Hi!

My name is Pat. I’m a Ruby developer from Rehoboth Beach, DE. I write practical code for startups, web firms, small businesses, and nonprofit organizations. I practice test-driven development and have a strong interest in object-oriented design. I’m available for hire!

Blog Posts

Thinking Programmatically

July 18, 2017

What makes someone a senior developer? Is it years of programming experience? Is it time spent mentoring less-experienced developers? Is it a knowledge of best practices and the ability to identify code that strays from them? It’s obviously some combination of the above, but it’s also the ability to think like a programmer.

MAKE RAILS CRUD AGAIN

July 6, 2017

Make Rails Crud Again

Routes in Ruby on Rails should rarely not be RESTful. Also, alliteration is always awesome!

Primitive Obsession Is Not a Cologne

July 4, 2017

Today, I’m pairing, but not the way you might expect. I’m pairing craft beer with craft code. The beer is Ithaca Brewing Company’s Creeker - a juicy, malty, bready double IPA that clocks in at 8.5% ABV and reminds me of a stronger version of Heavy Seas’s Loose Cannon. It smells great!

The code does not smell great. It’s an example of primitive obsession, which is, ironically, not a cologne. It’s a code smell that arises when primitives (e.g. strings, integers, etc.) are used in place of objects.

Tactical Design in Practice

June 9, 2017

To new designers or seasoned developers starting to think more about design, the SOLID principles can seem too academic and can be hard to remember. They apply mostly at the class level, whereas object-oriented programming usually occurs at the method...

My Work

Health Fair Connections

HFC is startup using Ruby on Rails to provide a marketplace and event management system for companies planning employee health fairs and vendors booking booths. I helped them with multi-step forms, automated testing, geocoding, background jobs, and integration with Stripe, Twilio, Mandrill, and AWS.

ComScript

ComScript is a C#.Net application that drives water testing systems via a custom XML-based language. It runs on Windows, Linux, and RaspberryPI. I built GUI and command-line apps that allow users to create and execute profiles to manage device connections, data logging, and I/O.

Washington Monthly

Washington Monthly is political magazine that has been on the web and in print for decades. I helped rebuild their website and import thousands of articles from their previous platform.

Find Me

Kettul

I co-run a programming/design team that partners with small businesses and startups to create websites and apps!

Ruby for Web Designers

I wrote a book for web designers and front-end developers who want to learn how to code.

learnruby

I post screenshots of Ruby code on Instagram to show new developers what Ruby can do.

Shoot me an email and tell me about your project. I'd love to help!

@elegantbrew

Find me on Twitter at @elegantbrew!

I'm less active on these platforms, but you can also find me on LinkedIn, Google+, Github, and BitBucket.