Dev - Sam Webster Harris

I am a full-stack developer who likes building things.

I make pretty great sand-castles and dubious rafts, but I really excel at making damns. When I’m not near water building real things, I also enjoy writing code and talking about things that are completely off-topic as if I seriously think it is actually the matter at hand.

This page is just me flaunting my wares to some cool cats doing anything awesome and need an extra developer to help make stuff happen.

If you’re just a normal person looking to read blogs from a millennial who doesn’t know what he is doing I need to sadly inform you that you’re in the wrong place, you should see my blog.

Well whoever you may be, you are most welcome.

Technologies

Experienced in:

React, React Native, Electron, Redux, Express, Javascript, Node, Mongo, PostgreSQL, testing (JEST, Cypress, Tape, +others…)

Dabbling in:

Elixir, Phoenix, Docker, Python, Networking, Solidity

Excited by:

TypeScript, Elm, GraphQL, ML, Kubernetes

Experience

Buzzhire – Front End Developer

I spent 3 months working as the only Front-end Dev for Buzzhire moving their codebase into React. I worked on their back-end admin dashboard and their new web app.

Buzzhire is essentially an uber for temporary staff. A modern temp agency.

Caidr – Developer and Team Lead

I lead the tech team with two other developers building Caidr, an AI doctor mobile app. We used React Native to release both iOS and Android and created a back-end dashboard for doctors to amend the content without requiring an app store update.

We also implemented different languages with a requirement to have the app available in Arabic. That was tedious but worth it. The app has had over 100k downloads.

Crowd Emotion – Product Manager

I was not a coder when I worked at Crowd Emotion, though I did dabble in python and SQL occasionally. I was the only product manager working closely with the CEO and CTO as well as all the relevant stakeholders.

It seems worth mentioning that I understand the needs of a business and why priorities might not match the things I most want to spend time coding. I learnt a lot managing the agile scrum process along with a bunch of customers who all wanted different things as well as a CEO, CTO and coding team who all had their own ideas as well. Let’s just say I have empathy for anyone telling me what to do because I’ve been there.

Crowd Emotion is a platform for detecting human emotions as they engage with media. This is used to show creators what they are doing right and wrong and how to get better reactions from their viewers. Our biggest client was the BBC and we worked out of the BBC worldwide office which was fun.

Founders and Coders – Graduate and Teacher

Founders and Coders is a Full-stack Javascript Bootcamp that focuses on peer-led learning. Students learn by doing and work in pairs through workshop challenges each week before building a project in the new thing they’ve learnt in the second half of the week. The final month the students build a tech for good project with a charity partner.

I had the pleasure of studying half the course in Nazareth and half in London, experiencing the best of both worlds. I have since taught and mentored for subsequent cohorts.

In my humble opinion, it is the best Bootcamp on the planet. They don’t charge fee’s and take a recruiting fee once you get a job, so it’s in their interest to create awesome coders.

Fun Projects

Name The Face

Ever found yourself in a new group of people and struggling to remember everyone’s name? I made an app to help learn the names of groups of people.

Currently, it uses the Github API to get profiles of people in a given github group so you are limited to learning names of other developers. At some point, I might make it more multipurpose…

SyncKick (WIP)

An app to let you listen to audio (podcasts, music, books) at the exact same time as other users of the app. Want to talk to people about the podcasts and books you listen to? You can if you are in sync with each other =]

Initial prototype in Express, Handlebars and PSQL just to prove points of listening in sync. Currently working on building a full version with an Elixir/Phoenix backend with dedicated Android and iOS apps using Kotlin and Swift.

Arbitrage Bot

A bot that is integrated into various crypto exchanges and scans for arbitrage opportunities. It lets you sell on one exchange and buy on another to make the most of currency value disparities.

Note
– Do not try to use this. Backtesting proved it was really good at losing lots of money
– I also dabbled with an AI trader that analysed market sentiment to make trades, backtesting proved it was even better at losing money. (so glad historical data exists )
– I then built a basic Ethereum wallet with Solidity which thankfully hasn’t lost any money

How to make money from Crypto Arbitrage | executium ...

Live Discussion Board

I wanted to learn Elixir and Phoenix to better understand Functional Programming and Websockets.

I built an app with user login and a PSQL database which was a bit different to implement in Phoenix compared to anything I have done in Node.

The app lets users create topics and edit them. I used WebSockets so users can comment on a discussion in real-time without anyone needing to refresh the page so you can have live discussions.

Hackathon Wins

Hackleague – Emotional Betting

The challenge. Build a bot that can play poker against an opponent. Take in face data to determine the opponent’s emotions and then change your strategy based on what the opponent is thinking.

My partner and I built a bot that made 40% more money in the game than anyone else in the time limit.

InnoApps – Smart Cities

I got to the final of this hackathon and sadly had my partner dropped out. I was the only solo contestant but I managed to come third in this prestigious hackathon and win a nice €5000 (and a not so nice Huawei phone ).

My app helped people find immediate care in emergencies from other locals with the relevant skills / equipment. e.g. someone suffering an asthma attack could be helped by a neighbour with an inhaler.

The idea came about after I nearly killed my flatmate with a cashew nut allergy and had to wait a long time for an ambulance. I realised there must be 5000 people within 200 metres of me and thus a good 200 Epipens sitting around not being used, yet I might be about to watch my friend die. It seemed illogical.

EYIF, in partnership with HUAWEI, launches the 3rd edition ...

Hack the Press

Technically there were no official winners as it was just a collaborative weekend to try and get ideas off the ground. However, both my projects were the only ones taken forward after the weekend. So with a glass half full approach, you might say I won twice

Commentative – App to let you share articles with select friends and have your own private comments. So basically you can share notes and ideas on the news you read.

SyncKick – The idea I mentioned earlier about listening to things in sync with people so you don’t live in your own little silo.