Hi, I'm Allan.
I'm a Solutions Architect for an EdTech company in New Zealand, and my passion for technology began early. I remember figuring out how to get Lode Runner working on my school's Apple II, which sparked my fascination with computers. A couple of years later, connecting to the internet for the first time and seeing the web load, one rotating gif animation at a time, in Netscape Navigator sealed the deal—I was hooked.
As the web evolved, so did my enthusiasm and skills to build things for it. From the Geocities era of HTML and the early days of CSS to dynamic languages like PHP and ColdFusion, I have always loved learning new technologies. At high school and through university I became interested in the server side of things and started hosting my websites on a Linux machine from our flat's ADSL connection. My interest in cloud computing was piqued when my flatmate introduced me to Amazon Web Services (AWS), which back then offered just a few services like S3 and EC2 and only via API, but a huge jump in possibilities from the old cPanel based VPS services I had been using.
Straight out of university, I was fortunate to work with AWS professionally, starting with simple EC2 deployments and growing my expertise over the next decade into much larger autoscaling and fault tolerant systems. Today, I work on a substantial EdTech platform, blending my passion for technology with my professional career.
At home, my hobbies still revolve around tech. I've created an advanced home automation system using Home Assistant, which manages everything from lighting and heating to security and even making coffee. Behind this setup in the back of the garage is a server rack with a multi-node Proxmox cluster, a Synology NAS, a host of Unifi networking gear, and an APC UPS—perhaps excessive, but it's a fantastic learning tool and ensures redundancy.
When I step away from the hum of the server rack, I capture the beauty of New Zealand's landscapes with my camera. While I mostly shoot digital, I also enjoy using analog cameras for the unique satisfaction (or frustration?) of film photography. Naturally, my photos are hosted on an AWS-powered, serverless website that I designed for organizing, resizing, and publishing new content.