Hey there! My moniker here is Desert Thunder, but usually I go by Owais. I’m a software engineer with roots in New England and Austin, TX. Right now I’m enrolled as a master’s candidate at the University of Texas, and most recently worked as a senior backend engineer at Edlink.
The purpose of this site is for me to give back to the software engineering and computer science communities. There are a lot of tools, information, and resources out there, many of them freely available. They’ve been paramount to my transition from the natural sciences in to engineering (I double majored in microbiology and biochemistry). As I’ve been learning new technologies and concepts, I’ve taken a lot of notes and would like to share publicly. Additionally, I would like to dabble in teaching and have essays posted to help expose readers to complex topics.
I’d like to add that there will be some posts and notes about mental health and personal development. The best engineers in my experience are the ones who live fulfilling lives. I’ve seen it. I was raised by one of those engineers.
Learning is fun. Engineering is supposed to be fun. I hope my work here helps you enjoy what you’re doing!
Right now I’m deepening my understanding of Linux, design patterns (shout out to uncle bob), and software architecture. To supplement this, I’ve been learning Golang and C++ to augment my knowledge of the dynamically typed languages I’ve used for much of my career (Python, Ruby, and JavaScript).
Some projects I’m working on include a mental health application with Django, and some CLI and TUI tools with Python (rich and textual) and Golang (Bubbletea).
In the future I’d like to learn functional programming concepts and native iOS development with Swift. Charm, the company behind Bubbletea, has exposed me to Elm architecture. This led me to Gleam, and my work with Rails showed me Elixir and Phoenix.
Outside of programming, I love to read, lift weights, and watch Dodger baseball. It has been a blast hearing the ball come off of Shohei Ohtani’s bat at the ravine every night. I like to read all kinds of books. Right now I’m reading the first of Henry Rollins’ Black Coffee Blues trilogy, as well as A Psalm for the Wild Built.
This page is a brief introduction to who I am and what I care about. For more details, projects, and some of my thoughts, check out my blog and portfolio.