engineer and source code control manager for a small team focused on rapid development of Web-based, open source CRM application customization. My duties focused on producing tools for managing unit tests as well as deployment and training of git, Review Board, MediaWiki and a number of other helpful development tools. I was also tasked with writing the process and documentation for new developers on the team and routine administration of the above.
Freelance Android App Developer
May 2011 - Sept 2011
Authoring and designing revenue models for self-developed Android handheld-device applications.
- A browser app for WikiMedia Commons Features Images and other media.
VMware, Inc.
Member of Technical Staff
May 2008 - April 2011
Member of the SCM team with responsibilities including
- infrastructure and tool development
- in-house application maintenance
- Perforce administration
- build infrastructure modularization
- C/C++ code component build analysis
Member of the build team with responsibilities including
- infrastructure tool development
- ongoing support
- reporting
- support of geographically diverse developer build environments
ITA Software, Inc.
Senior Systems Engineer / Toolsmith
April 2001 - May 2008
One of a team of systems engineers. ITA was a small startup when I arrived and has grown into a thriving medium-sized company. My day-to-day duities include:
- Toolsmithing in Perl, C++ and shell scripts (including monitoring, control programs, QA support software, etc)
- Linux systems and network administration
- Rotating on-call duties
- Systems security
- Internal application support including Big Brother and Bugzilla extensions
- Customer and vendor support
HighWired.com
Systems Architect
July 1999 - Feb 2001
A key role managing the production infrastructure team for a high-volume web site which included:
- Capacity planning
- Security and recovery planning.
- Database and content management performance analysis.
- Planning and deployment of systems infrastructure elements such as:
- load-balancing hardware, static-content Web servers,
- dynamic-content Web servers, firewalls, mass storage systems, etc.
Previous programming-oriented role in the company included:
- Wrote monitoring utilities.
- Implemented HTML-based spell-checking, 3D logo rendering, personalized mailing automation and partner content generation.
- Helped to estabish a development process.
- Mentored junior members of the development team.
- Extended/maintained Web applications.
Safety Net Solutions, Inc.
Senior Architect / Analyst
April 1997 - May 1999
Contract programming assignments.
Bank Boston (Now Bank of America)
UNIX Security Administrator
November 1996 - March 1997
Security administration as well as maintenance of the 3rd party security software. Wrote reporting scripts in perl for auditors; Provided technical input on the establishment of UNIX security standards; specified and evaluated network security products; managed change control process.
Independent Work
I also do a fair amount of programming on my own time. I am the author of a number of tools including plug-ins for The GIMP, modules in the core Perl distribution and a reporting system for the economy in the video game, Path of Exile (https://github.com/ajs/poefixer)
References
Provided upon request.
Copyright
This resume is copyright 2018 by Aaron Sherman.