Nick White
Developer and Librarian
Experience
- Development
- Fluent in development using JavaScript/TypeScript, Python, PHP, Bash, and whatever else.
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Extensive experience working in Linux environments, including:
- Ubuntu (incl. Debian, Raspbian, and Mint)
- RHEL (incl. CentOS, Rocky, and Alma)
- Arch Linux (i use arch btw)
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Full stack development using a variety of frameworks, libraries,
and tools, including
- React
- Svelte
- FastAPI
- HTMX
- Web Components
- Database Administration
- Managed and maintained databases in a variety of technologies, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis, as well as several BaaS microservice platforms
- Scripting ( Python, Bash)
- ETL on tens of millions of data records from diverse sources: modern DAMS systems or 15 year old spreadsheets
- Dev Ops
- Managed the web infrastructure for the library's digital initiatives and resources: CI/CD, IaaS, BaaS, even a LAMP server or two
- Architecture
- Maintained a Kubernetes cluster to deploy a heavily customized MediaWiki installation, including a Solr container and several custom containers to handle advanced features
- Spearheaded transitions to modern infrastructure models, employing those aspects of serverless, CI/CD, and microservices, to allow organizations to lean into its strengths.
- Communicated modernization needs to stakeholders with a variety of technical backgrounds, effectively translating advanced topics to common language and ideas.
Leadership
- Led teams of data modelers and data analysts to deliver hundreds of thousands of clean SKUs to B2B suppliers and manufacturers
- Coach junior developers on open source projects as well as code reviews on workplace projects
- Teach new developers from the LGBTQ community through my queercoding.org website (mostly scaled down through )
Employment History
- Newberry Library
- 2019 - present
- Developer and Digital Librarian
- Freelance Development
- 2014 - present
- Full Stack Dev, MediaWiki, Data ETL , Consulting
- Chicago Public Library
- 2017 - 2020
- Digital Collections & Digital Programs Coordinator
Publications and Presentations
- “Movement and Place in Mapping Movement” ( article, 2023 )
- “Marble Runs, Clown Cars, and Metadata Schemas” ( DLF Forum conference presentation, 2023 )
- “The Collective Wisdom Handbook” ( book, 2021 )
- “IIIF and the Problem with CSS Image Cropping” ( article, 2019 )
- “The Time Machine” ( Chicago #Code4Lib conference presentation, 2019 )
Colloquium Presentations
- “FOSS: Why?” (2020)
- “Digital Initiatives and Digital Humanities” (2021)
- “From Socrates to Stack Exchange” (2022)
- “Prototyping with AI” (2024)
- “Postcards: Are they the peak of human technology?” (2024)
Recent Web Dev Work
- Newberry Transcribe
- A fully homegrown platform for crowdsourcing transcription, intended for use in cultural heritage contexts.
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- Opacity Contrast Checker
- Contrast a11y checker for use with translucent overlays. An extremely niche tool with arguably the least catchy name in history.
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- Foreign Language Press Service
- A pretty straightforward presentation of content from a mid-20th century survey of foreign language press in Chicago. It was fun to make, and I think it mostly works!
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- Collection Stories: Halloween Edition
- A "pathfinder"-type website, just showcasing what we had been up to around halloween (we update it each year). It was the first time I created "Nzo", the little ghost who is now the unofficial Newberry mascot.
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- Collection Stories: Winter Edition
- Same as above, but for winter. Nzo returns as an easter egg -- click on the non-moving snowflake in the bottom right.
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- Mapping Movement
- Not that recent anymore, but I was really happy with it. I wrote several articles about it, one of which is linked here somewhere.
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- Mike Royko and Windy City Journalism
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This one was created as an in-gallery "interactable" -- and technically we don't have copyright permission for the essays, it was only allowed to be used on-site. That made it a very interesting project in the sense that it only ever had to work on one device -- a tablet in the gallery -- so many layout elements are hardcoded, and all the images are high resolution because they only had to download once... It was a very different kind of project, but, hard to show off in a portfolio.
(Someday I will get around to writing a couple of things about it: one will be about the red, because it was the first time I had to face color space as a relevant problem in dev/design work. The other article would be more about the design generally: Royko, the man, has an interesting position in the history of working class racial politics, and I found his whole dive-bar night-life vibe really inspirational, and I'm happy with the resulting aesthetic.)
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