Timothy Michel
Full-Stack Software Engineer • Rails · Go · React · Docker • Agentic AI Systems with Anthropic SDK & Claude Haiku
West Covina, CA – Open to Remote (U.S.) | +1 626-998-2531 |
Professional Summary
Full-Stack Software Engineer with 4+ years of experience designing, building, deploying, and operating production applications spanning Ruby on Rails, Go, React, TypeScript, PostgreSQL, Docker, CI/CD automation, and cloud-hosted infrastructure.
Specialized in building secure API-driven platforms, modern single-page applications, geospatial intelligence systems, and production-grade agentic AI solutions. Designed and deployed AI-powered applications using Anthropic Claude Haiku and the Anthropic Ruby SDK, including autonomous tool-calling workflows that interact with external APIs, evaluate intermediate results, apply safety constraints, and iteratively work toward user-defined objectives.
Architect and lead developer of Amigos Unite, a production community coordination platform featuring Rails APIs, React frontends, geospatial search, AI-assisted venue discovery, background processing, media workflows, containerized infrastructure, and automated GitHub Actions deployment pipelines. Experienced across the complete software development lifecycle, including requirements analysis, system architecture, API design, frontend engineering, database modeling, security engineering, AI orchestration, DevOps, CI/CD, and production operations. Passionate about building reliable, maintainable, and user-centered systems that solve real-world problems at scale.
Agentic AI Development
I Designed and deployed production AI-powered decision-support systems using Anthropic Claude Haiku 4.5, the Anthropic Ruby SDK, Google Places APIs, and custom Rails service architectures to transform natural-language user intent into actionable, location-aware recommendations.
Agentic Venue Discovery Platform
- Architected and implemented a multi-turn autonomous venue discovery system in which Claude Haiku independently drives search strategy, tool invocation, retrieval, evaluation, and recommendation workflows.
- Developed a production-grade agentic orchestration engine allowing Claude to dynamically determine search queries, select venue categories, perform iterative refinement, request additional venue details, and decide when sufficient information had been gathered.
- Built a structured tool-calling framework exposing Google Places search and venue-detail retrieval capabilities through JSON-schema tool definitions consumed by Anthropic's function-calling interface.
- Implemented stateful multi-turn conversational workflows supporting autonomous reasoning loops of up to eight tool-use cycles while maintaining serialized message history and tool context between iterations.
- Engineered intelligent venue evaluation pipelines that convert subjective user requirements such as atmosphere, accessibility, amenities, aesthetics, and event suitability into ranked recommendations supported by venue-specific reasoning and confidence indicators.
Retrieval-Augmented Geospatial Intelligence
- Integrated Google Places Text Search, Nearby Search, Geocoding, Place Details, Address Resolution, and Venue Photography services into AI-assisted event planning workflows.
- Developed location-aware retrieval systems capable of combining geospatial search constraints with semantic venue discovery and natural-language filtering.
- Built dynamic venue-ranking algorithms that score and prioritize recommendations according to user-defined criteria, venue ratings, category relevance, geographic proximity, and contextual suitability.
AI Safety and Governance
- Designed a two-layer validation architecture consisting of pre-retrieval filtering and post-generation verification to prevent AI systems from recommending inappropriate venue categories.
- Implemented deterministic server-side validation of AI-generated outputs using authoritative Google Places metadata rather than relying solely on model-generated responses.
- Established safety constraints, eligibility rules, ranking verification, output validation, and failure-handling mechanisms to ensure reliable production behavior.
Intelligent Service Orchestration
- Designed service coordinators capable of dynamically routing requests between traditional search algorithms, AI-driven search workflows, and category-based retrieval systems depending on available user context.
- Built graceful degradation and fallback strategies that maintain application functionality when AI services, third-party APIs, or individual search paths become unavailable.
- Developed reusable service-oriented AI architectures that separate orchestration, retrieval, ranking, validation, and presentation concerns.
Developer Productivity and AI-Assisted Engineering
- Utilized Claude Code throughout the software lifecycle for large-scale codebase analysis, architecture review, refactoring, technical debt reduction, debugging, and implementation planning across Ruby on Rails, React, TypeScript, Docker, CI/CD, and infrastructure components.
