Kumon

Kumon offer out-of-school classes, specialising in help with Maths and English. Their site and systems are used to offer services and arrange appointments across 60 countries and regions. I was contracted as part of a team specifically as a lead developer. This role entailed a complete reworking of their system, including vital data import and seamless transition for the business. This was a huge project with a similarly huge amount of features.

As lead developer I did the vast majority of the work within the project. In collaboration with managers and stakeholders, I designed a custom php/MySQL Laravel system from scratch. The system had a huge amount of features including: multi language support, appointment management, as well as a complex and comprehensive custom CMS. All of this was built within a reliable continuous integration/continuous delivery environment in Azure, meaning that agile and quick release processes were possible.

The system used Laravel, MySQL, jQuery as well as numerous other front-end plugins and systems. The appointment booking functionality and calendars were implemented using FullCalendar and TempusDominus. The entire admin area used Boootstrap and FontAwesome for styling. The CMS used elements such as Summernote. Data reporting used Datatables.

Temper

Temper are a short term work/recruitment agency from the Netherlands. They were launching into the UK market and needed lead developer cover as part of this project while they found a permanent lead developer.

The Temper system is a microservices driven architecture with many complex requirements. It is mainly based in Laravel, and uses many parts of software architecture. It offers features for matching users to clients, reporting for providers, multi-language support across multiple sites, and many other challenging technical solutions. This requires skills from all elements of a microservices environment, from queuing through to advanced database querying and reporting.

I also piloted several new approaches within the development team. I coached and assisted the Junior developers in my team, ensuring that best practices were adhered to and applied. The UK launch went successfully, and I handed over in early 2023.

Made for trade

Made for trade are a manufacturing company delivering Bifold Doors and Lantern windows. They needed a complete rework of an existing quote system with extended functionality. This was as part of a company move to a more digital approach with software team.

I designed and worked on a complete quote system. This a greenfield project initially built in Laravel but was extended to be a microservices installation that offered numerous features. Customer management, reporting, an API were all created. A front end that included 3D rendering and customer wizards was developed. While based on PHP and Laravel, it also included major work with MySQL, SQL Server, as well as in JSON API access and front-end 3D modelling using BabylonJS. All of this had to be built in a best-practice way that allowed to hand over the work for the planned new IT team. I developed the whole system from scratch, using an AGILE approach and Continuous Integration (via Travis), as well as documenting, handing over and training the new staff allowing a smooth transition.