Jim O’Brien
Work Experience
WordPress Developer (Freelance / Owner)
Currently taking on leads, job opportunities, contracts, and for-hire positions. Owner of VisionQuest, working for myself on and off since 2013.
Software Engineer → Technical Lead
Technical Lead for the Digital Media Branch at CDC (Office of the Associate Director for Communications). Supported the WCMS project converting CDC from Percussion Rhythmix to WordPress — shipped 18 custom Visual Composer modules. Joined the TemplatePackage team, rolled out 200K+ pages for Template Package v4, cut build time 75%. Performed code reviews, production deployments, improved CI/CD pipelines (50% faster), converted 700+ SVG icons to webfonts. Supported the COVID outbreak — co-produced Vaccines.gov (Next.js on CDC infrastructure, mentioned by the President in 2021). Helped relaunch CDC.gov in May 2024.
Gained mastery of PHPStorm, regression testing, high-availability apps, git version control & workflow management, GitHub Actions, pull request reviews. Switched build tooling Grunt → Gulp, implemented eslint/stylelint, built an ExpressJS dev server with browser-sync. Practiced Agile, SCRUM, and Kanban including JIRA triage, resource allocation, and stand-ups.
Software Engineer (Contract)
Passed Toptal’s rigorous developer vetting process. Worked for a LA-based law agency on site customizations and updates.
Developer (Contract)
WordPress maintenance, support, and custom theme development for agency clients. Met the owner at WordCamp Atlanta.
Learned git version control, Foundation library, custom WordPress Customizer configurations, and Vagrant environment setup. Enhanced jQuery and JavaScript skills.
Development Director
Lead developer and admin for a growing Marietta marketing agency. Managed all client technical needs: system administration, PHP development, HTML templates, CSS, database administration, and email configuration.
Gained deeper experience in sysadmin, PHP, CSS/JS animation, database administration, and email configuration.
Web Developer (Intern → Contract)
Magento development shop where I learned CSS, responsive web design, WordPress plugin development, custom post types, and e-commerce solutions. Started as intern, stayed on through October 2013.
Learned CMS architecture, Magento and WooCommerce, and enhanced Photoshop skills.
Research Assistant
Research for Dr. Hamilton at the Auburn Cyber Research Center. Unity game development for Con-ops in 3D modeling; built PHP website for cyber.auburn.edu.
Learned VPNs, password cracking, network security, rainbow tables, GPU manipulation for password cracking, A* pathfinding algorithms.
Education
Bachelor’s Degree, Computer Science (Junior)
Transferred to Auburn for CS degree — left to accept a full-time development position. Worked at the Auburn Cyber Research Center under Professor Hamilton in the Information Assurance Lab.
Associate’s Degree, Science (Graduated 2012)
Achieved 69 credit hours for transfer to Auburn University.
High School Diploma, College Prep
Electives: Database Management, Access/Excel, Telecommunications. Activities: Wrestling.
Technical
Languages
Proficient: HTML, CSS, PHP, JavaScript, SQL/MySQL
Intermediate: TypeScript, Bash, PowerShell, Python, C++, C#, Java
In Progress: Rust, Ruby on Rails, Go
Development
Proficient: Vanilla JS, AJAX, Node.js, React, Next.js, Express, GraphQL, REST APIs, WordPress, WooCommerce, Stripe, Bootstrap, PHPStorm, VSCode
Intermediate: Angular, Laravel, Meteor, Gulp/Grunt/Webpack, ESLint, Babel, PHPUnit, GitLab CI
In Progress: Gatsby, Svelte, Vue.js, WebGL, PhoneGap/Cordova, Unity
DevOps & Cloud
Proficient: Git, GitHub, GitHub Actions, GitLab, Bitbucket, Jenkins, CI/CD, Vagrant, WHM/cPanel, VMs
Intermediate: AWS (EC2, S3, Route 53, RDS), Kubernetes, Ansible, Docker, Chef, Puppet
In Progress: Travis CI, Azure, Google Cloud Platform
Databases
MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, Firebase, Pusher, SQL Server, ERD diagramming, PDO PHP, phpMyAdmin
Security & Testing
Security: Fortify, WebInspect, SSL/TLS, OAuth2, SAML, SSO, XSS prevention, NTLM/NLA
Testing: PHPUnit, WPMock, Selenium, Jest, Cypress, Puppeteer, xdebug, 508 Compliance, Regression
Systems & Tools
Linux: SSH, CLI, Bash scripting, LAMP/LEMP, Nginx, Apache, Ubuntu, CentOS
Windows: Server 2008–2016, PowerShell, Active Directory, IIS
Tools: JIRA, Confluence, Slack, Adobe Launch, GA4, Verint/Foresee, OneTrust