List of Google and Anthropic tools that I have used:
CORE TECHNICAL SKILLS
AI Engineering & Agentic Systems
AI Engineering & Agentic Systems
- Anthropic Claude Haiku 4.5, Anthropic Ruby SDK, Agentic AI Architectures
- Multi-Turn Tool Calling, LLM Orchestration, Retrieval-Augmented Workflows (RAG)
- Autonomous Search Agents, Structured JSON Generation, Prompt Engineering
- AI Safety Controls, Output Validation, Criteria-Based Recommendation Systems
- Natural Language Interfaces, Decision-Support Systems, Human-AI Collaboration
Backend & Platform Engineering
- Ruby 3, Ruby on Rails 7 (API-Only Architecture), RESTful API Design
- Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA), Domain-Driven Design, Object-Oriented Design
- PostgreSQL 17, ActiveRecord, Redis, Sidekiq, ActiveJob
- HTTParty, JSON API Serialization, Background Processing, Asynchronous Workflows
- RSpec, Test-Driven Development, Behavioral Testing, API Validation
Security Engineering
- JWT Authentication, Devise, Devise-JWT, OAuth / OmniAuth
- CSRF Protection, Secure Cookie Management, Refresh Token Architectures
- Role-Based Access Control (RBAC), Authorization Policies
- Rack::Attack Rate Limiting, Blind Index Encryption, AuthTrail Monitoring
- Secure API Design, Secrets Management, Security Hardening
Geospatial & Location Intelligence Systems
- Google Places API, Geocoding, Reverse Geocoding
- Google Maps Platform, Address Normalization, Time Zone Resolution
- Venue Discovery, Proximity Search, Location Enrichment
- AI-Assisted Venue Recommendation Systems
- Geospatial Search and Location-Aware Application Design
Frontend Engineering
- React, TypeScript, JavaScript (ES6+), Vite
- Single Page Application (SPA) Architecture
- Context-Based State Management, Protected Routing
- Axios API Integration, Component-Driven Development
- Responsive Design Systems, SCSS Architecture, Design Tokens
DevOps, CI/CD & Production Operations
- Docker, Docker Compose, Containerized Application Architecture
- GitHub Actions, Continuous Integration, Continuous Deployment
- GitHub Container Registry (GHCR)
- Linux Server Administration, VPS Deployment Automation
- Nginx Reverse Proxy, TLS/SSL Configuration
- SSH-Based Deployment Orchestration, Environment Management
- Production Monitoring, Health Checks, Release Automation
Distributed Systems & Infrastructure
- Event-Driven Processing, Background Job Architectures
- Redis Messaging and Queue Processing
- Scalable Service Integration Patterns
- Fault Tolerance, Graceful Degradation, Fallback Architectures
- High-Availability Application Deployment
Media Processing & Content Safety
- Active Storage, Ruby-Vips, Image Processing Pipelines
- Google Cloud Vision API Integration
- Automated Image Moderation and Content Validation
- FFmpeg Media Processing
- Secure User-Generated Content Workflows
Web Platforms & CMS Development
- WordPress, Joomla, CiviCRM
- GiveWP Donation Platforms
- Stripe Payment Integration
- SMTP, Email Delivery Infrastructure
- Content Publishing and Community Platform Development
Collaboration & Developer Productivity
- Claude Code, AI-Assisted Development Workflows
- Architecture Review, Refactoring, Technical Debt Reduction
- Git, GitHub, Code Review Practices
- Agile Development Methodologies
- Cross-Functional Technical Leadership
ENGINEERING PROJECTS
Amigos Unite — Full-Stack Community Platform
Production URL: https://amigosunite.org
Architected, developed, deployed, and maintained a production-scale community event coordination platform from initial concept through live operation. The system combines secure identity management, geospatial intelligence, AI-assisted venue discovery, asynchronous processing, media workflows, and automated cloud deployment infrastructure within a modern service-oriented architecture.
Backend Platform Engineering
- Designed and implemented a Rails 7 API-first architecture utilizing PostgreSQL, ActiveRecord,
Jbuilder, ActiveModel Serializers, JSON API Serializer, and service-oriented domain logic. - Developed comprehensive RESTful APIs supporting event management, participant coordination,
venue management, profile administration, image processing, and geospatial services. - Built secure authentication and authorization systems using Devise, Devise-JWT, OmniAuth, JWT-
based session management, CSRF protection, role-based access controls, and refresh-token
workflows. - Implemented security hardening through Rack::Attack rate limiting, Blind Index encrypted lookups,
suspicious activity monitoring, secure cookie handling, and request validation pipelines - Created reusable domain models, policy-driven authorization workflows, service objects,
background jobs, and API integration layers supporting long-term maintainability and scalability.
