Tom's World

About Tom

Software Engineer with over 10 years of experience checking in! Currently serving as Backend Technical Lead (Staff level) at mod.io — the cross-platform modding solution used by studios and players worldwide.

Leading a team of developers across codebases ranging from monolithic to microservice-based. Designed and delivered major greenfield projects, including a multisided marketplace for purchasing and selling user-generated content. Built new core features and functionality to handle large-scale traffic.

Defined and rolled out a new software development lifecycle process, mentored and upskilled developers, and migrated key cloud infrastructure with the cloud team to produce major cost savings.

Got a drive to keep learning and love finding new ways to solve problems. Never shy away from new tools and technologies. Strong ability to initiate, plan, and see a goal through to completion. Can comfortably adapt to any tech stack with ease. Completed a Bachelor's Degree in Information Technology in 2016.

Skills & Interests

Stacked with a full arsenal of web tech. Here's what's in the toolbox:

• PHP — Laravel Framework
• JS — TypeScript, ECMA and Node
• Frontend — Vue, SCSS, HTML5
• SQL & NoSQL — MySQL, Postgres, MariaDB, DynamoDB
• Cloud — AWS
• Testing — Unit, Integration, Functional (PHPUnit, Jest, Postman Automation)
• Automation — GitHub Actions, CodePipeline, release-please
• Containers — Docker, ECS, ECR
• API Docs — Swagger
• Standards — PHPStan, CS Fixer, ESLint
• Observability + OTel — Sentry, Grafana, Cloudflare
• Principles — SOLID and Design Patterns
• Additional Languages — C#, Python, Java and GoLang
• Protocols — REST, SOAP and GraphQL

Monday 18/1/2021: Backend Software Engineer to Backend Technical Lead — mod.io

Promoted from Backend Software Engineer to Backend Technical Lead at mod.io, the cross-platform mod support service used by studios and players worldwide. Led the backend engineering team, driving architecture decisions, system design, and technical direction for the platform's API and infrastructure.

Responsibilities included mentoring engineers, conducting code reviews, coordinating cross-team technical efforts, and ensuring the backend scaled to handle billions of API requests. Worked closely with product and frontend teams to ship features that powered mod support across PC and console titles.

Monday 2/9/2019: Mercato Group (Under the Direction of Big Red Group)

Designed and developed a Digital Signage platform — full CRUD Laravel API, Vue front-end with Vuex and Vuetify, NativeScript app for Android and iOS, and an Electron app for Windows and Linux. The whole lot deployed to AWS.

Monday 6/11/2017: Big Red Group

Shipped a ton of campaign websites and projects across a wild range of tech. Built large-scale websites with Laravel, Nova, Vue and Vuex. With the team developed a HTML5 game for a large supermarket chain with a Vue front-end and Laravel API scoreboard. Maintained and managed a large car manufacturer's website on Drupal. Built a chatbot proof of concept for a large telecom using Firebase, Dialogflow and Facebook. Created a VR store preview with Unity and Laravel. Wrote a dynamic EDM generator in Node. Also designed and developed a framework for rapid development of dynamic banner ads using Node and TypeScript.

Thursday 1/1/2015: Quantum Code (Co-Founder, 2 Years)

Co-founded Quantum Code and hit the ground running. Built websites and themes for WordPress and Joomla. Handled client meetings, quoting, tenders and sales. Maintained and managed on-site servers for select clients.

Monday 2/7/2012: University of South Australia (Mid 2012 — 2016)

Bachelor of Information Technology (Games and Entertainment). Where it all began!