Welcome! I am a front-end web developer, specializing in responsive web development, HTML5, CSS3, jQuery and JavaScript. I also do some back-end work, including PHP, MySQL, and some database design. Additional skills include front-end frameworks such as Bootstrap and Foundation; jQuery Mobile and jQuery UI; Git and GitHub; Markdown; Ruby scripting; and some Ruby on Rails and AngularJS.
I am also a teacher of these skills, having worked as a college instructor of graphic design and web development for 13 years. I am seeking freelance or full-time work in front-end web development or instruction.
About
I began web work fifteen years ago, when I started making banner ads and screen logos in flash. I spent several years building old-school web pages, almost losing interest until responsive web design came along. Since then, I have been happily teaching and working on web projects, periodically taking on a new subject (there is always so much to learn!). At the moment I am beginning to learn how to build a RESTful API using Ruby and Sinatra; after that I will probably take on a MEAN stack or Web Components project.
There are quite a number of things I do besides web development, and web development may not be what you’re looking for. In that case, here are some redirects:
Projects
Dominique
Dominique is a tiny JavaScript library that makes DOM selection and manipulation more convenient, without noticeable performance overhead.
Dominique works directly with the natively-supported DOM API, but provides jQuery-like selectors to take the place of the awkward document.querySelector and document.querySelectorAll. In addition, Dominique provides a polyfill to allow users access to the ES2015 for...of loop; an easy way to create elements to take the place of document.createElement(); and four pluralizer methods to make DOM manipulation more convenient: .property(), .method(), .setAttributes(), and .styles(). The benefit of using Dominique over other libraries that may do similar things is that Dominique minifies to under a single kilobyte!
Featured skills: JavaScript DOM extension and object prototyping.
Lauch the Dominique readme and sample page, or access the source code on GitHub!
Mouse Knight
The Mouse Knight website was a client commission for an author, of which I designed and built the front end. In this author’s book, a mouse reads an old manuscript on knighthood and, inspired, sets out to become a knight himself. The design of the website is based around the idea of an illuminated manuscript, such as the mouse hero might have read in the story.
Featured skills: responsive design, mobile-first development, HTML5, CSS3.
Lauch the Mouse Knight website!
Sessile Lite
Sessile Lite is a CSS3 layout library, intended to become the integral part of a front-end framework named Sessile. The Sessile layout library relies heavily on CSS3 features such as calc measurements and the flex box model, so it doesn't play nice with some of the older browsers (I’m looking at you, Internet Explorer, but also slightly older versions of Safari); nevertheless it can work well when used in conjunction with a polyfill such as flexie.js. And if legacy browsers are not a major concern, I think there is much to recommend Sessile Lite. The files are tiny (the minified CSS files come in at less than 15K total – yes, total!); developers can choose their own break points for their responsive designs (unlike other layout libraries and front-end frameworks); designers are not confined to a 12-column grid (again, unlike other frameworks); and the requirement for non-semantic classes in the markup are kept to a bare minimum, keeping code relatively clean.
Featured skills: responsive design, modular CSS, CSS3 flexible box.
I think the best way to become acquainted with the library is to peruse the documentation. Or, go ahead and download the files from GitHub and try it out yourself!
Fun fact: I used the Sessile Lite library for the layout of this website!
Cutter Hays
This is a custom flat-file CMS for a professional artist and author. The client has a super-simple back end to upload images – including a title, description, and category – and a delete function to remove an uploaded image from the website.
Featured skills: PHP, JavaScript, jQuery, AJAX, JSON data, responsive design, CSS3.
Lauch the Cutter Hays website! (This is a locally-stored version. To log into the back end and explore the simple functionality of the CMS, get in touch with me for login instructions.)
Syllabus Templater
A college for which I teach web development had a problem with their syllabi: updates to the formatting and verbage were made frequently, and it was difficult to get all instructors to update their syllabi consistently each quarter. I came up with the solution for a web interface where faculty could enter just a few key pieces of course data, and have the rest of the corresponding data retrieved from a database. The Word document is created and downloaded using a PHP library called PHPWord. All syllabi can be updated consistently each quarter, since any changes can be simply added to the PHP script.
Featured skills: PHP, PHPWord library, MySQL, database design, jQuery, jQuery UI, responsive design, CSS3.
Lauch the Syllabus Templater!