Artificial Intelligence and Location Intelligence
- Designed and deployed an agentic AI venue recommendation platform using Anthropic Claude
Haiku, Google Places APIs, and custom orchestration services. - Implemented geospatial search, venue discovery, address normalization, location enrichment,
geocoding, reverse geocoding, and venue-photo retrieval services. - Developed AI-assisted event planning workflows capable of transforming natural-language
requirements into ranked venue recommendations. - Integrated semantic search, retrieval augmentation, structured reasoning workflows, and
intelligent recommendation engines directly into the event creation process.
Media Processing and Content Safety
- Built automated image-processing pipelines using Active Storage, Ruby-Vips, and Image Processing
libraries. - Implemented asynchronous media transformation, image resizing, optimization, and storage
workflows. - Integrated Google Cloud Vision SafeSearch moderation services to automatically evaluate uploaded
content for inappropriate imagery before publication. - Developed secure media validation and content-safety controls protecting user-generated content
workflows.
Frontend Engineering
- Developed a React and TypeScript single-page application utilizing Vite, Context APIs, Axios service
layers, protected routing, and role-based user experiences. - Implemented reusable component systems including event management interfaces, modal
workflows, location management tools, card-based presentation layers, and responsive form
architectures. - I Designed modular SCSS-based design systems supporting responsive layouts, reusable styling
primitives, and maintainable UI development.
Distributed Systems and Infrastructure
- Designed containerized deployment architectures using Docker, Docker Compose, PostgreSQL,
Redis, Sidekiq, and Nginx. - Implemented asynchronous job-processing pipelines for media processing, notifications, and long-
running application workflows. - Managed production Linux infrastructure, reverse proxy configuration, TLS termination, secret
management, environment configuration, and application monitoring.
CI/CD and DevOps
- Built GitHub Actions pipelines providing automated testing, container image generation, GitHub
Container Registry publishing, and production deployment automation. - Implemented continuous integration workflows validating application behavior through automated
test execution and deployment verification. - Developed automated VPS deployment pipelines utilizing Docker image promotion, remote
orchestration, health checks, rollback-safe deployment strategies, and infrastructure-as-code
principles.
Quality Engineering
- Developed behavioral test suites using RSpec to validate business rules, API behavior,
authentication workflows, authorization policies, and service-layer functionality. - Applied automated testing, logging, diagnostics, and observability practices to improve system
reliability and maintainability.
Groovey Task Manager — Full-Stack Go + React Application
GitHub: github.com/sagacic-tim/Todo_Axios_Api
Designed and implemented a production-style task management platform demonstrating modern full-stack software engineering practices, including service-oriented backend architecture, responsive frontend design, containerized infrastructure, automated deployment pipelines, and comprehensive automated testing. The system provides calendar-based task scheduling, lifecycle management, and deployment workflows modeled after real-world SaaS applications.
Backend Engineering (Go)
- Designed and implemented a layered Go application architecture utilizing Gin, GORM, PostgreSQL, and service-oriented design principles.
- Separated application responsibilities into transport (HTTP routing), service (business logic), repository (data persistence), and domain model layers to improve maintainability, testability, and long-term extensibility.
- Developed RESTful APIs supporting task creation, scheduling, modification, completion tracking, dismissal workflows, and lifecycle state management.
- Implemented structured validation, error handling, request processing, and database abstraction layers to isolate business rules from infrastructure concerns.
- Designed PostgreSQL-backed persistence supporting task metadata, due dates, scheduling
workflows, and state transitions. - Applied dependency injection and interface-driven design patterns to support isolated testing across application layers.
Frontend Engineering (React & TypeScript)
- Developed a React and TypeScript single-page application using Vite for rapid development and optimized production builds.
- Built an interactive calendar-based user interface that organizes tasks by day and provides intuitive scheduling and rescheduling workflows.
- Implemented reusable component architectures, modal-based task editing, form validation, and responsive user experiences.
- Integrated Axios-based service layers for API communication and asynchronous state updates.
- Designed maintainable frontend architecture emphasizing component reuse, separation of
concerns, and scalable UI development practices.
