Zachary Halbrecht

* Happily employed full time, not currently seeking

10 Hanover Sq., Apt. 16C
New York, NY 10005
Phone: 646-436-5587
Email: zhalbrecht@gmail.com

Objective:

To become a member of a small team focused on designing, creating and supporting high visibility Web applications that work cross-platform, cross-browser, and adhere to sound design principles using current technology

Experience:

Software Developer, StreetEasy.com, New York, NY
September 2008 - Present
  • Implemented new features for StreetEasy.com taking ideas from conception to completion using Ruby on Rails and JavaScript
  • Managed cluster of Amazon EC2 instances allowing for easy provisioning of new servers to accommodate steadily growing traffic [quantcast stats]
  • Acted as technical liaison providing analysis to management, clients, and partners for designing solutions and estimating project schedules
  • Analyzed and fixed performance issues throughout the application. Added indexes to appropriate database tables, debugged memory leaks in long running batch jobs, and cached expensive page components using memcached
  • Wrote and maintained hundreds of web scrapers in Ruby to acquire, validate, and republish data from external sources
Lead Rails Developer/President, Shiny Metal Assets, Inc., New York, NY
February 2007 - March 2008
  • Designed and developed a Web 2.0 RSS aggregator (ajarr personal portal) using Ruby on Rails, MySQL and JavaScript
  • Co-founded a company to help orchestrate sale of software and intellectual property related to Ajarr [press release]
  • Engaged with designers and product manager to add new features to Ajarr including a feed creator and administrative reporting, further solidifying the product and eventually rereleasing it as Flywheel via TalkPoint Communications, Inc. [Flywheel]
Senior Director, IT, International Institute for Learning, Inc., New York, NY
January 2007 - September 2008
  • Constantly managed numerous projects often leading teams in designing solutions, instilling software/web development best practices and troubleshooting issues during development efforts
  • Developed build and deployment processes using NAnt to manage Web site and product releases - in one case reducing the build/packaging/distribution cycle from several days to several minutes
  • Deployed Mantis bug tracking software and trained staff in its use to document and report on outstanding issues across all IT initiatives
  • Performed migration of numerous key resources from unsatisfactory, disparate hosting environments into secure, fault-tolerant data centers
    • Services migrated include: SharePoint Services 2003 implementation, iil.com Web site, web-based products, and Centra, IIL's platform for delivering live eLearning courses
  • Led team of three engineers during deployment of Exchange Server 2007 for 15 locations throughout the world
  • Diagnosed performance issues and implemented fixes for PHP/postNuke based community Web site allPM.com
Senior Programmer/Analyst, International Institute for Learning, Inc., New York, NY
August 2002 - December 2006
  • Architechted a CMS used to deliver project management methodologies and best practices
    • Included development of a process diagram editor in C# which published user created diagrams to server in a subset of the SVG format
    • Creation of ASP.NET 2.0 component to render SVG-based diagram definitions into JPG images able to be displayed in a web browser without the use of non-standard plugins
  • Developed templating system for iil.com using ASP (VBScript) allowing marketing team to make sweeping, site-wide design changes by modifying a small number of HTML and CSS files
  • Modified off the shelf E-Commerce software to meet requirements for selling and fulfilling event registrations and scheduling
    • To date this registration system has processed more than 50 million USD in course and product sales by customers and salespeople since its deployment in 2002
  • Installed, configured and managed a multi-user Subversion implementation to protect and organize source code on a company wide basis
Web Developer, GlobalinX Corporation, Morristown, NJ
September 1999 - June 2002
  • Developed Classic ASP (VBScript) web applications including a HR portal used by job candidates to submit resumes and by internal staff to manage the application process
  • Directed and published promotional websites using Flash
Lead Guitarist, Blu Velvet, New York, NY
September 1999 - May 2000
  • Played guitar for band co-writing music and performing at venues in New York City
  • Helped design and maintain a Web site to market ourselves to a larger audience
IT Intern, Obik, LLC, Princeton, NJ
June - August, 1999 - 2000
  • Acted as technology consultant researching software suites and hardware, and assisting colleagues with technical issues
  • Beta tested products and debugged VBScript code

Education:

Rutgers University/Rutgers College, New Brunswick, NJ
BS Computer Science, Minor Music

Proficiency Summary:

Programming Languages:
Web Development Frameworks:
Database and Data: