Hello Echo, I am James.

Programming is in my blood. Well, I'm adopted and don't know for sure, but my parents brought me up in the maths and sciences, always reading, and programming just came so naturally for me. Yet so did design. I'd classify myself as an interface designer, having worked on multiple mobile and web apps including two for the iPad, and a front-end developer. I have worked projects like Community Online from design conception to front-end, custom back-end, Flash streaming technology, custom multi-group chat system, and much more; though I have also taken a merely front facing role in projects like Ashes, where the interface design is mine and all the Objective C was done by Tom Krush.

My latest project has brought the theory of Active Record more truly to CodeIgniter. Active Record of course is from Ruby on Rails and allows for models to be built with just a few lines of code, and mixed with migrations, can make for very agile development. My contributions to this project have been in a relationship system, allowing for a model to link to data in another model. Such as:

$articles = $this->articles_model->find(array(), 1, 15);
foreach ($articles as $article) {
  echo $articles->blog->name.' » '.$articles->title;
}
						

The articles_model here has belongs_to('blog') declared, giving each returned row access to it's blog. If I wanted to list articles of the same category, I could do something like this:

$article = $this->articles_model->first();
$related_articles = $article->category->articles->find(array(), 1, 5);
						

Here the articles_model has belongs_to('category') and the categories_model has has_many('articles'), allowing me to quickly pull all articles with the same category. These are just a few things that are possible with our additions, which you can check out on Git.

I love what I do, so let me show you some stuff.

PS

As we push the edge of what is possible in the browser, often times we utilize technologies that don't work in all browsers. This page uses CSS3 box shadows, text-shadows, gradients, rounded corners, and web fonts. All of these work in Safari, Chrome and Firefox, however IE will see something a little simpler.

PSS

Right! The fonts used on this page are from The League of Moveable Type and Hoefler & Frere-Jones. Body copy is set in Junction, headers are set in League Gothic and supplemented by Gotham. Oh, and that font up top ("I am James.") is Chunk, a great alternative to one of my all-time favorite fonts, Archer.

Récuté

Since 2001, James has pushed the edge, learning everything he could get his hands on. HTML and JavaScript were a good start, but as soon as James had a Mac in front of him, he buried himself in CSS. James has worked in PHP since 2003, developing CMSs, web apps, and much more. The CodeIgniter framework has revolutionized his efficiency and ability to rapidly construct any challenging project in front of him.

He lives for the thrill of bleeding edge.

Education

• The Illinois Institute of Art – Schaumburg
  Bachelor of Fine Arts in Web Design & Interactive Media
  December 2008

Skills

• HTML5
• XHTML
• CSS 2.1
• CSS 3
• SASS (SCSS)
• JavaScript
• CoffeeScript
• jQuery
• ActionScript
• PHP 5
• CodeIgniter
• Zend
• mySQL

Experience

• Abt Electronics – Developer

  Skills used: PHP5, mySQL, HTML, CSS, jQuery and user interface design

  January 2011 – present

• Community Christian Church – Web Development Director

  Built a completely awesome new website that brings a brand new view of social interactivity to church websites and also brings a full online church system for running both live and prerecorded services. Honing his skills in AJAX, Flash, PHP and relational databases, this was one of his biggest projects yet.

  Skills used: PHP5, Code Igniter, mySQL, HTML, CSS, jQuery, ActionScript 3.0, design and layout

  December 2009 – January 2011

• Clear Channel Radio – Senior Online Content Manager

  Built an application for managing the office paperwork that covered everything from the sale of an ad to a client to the production and airing of the ad on the radio. Not only this, but was also largely in charge of the websites for two radio stations in Chicago.

  Skills used: PHP5, Code Igniter, mySQL, HTML, CSS, jQuery, ActionScript 3.0, design and layout

  September 2008 – May 2009

Freelance

• Roe Conn (work no longer active) – the Snoble Media Group – 2008

  Was brought in to build out this project from PSD to a working site within a CMS, along with constructing an audio player in Flash and a Podcast system.

  Skills used: PHP5, HTML, CSS, ActionScript 2.0

• Christian Life Church (work no longer active) – 2007

  Worked with another developer to design, strategise and build this site, delivering a Podcast, news feeds, and much more.

  Skills used: PHP5, mySQL, HTML, CSS, ActionScript 2.0, jQuery, design and layout

• Middle Coast – SnowFire Creative – 2006

  Built the website from PSD on a custom CMS and customized Big Cartel CSS.

  Skills used: PHP5, mySQL, HTML, CSS

• Talent Drive – Telegraphics, Inc. – 2006

  Built many small pieces to the puzzle, including custom content management tools to meet the needs of Talent Drive.

  Skills used: PHP5, mySQL, HTML, CSS, jQuery

I'm Social

You can find a lot about me on the web. I encourage you to check out my Dribbble account for a look at many of my recent projects (much of which isn't on this page), my Github account to see much more of my code (including the entire Community Online project), and my Twitter account to see if my personality is what you are looking to add to your team.