profile
  • Taylor Ackley
  • Redmond, WA
Taylor aims to improve everyday and to "Learn, practice, teach".

Considered a hands on professional who likes to get things done, he has a background in mission critical and high-pressure environments that has taught him to be detailed oriented, work in a team-first culture and how to think outside of the box to solve challenges.

What is unique about you?

If I had to choose just one thing, I would zero in on my ability to understand the spirit of vague requests and translate that back to both the internal and external stakeholders in a way everyone can understand, both technical and non-technical.

If you were a car brand, what would you be and why?

Toyota. Ultimate reliability with no shortcuts on quality. Toyota also has a reputation for practicality and attention to detail, something I can relate too. It may not be the flashiest on the inside, but they make sure to place everything right where you need it.

How do you make Software design decisions?

That's easy. Look at your data. What is it telling you? Are your users on mobile, desktop or tablet? What are your event's telling you, do they say your users are getting stuck on a certain page in the flow? Listening to the data you have available to you is the easiest way to make sure you're investing in the right place.

What is your claim to fame?

I wouldn't exactly call it fame, but way back before CodeAcademy existed... there was HTMLGoodies. I had started learning HTML in 1997 and primarily used FrontPage. Discovering HTMLGoodies helped me make the transition to manual HTML instead of WSYWIG. I wrote the author to let him know how appreciative I was and he was kind enough to acknowledge me in his book.

Somehow I also ended up in a heating and a/c company commercial, but we don't talk about that :)

How do I get started in computer forensics?

First, computer forensics is nothing like what you see on TV, or all trial technology for that matter (Looking at you Bull). Computer Forensics can be divided into two camps, Civil and Criminal. I can't speak for the latter, but for the short while I was in the field, it was extremely challenging and I loved every minute of it. Each collection brings new and unique challenges that will take your technical and preparation skills to the max. I was primarily involved with the processing and facilitating of collections, though I did do one or two myself. To get started in computer forensics, your best bet is to start out as an analyst at a e-discovery company. To advance and get far in the field, it will help if you have all of your Cisco and MCSE Certifications. The UW also has a certificate program. Good Luck!

Do you have a favorite website?

I have a certain affinity towards Quora. The variety of information and quality of the answers makes it easy to find answers to questions you never thought to ask. I also admire Unsplash. They offer free do whatever you want stock photographs that are extremely high quality. They make sure great hero background images, but I find myself browsing the images endlessly and simply admiring the beautiful photos.

I heard you have a weird response to the question "What is your weakness?" Is that true?

What is this, a job interview!?! All kidding aside, I happen to think this is a very interesting question that yields interesting responses. Many people try and spin a supposed strength as a weakness, for example "I am too detail oriented!" While that can be a sort of weakness since worrying about only details can mean a project never gets off the ground, it's not really the point of the question. Really, the answer is much more simpler than most people want to believe. We all have skill deficits, for example I have awful handwriting, but thats doesn't really the answer the question either. The truth is, we all have the same weakness, we're human. We make mistakes, we misjudge, we fall down. It's what you do about the mistakes that matter, learn from them and move on.

I haven't failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work. Thomas Edison

Motto

"Quality without compromise in everything I do"

Creed

"No excuses, just solutions"

Certificates

  • M101P: MongoDB for Python Developers. February 2015.
  • Google Analytics (GAIQ). October 2014 to May 2016 (Expired)
  • Relativity Certified Sales Professional. March 2013 to April 2014 (Expired)

Projects

Scormify.io

After identifying a gap in our product offerings, I demonstrated intraprenuership and endevoured to fill the gap by creating Scormify.io in my spare time. Built using the MEAN stack with a intelligent build system and hosted on Heroku, Scormify is designed to be a quick and simple way to create beautiful, response SCORM courses from streaming videos and documents.

WeatherApp

As a means to experiment with presenting data in different ways I built a small weather application that uses the Dark Sky API to display the weather. I chose to use Angular 1.5 to start getting used to using components. Lastly, I revamped my gulp file to serve up a static site and work on improving my front-end workflow skills. Github Repo | Demo

Whelp Emoji Slash Command for Slack

I got tired of copying and pasting my favorite emoji from Google. The solution? Create a simple Slash command in Slack. A simple /whelp yeild this lovable guy, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Best 15 minutes I ever spent. Joke's on me because now Slack has a built in /shrug command. D'oh!

Throwbacksnw.com

Migrate online store from Magento store hosted on unmaintanable custom infrastructure to SaaS Shopify site. Greatly reduced costs and maintance while increasing site reliability, speed and go-to-market efficiency for new products. Throwbacks Northwest

Node REST API SDK Boilerplate

Boilerplate SDK with OOP (Class) structure. Uses only native Node ES6 functions and is easy to customize and add new modules. Used to create the Fortuna LMS SDK. Github Repo


Job History

Knowledge Anywhere

Developer. May 2017 - Current

    Achievements include
  • Participate in web-based application design, architecture and estimation planning sessions.
  • Implement application solutions to customer specification and satisfaction in C#, SQL, SCSS/CSS and Angular.
  • Continuinally improve processes and tooling. Advocated for switching to Git and using Gulp to improve collaboration and front-end workflow.

Knowledge Anywhere

Client Experience Advocate. December 2013 - May 2017

    Achievements include
  • Reducing dependence on the development team for client support.
  • Automate several redundent tasks for higher efficiency and accuracy.
  • Improve customer satisfaction by providing custom reporting directly out of SQL Server.
  • Lead dozens of ontime and on budget projects of varying complexity.
  • Automated routine responses of support inquiries to reduce strain on staff and improve response time.
  • Lead Environment Management efforts.

Inventus f.k.a TERIS

Project Analyst. May 2012 - Oct 2013

    Achievements include
  • Thrived in a mission critical environment while supporting a team of 4 attorney level project managers.
  • Assist in the collection and processing of sensitive e-discovery document collections.
  • Only person in the office with a Relativity Certified Sales professional certification.
  • Was the goto resource for clients and sales department for complex, technical questions.
  • Loved every minute of a job with a high drop-out rate for new hires.

Proulumina

Project Analyst. August 2010 - May 2012

    Achievements include
  • Worked in a professional, team-oriented environment to create polished and professional looking deliverables that were used in court, mediation, depositions, and large scale legal events and seminars.
  • Worked behind camera, often solo, for 16+ hours per week. Behind camera work included traditional video production, webcasting and audio/lighting setups.

Key Skills

Languages

Javascript (ES6)
70%
TypeScript
50%
Ruby
30%
C#
70%
Python
40%
SQL
60%
NoSQL
60%
Client Side

HTML5
90%
CSS
80%
Handlebars
80%
Sass
70%
Frameworks

Angular
80%
JQuery
60%
.NET
70%
Ember
50%
Backend

NodeJS
80%
Express
90%
Rails
50%
Other

  • Gulp
  • Git
  • TFS
  • AWS & Heroku & Azure
  • Scrum/Agile
  • REST
  • OAuth

What am I Learning?

Currently, I am learning and practicing ES6 and Karma/Jasmine.

ES6 is the way forward and I enjoy using it. Specifically, the let and const variable types have signifcantly improved my programs.

Quality Assurance testing is invaluable, but only useful when they don't spend the majority of their time stuck in regression testing. The benefits of using Karma/Jasmine are obvious and help improve the speed of usability testing and overall quality.