Infrastructure, DevOps & Deployment
- Containerized the complete application stack using Docker and Docker Compose, including Go API services, React frontend, PostgreSQL database, and Nginx reverse proxy.
- Configured Nginx routing to serve the React SPA while proxying API traffic to backend services through a unified entry point.
- Implemented TLS-secured deployments using Let's Encrypt certificates and server-level authentication controls for protected demonstration environments.
- Designed automated CI/CD workflows utilizing GitHub Actions, GitHub Container Registry (GHCR), Docker image publishing, and VPS deployment automation.
- Built deployment pipelines enabling source-control-driven releases through automated image generation, distribution, and container orchestration.
Quality Engineering & Testing
- Developed comprehensive automated test suites covering repository, service, and transport layers independently.
- Utilized in-memory SQLite databases for rapid, isolated testing of business logic and persistence workflows.
- Applied interface-based testing strategies to validate application behavior while minimizing infrastructure dependencies.
- Implemented repeatable testing workflows supporting reliable continuous integration and
deployment processes.
Professional Experience
Full-Stack Developer — The Global Village Children’s Project — 2020 – Present
- Designed and implemented Stripe-based donation platform that generated over $40,000 in charitable contributions
- Migrated payment infrastructure from PayPal to Stripe under tight operational constraints, maintaining continuity of donation flows
- Built subscription lifecycle management and webhook processing pipeline via GiveWP integration
- Maintained WordPress infrastructure, deployment configuration, CI workflows, and SMTP email delivery systems
- Applied Claude Code to analyze and refactor legacy PHP/WordPress customizations, improving maintainability and reducing technical debt
Web Developer — Boston 9/11 Truth — 2018 – 2020
- Designed and maintained full website and content infrastructure for a media-focused organization
- Managed hosting configuration, platform operations, and deployment pipelines
Web Developer / Founding Member — 9/11 Truth Action Project — 2014 – 2017
- Built website, donation platform, and member-facing web infrastructure from the ground up
- Integrated JWPlayer video streaming system delivering ad-free video content to subscribers
- Managed VPS hosting infrastructure, DNS configuration, and deployment operations
Education
Independent Study of Modern Full Stack Software Development Cycle
Independent Study — Full-Stack Software Engineering, Platform Architecture & Agentic AI Systems
2021 – Present
Completed four years of intensive independent study and hands-on application development focused on modern software engineering, distributed systems, cloud-native deployment, and AI-enabled application architecture.
Areas of study and implementation include:
- Full-Stack Software Engineering: Ruby on Rails 7, Go, JavaScript, TypeScript, React, Vite, RESTful API design, service-oriented architecture, object-oriented design, domain modeling, and modern frontend engineering.
- Database Systems & Persistence: PostgreSQL, relational database design, query optimization, ActiveRecord, GORM, data modeling, migrations, and transactional application design.
- Security Engineering: JWT authentication, OAuth, OmniAuth, CSRF protection, role-based authorization, secure API design, encrypted data handling, rate limiting, and production security hardening.
- Agentic AI Systems: Anthropic Claude Haiku, Anthropic Ruby SDK, multi-turn tool-calling architectures, autonomous agent workflows, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), structured AI outputs, prompt engineering, AI safety controls, and intelligent recommendation systems.
- Geospatial & Intelligent Search Systems: Google Places APIs, geocoding, reverse geocoding, location intelligence, venue recommendation systems, AI-assisted search, and geospatial application design.
- DevOps & Cloud Operations: Docker, Docker Compose, GitHub Actions, GitHub Container Registry (GHCR), CI/CD automation, Linux server administration, VPS deployment, Nginx reverse proxy configuration, TLS/SSL management, and production operations.
- Distributed Systems & Background Processing: Redis, Sidekiq, asynchronous processing, job orchestration, event-driven workflows, service integration patterns, and fault-tolerant application design.
- Testing & Quality Engineering: RSpec, automated integration testing, behavioral testing, API validation, continuous integration workflows, debugging methodologies, and software maintainability practices.
Computer Science Coursework (Upper Division)
California State University, Fullerton – 1996
Physics Coursework (Upper Division)
California Polytechnic University, Pomona – 2003
Associate of Arts — Business Administration
Fullerton College, – 1993
Regenerative Studies Coursework (Master’s Program)
John T. Lyle Center, California Polytechnic University, Pomona – 2003