Software engineer · Builder · Occasional writer
I make software feel thoughtful.
I’m Alejandro Barrientos. I create thoughtful software and practical systems for people navigating complicated work.
Finding Change
Exploring brute force and greedy solutions to finding the minimum number of coins that add up to a specific sum.
4 min readTime to Go
Learning Go through a small object mapper, testing tools, dependency management, and Docker deployments.
3 min readTools of the Trade
Why knowing your editor and its shortcuts matters more than picking a side in an IDE debate.
2 min readTime Tested
Making time-based business logic testable with a TimeService interface and the Tock test clock.
5 min readDo You AWS
Learning AWS networking and automating a minimal VPC setup with Ansible.
4 min readAbout
I like solving hard problems in ways that feel straightforward.
I'm a software engineer with a strong drive to create quality software that is ready for production. I enjoy leading highly motivated teams that love to move quickly and challenge my skills.
My background spans large corporations and small startups, balancing enterprise design with startup scale, cost, and delivery. My work has focused on backend engineering, with interests in frontend development, AWS automation, deployment pipelines, and software process.
I believe the most productive teams communicate well and share knowledge quickly. I want to help create teams where I can learn from others and teach what I know.
Experience
Enterprise craft.
Startup instincts.
The journeyStaff Software EngineerIntuitMay 2018
Helping modernize a codebase used by millions of people, bringing enterprise experience to a large production system.
Technical LeadZeeto.ioSeptember 2016 — May 2018
Joined a team rewriting a legacy system and helped junior engineers build enterprise-quality software with a lean, agile approach. Worked with Node, React, Spring Boot, AWS containers, and Kafka streaming applications.
Director, EngineeringGimbal, Inc.May 2014 — September 2016
Helped build a context-aware platform following its divestiture from Qualcomm. Rebuilt services infrastructure in AWS for cost efficiency and scale, and helped grow an engineering team supporting tens of millions of active users per month.
Staff EngineerQualcomm — QLabsJanuary 2013 — May 2014
Worked on Fyx, a Bluetooth proximity project that merged with Gimbal's geofencing platform. Developed Java backend services, Ruby on Rails services, and Android and iOS SDKs and applications in a small agile team.
Senior EngineerQualcomm — QISJanuary 2007 — January 2013
Worked on the QChat engineering team, building software for sub-second VoIP calls and highly available distributed systems. Learned to maintain availability during large rolling deployments across geographically redundant locations.
ProgrammerThe Scripps Research InstituteMarch 2005 — December 2006
Maintained and developed in-house EEG software while in college. Worked with a Java Swing interface and a JNI library integrating MATLAB analytics, and learned the value of early user feedback on interface design.
Education
UC San Diego
B.S. Computer Science, Cum Laude
Sixth College · September 2003–December 2006 · Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi honor societies
Stanford University on Coursera
Machine Learning certificate
December 2017–February 2018 · Certificate earned February 11, 2018