# Robert Palmer ## Senior Full-Stack Web Developer San Diego, California | email any mailbox at honestcode.com | [honestcode.com](https://honestcode.com/) | [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/honestcode/) Full-stack web developer with more than 25 years of experience building and operating public-facing websites and custom applications. Led a portfolio of a dozen concurrent customer websites, from discovery and implementation through deployment and production support. Combines hands-on JavaScript, TypeScript, Vue.js, PHP, WordPress, APIs, and AWS/Linux work with a background in design, accessibility, technical SEO, content operations, and clear communication across technical and nontechnical teams. --- ## Relevant Strengths - **Public web and content platforms**: Responsive, accessible, standards-compliant websites; WordPress, custom CMS functionality, content-team workflows and documentation - **Full-stack engineering**: JavaScript (Vue.js), TypeScript, HTML, CSS, PHP, Python, SQL/MySQL, backend services, Git, automated testing, API design and processing, systems thinking, scalable solution architecture, traditional and serverless deployment - **SEO, performance, and operations**: Structured data and Schema markup, Lighthouse improvements, cross-browser and cross-device compatibility, Linux deployment on AWS, incident management and troubleshooting - **Project leadership**: Requirements discovery, technical design, implementation, launch, maintenance, and collaboration with designers, strategists, content teams, customers, and vendors --- ## Selected Engineering Work ### AI-Powered Executive Decision Support: Ontix - Designing a natural-language operating-system layer for customers' businesses, beginning with an agentic application that lets executives ask business questions and receive useful answers from organizational information - Deploying the application on Cloudflare's serverless platform, with attention to secure data access, dependable orchestration, and a clear path from prototype to production - Evaluating where foundation models add meaningful value and where conventional data analysis or deterministic application logic produces a better result ### Automated Form-Response Routing: Client Application - Built a Python application on AWS Lambda to process and route complex form responses - Translated business rules into maintainable serverless logic and integrated the service into an existing customer workflow - Led this migration while commanding an incident where the customer's hosting was due to be terminated with two weeks notice ### Multi-Client Web Platforms: DEPARTURE - Led concurrent development, deployment, maintenance, and troubleshooting for a portfolio of customer web applications hosted on AWS and other cloud infrastructure - Worked across application interfaces, APIs, databases, hosting, DNS, security, performance, accessibility, and content operations to resolve systemic issues rather than isolated symptoms - Partnered directly with creative, strategy, content, and customer teams to turn or changing requirements into practical technical plans and production releases ### Domain-Specific Customer Experiences - Learned unfamiliar technical domains quickly -- from irrigation, plant and soil characteristics to precision force measurement -- to build and explain accurate customer-facing experiences - Produced technical writing and illustrations that make complex products and systems understandable without sacrificing important detail --- ## Experience ### Ontix | Solutions Lead April 2026 - Present - Lead discovery, product definition, and solution design for AI-driven business applications and customer digital platforms - Research emerging model and agent capabilities, prototype practical applications, and translate promising experiments into production-minded architectures - Partner with strategy, creative, and customer stakeholders to define desired outcomes, clarify tradeoffs, and guide implementation - Develop full-stack applications and cloud infrastructure, staying close to the work to test assumptions and judge feasibility directly ### DEPARTURE | Senior Web Developer March 2021 - April 2026 - Led development, deployment, maintenance, and production support for a dozen concurrent customer websites - Built custom WordPress features and themes using PHP and JavaScript, including API integrations, backend services, and MySQL-backed functionality shaped around customer and content-team needs - Diagnosed inherited sites and resolved problems spanning application code, databases, hosting, DNS, performance, accessibility, and content operations - Improved technical SEO through Schema structured data work and codebase changes that raised Lighthouse scores for better search discovery - Partnered directly with customers, designers, strategists, content teams, vendors, and hosting providers to scope work, solve issues, and deliver maintainable web experiences - Wrote customer documentation and supported agency systems alongside website delivery - Selected customers: Hunter Industries, ResMed, Seer, XiFin, and Mission Trails Regional Park Foundation. ### Viasat | Graphic Designer September 2016 - February 2021 - Created technical marketing systems and content for a global communications company, including data sheets, presentations, annual reports, and 2017 rebrand materials - Translated complex technical information into clear visual communication while collaborating in a large, matrixed organization ### Honest Code | Independent Full-Stack Developer / Founder May 2010 - February 2021 - Ran a full-stack development and design consultancy, leading engagements from discovery and product definition through architecture, implementation, launch, and long-term support - Managed scope, priorities, customer communication, vendors, infrastructure, and production incidents as a sole proprietor - Selected customers include Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, and a precision-sensor manufacturer supported continuously since 2012 ### Robert Palmer | Freelance Web Developer November 2007 - May 2010 - Developed websites and digital products for independent designers and agencies ### Miriello Grafico | Production Artist / Web Architect / System Administrator June 2002 - November 2007 - Built websites and production systems while supporting packaging and catalog programs for Hewlett-Packard, Iomega, TaylorMade-adidas Golf, and the Gemological Institute of America - Managed agency technology and helped coordinate worldwide retail packaging production across 13 languages ### Earlier Experience - **NextLeft** | Production Artist, 2000 - 2002 - **The Mesa Press** | Design Editor, September 1999 - March 2000 -- Redesigned and produced the campus newspaper; supported copy editing and advertising operations - **The Daily of the University of Washington** | Page Designer, October 1998 - June 1999 -- Produced daily news and sports pages, special sections, and editorial inserts; occasionally assumed publication-wide production responsibility - **Opto 22** | Web Intern, August 1997 - August 1998 -- Helped redesign a 385-page technical website, created internal publications, and proofread product documentation --- ## Education - University of Washington -- Undergraduate study, 1998 - 1999