Ivan Kulagin

Languages

Databases

Devops

Clouds

Ai

Microservices

Protocols

Cryptography

Frontend

Os

Visuals

Human languages

Contacts

IT skills

• APIs: The facade of your system, hiding its internal complexity. Everyone wants this facade to be nice for others, and I’m helping people with that
• Testing: I have a weighted approach of testing: there’s no need in overtest everything (at the beginning for sure), but the critical parts should be tested
• Refactoring: This is huge topic, and only following best practices and carefulness lead to success. Sometimes this process takes a lot of time, even if you have detailed plan
• Data parsing/normalizing: Probably my favourite types of tasks. I love data manipulation
• Data scraping: Watching run logs of hundreds of simultaneous scraping connections really please my eyes
• Tasks automation: As a programmer, you always have a mind/hands work to do. Automate repetitive tasks, but only after they become really annoying. Don’t automate too early
• Networking: Every developer should have experience with building own “Anton”. Since the 2007, when I had two, and till now, when I have eight bare-metal servers in my house, I love to practice networking stuff
• Clouds: As a freelancer I use clouds from the early AWS days, and my experience grow with each new client. There are huge amount of tools clouds provide, and I have been working with most popular of them. Sometimes building crazy things

Soft skills

• Self-organization/time management: Having been a freelancer all my life, mastering planning and time-management is a must
• Analytical abilities: Learn yours and others mistakes, track success, make future decisions based on both
• KISS: Don't overcomplicate/overengineer, split complex tasks on subtasks, manage one at the time
• Creativity: When you experienced with your tools, you can do amazing things with them
• Perseverance: There's always a way to do the thing, but if stuck, try to find another solution with team
• Problem Solving: Formulate the problem, that is 80% of solution. Consult with pros, use other's expertise and become better professional
• Eager to learn/Curiosity: The more you know, the more ways you can do the task. Always learn something, even unrelated to your main specialization. It's worth it

My dream team

• have the №1 rule in your code is low in coupling and high in cohesion
• code review is the only way code become merged to main
• love to write tests and that is easy to do, because of rule №1
• don’t spend thousands of hours per year on endless daily voice meetings
• have clear requirements and just work, using daily text reports to sync
• prefers self-documenting text communication over voice
• located in US/Europe/Australia/East and Southeast Asia region
• prefer to write 10 lines of code as warden’s strategy instead of adding huge devise gem monster as dependency just to have simple authentication
• understand the problems the Active Record pattern introduce, and you do your best to keep it lightweight as possible
• so advanced, that prefer ROM/Sequel over ActiveRecord for a reason

Related interests

• Microcontrollers: We live at the times when buying NY/Christmas garland is boring, if you have ESP32 (which has WiFi module), few 10x10 plates of ws2812B, and love to solder
• GTD: Learning how to manage your own life, how brain works, how it tends to cheat you, etc is a key of success for freelancer

Job log

Please note, these are major jobs I'm proud of. As a seasoned freelancer, I did lots of short-term projects (see my Upwork profile)

• Frigbot (IoT): 2022-10 – 2024-06
  Position: Rails Fullstack Developer + DevOps engineer
  Legacy Rails code refactoring, telecom integrations, high-load IoT cloud built
• AVR Chiptuning: 2020-08 – 2020-10
  Position: Elm and Hanami Full Stack Developer
  Frontend (Elm) and backend (Hanami API+dry) development
• BlockVestMovement: 2020-05 – 2020-08
  Position: DevOps Architect (AWS/Terraform/HashiCorp Stack)
  Multi-environment AWS stack design and implementation, CI setup
• spINFLUENCEit: 2016-03 – 2018-06
  Position: Lead Backend Developer (High-Performance APIs)
  Complex backend for iOS and macOS applications
• Instamotor Inc.: 2015-07 – 2015-09
  Position: Ruby Backend Engineer
  Refactoring and extending communication layer using Twilio API
• Apple pass manager: 2015-03 – 2017-07
  Position: Apple Passbook/AngularJS/Rails Full Stack Developer
  Apple pass WYSIWYG designer with passbook API integration
• Skymond mobile Op: 2013-10 – 2015-03
  Position: Senior Ruby Backend Developer and DevOps Engineer
  Online Charging System (OCS) for virtual mobile operator
• Higgins MD 420: 2013-10 – 2015-03
  Position: Rails Fullstack Developer
  Refactoring and developing website for medical marijuana evaluation clinic
• Pelesend corporate site: 2013-04 – 2013-08
  Position: Backend Rails Developer
  Refactoring and UI improvements of Pelesend corporate site
• ABC Logistik: 2013-01 – 2013-06
  Position: Full Stack Ruby on Rails Developer
  Regular complexity site for Russian logistic company

Location

Please keep in mind that over the past 12 years, 95% of my clients have been based in North America, so my work schedule is already adjusted to ensure significant overlap with that region. The same applies to Southeast Asia region.

• I can relocate easily — I just need to notify my landlord.
• Preferred regions to live and work: Southeast Asia (especially Malaysia), Georgia (I have a residence permit there), Türkiye.
• From November to May, it gets chilly in Georgia (country), so I usually work and travel during this period.
• This winter, I plan to go to Southeast Asia.
• Until 2022, I lived in Russia, but I will not return there anymore.
• My current time zone: UTC+4

Desired salary

• My rate is 40$/hour. That's 40h*160h*12m = 76800$ per year (net).
• I'm totally OK with a 1/2 rate for the first onboarding month