Design and Systems Thinking
Alongside my professional work in warehousing and logistics systems, I have spent many years designing and building software, tools, and small systems for my own use and for others. This work is not a separate career track; it is an extension of how I think about problems, systems, and the people who operate them.
This section describes how I approach design and why I build things, rather than serving as a catalog of projects or technologies.
Why I build things
I tend to build tools when existing ones are insufficient, overly complex, or poorly aligned with how people actually work. In many cases, the goal is not to create something novel, but to reduce friction, clarify intent, or make a system easier to understand and operate.
Much of this work grows out of practical needs:
- Making data easier to reason about
- Reducing manual or error-prone steps
- Exposing system state that would otherwise be hidden
- Creating interfaces that do not require constant explanation
These motivations mirror the same concerns that show up in my professional systems work.
Design priorities
Across projects, a few priorities show up consistently:
- Clarity over cleverness
- Predictable behavior over surprising features
- Interfaces that make intent obvious
- Systems that fail in visible, understandable ways
- Tooling that supports operators instead of second-guessing them
I am generally less interested in showcasing technical sophistication than in producing systems that people can use confidently without constant reference to documentation.
Constraints as inputs
Many of the tools and projects documented here were built under constraints: limited time, limited scope, older platforms, or specific operational requirements. Rather than treating those constraints as shortcomings, I tend to treat them as design inputs.
Working within constraints often leads to simpler, more focused solutions and forces clarity about what actually matters.
Relationship to my professional work
Although much of this design work is personal or exploratory, it is closely related to my work in warehousing and logistics systems. The same concerns apply:
- Systems should be observable
- Failures should be detectable early
- Interfaces should not require constant explanation
- Operators should not be burdened by unnecessary complexity
In that sense, this design work is less about technology choices and more about reinforcing patterns that carry across domains.
What you will find here
The pages in this section document software, tools, and experiments that illustrate these ideas. Some are small and narrowly focused; others explore broader ways of describing or structuring data and systems.
They are presented for context and illustration, not as a portfolio or product offering.
This work exists alongside, not instead of, my professional focus on warehousing and logistics systems. It reflects how I approach problems when I have the freedom to explore solutions more directly.