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Ben Rothman

Full-Stack Developer

About

I am a detail-oriented developer with a focus on producing clean, modular, and—above all—maintainable code.

Experience

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    Software Engineer, 

     —    6 months

    Mountain View, CA (Remote)

    • Improved front-end workflow with tooling for easier cross-browser, responsive testing
    • Migrated legacy search and video transcoding services to reusable API
    • Front-end optimization, including reducing size of served Stylesheets by 30%
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    Software Engineering Co-op, 

     —    2 years

    Mountain View, CA (On Site)

    • Proposed and lead effort to overhaul front-end with modular, concise JS/CSS. Began migration to Bootstrap 3, Sass, Gulp and Browserify. Established code quality/style guidelines
    • Oversaw new interns’ contributions to Math Shack (JavaScript math tutoring system, began 2012). Enforced code quality standards and reviewed interns’ code for efficiency and clarity
    • Spotted bottlenecks in web stack by creating a load testing method with AWS micro-instances
    • Created a scalable, real-time data analytics dashboard with Node and Redis
    • Made Geometry exercise framework for student manipulation of 3D shapes in HTML5 Canvas
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    Research Assistant,  Applied Mathematics Department - Northwestern University

     —    2 months

    • Wrote automated 3D mesh generation software in MATLAB using layered scans of carotid artery

Projects

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    , Hobbie

     —    a month

    Real-time multiplayer game implemented using Meteor, React, and MongoDB

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    , Contributor to Open-Source Library

     —    3 months

    A Node-only Sass linter for both Sass and SCSS syntax

    • Added linting rules, with full test coverage, which promote maintainable stylesheets
    • Wrote tool for migrating linter settings from the popular Ruby SCSS linter
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    , Northwestern Delta Lab

     —    6 months

    • Research and development with a small team to create crowdsourced learning platform
    • Prototyped application that supports real-time CSS living-style-guide creation
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    , Slivka Residential College

     —    a year

    • Provided access to student's event attendance points, used to determine housing eligibility.
    • Utilized PHP, MySQL, Grunt (then Gulp), jQuery, Highcharts, DataTables, and more
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    , Northwestern University NUVention: Web

     —    6 months

    "Translating your relationships into gifts crafted with love." Giftique is a gift recommendation engine leveraging user input and social media platforms to deliver unique and thoughtful gifts. Part of NUvention:Web course through Northwestern's Farley Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

    • Built single page app in using Backbone.js + Marionette.js, with a Parse backend. The app incorporates Facebook authentication and utilizes Etsy's API to populate products
    • Used customer feedback, mentorship, and field experts to focus on product marketing, customer segmentation, and algorithm development
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    , Hobby

     —    6 months

    • Devoted in excess of 600 hours replicating all aspects of campus within video game
    • Printed results as 3D model which is now on display in the lobby of the largest building on campus

Education

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    Computer Science and Applied Mathematics, Bachelors of Science

     —    5 years

    Northwestern University, GPA: 3.6, Cum Laude

    • EECS450 - Internet Security
    • EECS354 - Network Penetration
    • EECS471 - NUVention: Web
    • EECS330 - HCI
    • EECS395 - Game Development
    • EECS339 - Intro to Databases
    • EECS340 - Intro to Networking
    • IEMS304 - Data Mining

Skills

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    Skills

    • Web Performance Optimization
    • JavaScript Design Patterns
    • Responsive Design
    • Progressive Enhancement
    • Cross-Browser Compatibility
    • Test-Driven Development
    • Continuous Integration
    • Agile Methodologies
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    Languages

    • JavaScript
    • ES6
    • Sass
    • CSS3
    • HTML5
    • PHP
    • SQL
    • Python
    • Git
    • Unix
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    Frameworks

    • Bootstrap
    • Backbone.js
    • Node.js + Express
    • Flask
    • Django
    • React
    • Meteor
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    JavaScript Libraries

    • jQuery
    • Gulp
    • Grunt
    • Browserify
    • RequireJS
    • Highcharts
    • DataTables
    • Raphael
    • Socket.io
    • PhantomJS
    • Typeahead.js
    • Lodash
    • Mocha
    • Chai
    • ESLint
    • Sass Lint (contributor)
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    Data Stores

    • MySQL
    • Redis
    • MongoDB
    • AWS

Publications

Interests

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    Hobbies

    • Musicals
    • Rubik's Cubes
    • Minecraft

References

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    Ben is an extremely talented and hardworking engineer who cares about the efficiency of the rest of the team and he is generous with his time. I've had the pleasure of working with Ben for 3 years and have seen him grow from a very skilled intern to a valuable full-time software engineer.

    Ben keeps up-to-date on changes to the landscape of software and passes on this knowledge to the rest of the team; we've learned to rely on him to be aware of what technologies to try when we're looking at building new products. Likewise, he's diligent at sharing best practices for dealing with existing code due to his meticulous nature and willingness to understand how things work under the hood.

    As an engineer, Ben's not limited to one particular part of the stack; he's someone who can change focus quickly when necessary in order to get things done. His dedication and workflow are things that inspire the best out of other engineers.

    Max Chen (Shmoop, 2015)
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    Ben has done great work with me as an undergraduate research assistant in summer 2011 in Northwestern. He is brilliant. I think, he is the smartest student I've ever worked with. He is creative, reliable, independent, and out-going. Hire him, and you won't have regrets!!!

    Yulia Peet (Northwestern, 2012)