Rainy Sundays
Rich Gwilliam's digital shed
Rich Gwilliam Full Stack Developer
Rich is a full stack developer with a love of building cool stuff with PHP, Laravel, Javascript, Linux, and all kinds of open source tech.
He's all about getting stuff done and learning new things to do it right.
Give him money and he'll probably do it for you, he's nice like that.
- Location
- Sheffield, UK
- rich.gwilliam@gmail.com
- Website
- Look up
API development
USB, for data. Well, I suppose that describes USB, too.
An increasing number of web applications and websites are build on the API model and I'm a fan for the same reason I love USB connectors; I remember when a computer needed ps/2 connectors, printer ports, parallel ports and VGA connectors and the rat-king of cables it required.
When I need something new, I like knowing the basic connectors are already there with a sensible standardized interface. On top of that it greatly eases automated testing, so you know everything works and will keep working.
I've implemented REST APIs (as well as consumed them) in vanilla PHP, and I can tell you it's a damn sight easier to use a decent framework - usually Laravel in my case.
I've also tinkered with SOAP protocol and RPC patterns in my time.
I've been using API development since May 2012 (13 years).
Engagements using API development
Senior PHP Developer
ASL Holdings Ltd
May 2012 - Feb 2020For ASL I developed several long-lived and high volume telemetry systems. These processed large amounts of data and delivered it for rendering in charts and tables on a daily basis.
- HTML
- CSS
- Photoshop
- Javascript
- Jquery
- API development
- SQL
- BASH
- Linux
- DataTables
- LAMP Stack Admin
- FTP
- Git
- CICD
- Technical writing
Senior Web Developer
Vivedia
Jun 2020 - Jul 2021At Vivedia I worked on high-volume API systems providing on-demand streaming video to customers. As a personal project, I updated internal systems to greatly improve the efficiency of services supporting the vital ops team.
- PHP
- Laravel
- Vue
- Agile
- API development
- DataTables
- Ops Development
- Git
- Jira
- Project planning
- CICD
Senior Web Developer
GoSea Marine
Jun 2021 - Jan 2022- API development
- Vue
- Typescript
- Javascript
- CSS
- Git
- High capacity systems
- Jira
- CICD
Senior Software Developer
Patchworks
Jan 2022 - Jul 2022- Git
- PHP
- API development
- Ops Development
- Linux
- Docker
- High capacity systems
- NPM
- NodeJS
- Jira
Full-stack Developer / Devops Engineer
Hidden
Jul 2022 - Jul 2023At Hidden, I filled the role of an API Developer as well as a Devops Engineer. I updated and expanded existing legacy code to run on AWS Lambda functions for increased efficiency, and created Jenkins build servers for the Unity development team.
- HTML
- Vue
- CSS
- Javascript
- Typescript
- LAMP Stack Admin
- Linux
- Agile
- Ops Development
- Git
- PHP
- Amazon EC2
- Amazon S3 Buckets
- Amazon Lambda Functions
- AWS Suite
- Amazon API Gateway
- Amazon Cloudflare
- Postman
- API development
- High capacity systems
- Stable Diffusion
- Figma
- FTP
- Git
- Phinx
- Database Migrations
- Jira
- Project planning
- CICD
- Jenkins
- Technical writing
- Generative AI
Contract Senior Full-stack Developer
Eido Healthcare
Feb 2024 - Jun 2024Successful resurrection of a mothballed legacy Craft CMS project without documentation or input from the original developer; planning and provisioning of AWS infrastructure to support the software based on Docker images.
- PHP
- HTML
- CSS
- SQL
- Git
- NPM
- Javascript
- Craft CMS
- Linux
- LAMP Stack Admin
- Amazon EC2
- AWS Suite
- Laravel
- Docker
- BASH
- Figma
- Project planning
- Ops Development
- High capacity systems
- Apache
- Postman
- API development
- Technical writing
Contract Senior Full-stack Developer
Polygon
Jul 2024 - Nov 2024Maintenance and upgrade of a legacy native PHP 5.6 API with massive data sets to provide new functionality for clients both inside and outside the company.
- PHP
- HTML
- CSS
- Javascript
- API development
- Postman
- Vue
- Apache
- Database Migrations
- Agile
- Git
- SQL
- NPM
- Jira
- CICD
Contract Senior Full-stack Developer
STS Commercial
Feb 2025 - Aug 2025Development of high-precision bespoke analytics and diagnostic modules on a Laravel base to surface opportunities and weaknesses in extremely high-volume, fast moving Fintech data and fine-tune performance for emerging markets. Innovative and intuitive modelling of data, completely revolutionizing how stakeholders analyse performance.
- Laravel
- Javascript
- CSS
- HTML
- PHP
- API development
- Vue
- Database Migrations
- Linux
- Git
- Docker
- SQL
- Figma
- LAMP Stack Admin
- BASH
- NPM
- NodeJS
- Postman
- High capacity systems
- Ops Development
- Jira
- MAMP stack admin
- Technical writing