Alan Oliver

Background

About Alan Oliver

I’m a backend and platform engineer specialising in building, scaling, and stabilising production systems in fast-moving startup environments.My work focuses on backend services in Node.js, distributed systems, and infrastructure ownership - particularly where systems are under load, brittle, or mid-transition.Recently, I’ve- Migrated a live microservice architecture from Docker-based deployments to Kubernetes, delivering a smooth rollout with no downtime or production incidents- Designed and operated queue-driven backend systems handling asynchronous workloads, retries, and failure recovery- Built and scaled web data extraction pipelines using headless browsers, proxy rotation, and resilient worker architectures- Designed and implemented a secure, isolated serverless code execution runtime, supporting both JavaScript and Python, enabling user-defined code to run safely at scale- Owned production systems end-to-end, from architecture decisions through deployment, monitoring, and ongoing iterationWhile my primary focus is backend and platform work, I regularly deliver end-to-end features, including product-facing interfaces, internal tools, and operational dashboards - especially where backend changes require tight feedback loops with user experience.I’m comfortable working in ambiguous environments, taking responsibility for high-risk changes (migrations, scaling work), and making pragmatic engineering trade-offs that balance speed, reliability, and maintainability.Core areas- Backend systems: Node.js, APIs, workers, queues, async processing- Platform infrastructure: Docker, Kubernetes, CI/CD, runtime environments- Distributed systems reliability: scaling, failure handling, migrations- Web data pipelines: headless browsers, proxies, failure-tolerant scraping systems- Product-facing work: full-stack feature delivery where backend and UX intersect- Startup environments with real production constraintsI care about building systems that are boring to operate - predictable, observable, resilient, and easy for teams to reason about.