Jared Butler
Hi there! My name is Jared, and I'm a full stack software engineer, frontend
designer, and data visualization enthusiast! I also have passions in procedural generation, Web3 and
the Metaverse, and journalism in digital media, so I made this little website to talk about myself
and those passions!
My skills most
closely align with Full Stack Engineer, Frontend Engineer, Data Engineer, and Data Visualization
Developer roles. However, I love to learn and am always trying to add new technologies to my
tool belt--so keep reading to learn a little bit more about my skills and interests!
Projects
Sapientiam Tenebris (WIP)
Half data analysis project, half space exploration MMO--Sapientiam Tenebris translates the many pages and links of the Internet into a procedurally-generated Metaverse of star systems and wormholes. Players use their starships to travel to new webpages/star systems, and as they explore these new systems, they discover new procedurally-generated planet types, relics, and technologies which are then added to the in-universe database.
Languages: C#, Typescript
Libraries/Tools: Unity, React, Firebase, Shader Graph
Pictured below: A screenshot of the default player ship, "Archeopteryx", flying in orbit around a procedurally-generated planet.
TabSections
A simple, flexible Chrome Extension for organizing tabs that allows the user to create manipulatable partitions between groups of tabs in their browser.
Languages: JSON, JS, HTML
Libraries/Tools: Chrome Tabs API, NPM, chrome-extension-async
Pictured below: An example of a series of tabs split into sections using the extension!
TMB (Barcelona Metro System App)
A group project for 'Intro to Database Systems' at Georgia Tech where we created, using MySQL and JavaFX, an app for users and managers of Barcelona public transit. Users can buy tickets, take trips, etc., and managers can add/remove stations and lines, approve reviews, and so on.
Languages: Java, SQL
Libraries/Tools: MySQL, JavaFX, WindowBuilder
Pictured below: The 'Leave a Review' page in the app as it appears to users, allowing them to leave comments and ratings that are stored in the MySQL database.
NAR Website
The website I managed for North Avenue Review Magazine for four years, from 2018-22. The website is built with Ruby Sinatra and ferries form submissions to Mailchimp and Amazon S3 storage.
Languages: HTML, Ruby
Libraries/Tools: Sinatra, MailChimp, Amazon S3, Bootstrap
Pictured below: The preview page for NAR's Quaranzine, our first-ever online issue themed around Web 1.0, Memes, and the Quarantine. The Geocities-inspired preview was designed by yours truly!
This Website
My personal website, which has existed in several different phases over the years.
Languages: HTML, CSS, JS
Libraries/Tools: Bootstrap, Slick
Pictured below: The original CSS template I made for my website way back in 2014. I have no idea what I was thinking...
A Little More About Me...
Born and raised in Dallas, TX (although I currently live in Atlanta, GA), I've had a love for coding and digital art since I was very little--I have fond memories of tinkering around with GameMaker (does anyone still use GameMaker anymore?) in elementary school, showing off my little homemade projects to my teachers.
During my first year of high school, I made a portfolio website for the first time; the term 'website' is perhaps a bit generous, as the frontpage consisted of little more than some turqoise text laid against a blue background. Nonetheless, even by then I'd developed a fascination for procedural algorithms--I spent my spare time making tiny experimental web projects such as html pages that generated randomized color schemes, or a JS implementation of Conway's Game of Life.
After a summer of researching and writing web content about Texas Family Law for a local law office,
and a senior year where I spent every Wednesday tutoring underpriveleged students in West Dallas, I
came to recognize my passion for presenting facts and educating others, and how it could compliment
my preexisting passions for design and procedural algorithms. As such, when I came to Georgia Tech,
I chose to study Computer Science, and I selected concentrations in People (relating to HCI,
Psychology, and UX Design) and Media (Dataviz and Graphics). Seeking an outlet for my passions, I
joined the editorial board of North Avenue Review (NAR)
magazine (an open forum magazine on campus), where I served four years as Website Manager/Marketing
Editor, and later Editor-in-Chief. I wore many hats during that time--I worked on event planning,
revamped the website to support online-exclusive content as a part of NAR's move to an all-virtual
environment during the COVID-19 pandemic, and I represented NAR during financial planning and
organizational meetings with the Georgia Tech administration.
While at Georgia Tech I also
served several years in Student Government (SGA) as the College of Computing undergrad
representative, where I had the privilege of meeting dozens of faculty and student leaders across
campus--we worked together on a whole range of important projects such as elections, budgets, and a
new manual for student organizations. I later joined SGA's IT Board, where I helped design version
2.0 of Course Critique, Georgia Tech’s official grade-reporting web application used by GT’s student
body of more than 40,000 undergraduates and graduates! Without a doubt, Georgia Tech was a wonderful
and valuable experience for me in many ways.
Now that I've graduated, and have a few internships and some full-time Softare Development experience under my belt, I'm more confident than ever that I chose the right career path for me to pursue and express my passions! That being said, I'm still an enthusiast at heart--although I'm fairly busy these days, I still try to find time to work on my own passion projects every now and then. Right now I'm working on a historical data visualization project about one of the earliest multiplayer space exploration games (Noctis IV), as well as a videogame project of my own which you can read about in my Projects section!