The original class search was slow...

When I enrolled for my first quarter at Santa Cruz, I was baffled by how the course enrollment experience felt. Everything takes forever to load, and it's missing crucial information about the classes I want to take. How can I tell when classes overlap, what professors are good and bad, and when classes fill up?

...so let's make it better!

I wanted to design a class search app so that it was a central source of information, while not feeling overwhelming.

The app makes it as easy as possible to compare classes, instructors, and sections. At your fingertips, there's

• Class and section information
• Walking distances (based on your residence of choice)
• Enrollment history
• Grade distributions
• RateMyProfessors reviews and scores

Schedule with style.

Once you star a class you like, you can add it directly to your schedule. Class times will turn orange or red to show conflicts.

Get a head start on enrollment!

You can directly copy class codes into your shopping cart. The website also easily lets you share schedules, either by link or QR code.

It's extremely popular!

SlugSchedule currently boasts over 1.7k active users, and it's still growing. Thousands of students rely on it every quarter to enroll in their classes.

Built to last!

I wanted to keep the website running without ads or donations, even long after I left UCSC. It currently runs for $0, using a combination of clever static website hosting with GitHub Pages and CI/CD operations with GitHub Actions. I created a custom database format and compressed it using ZStandard to ensure fast loading times while remaining a static webpage.

Built for a non-tech-savvy crowd

I was contracted during the summer to build a machining calculator for engineers who were highly experienced in their field, but maybe not with computers. It was a struggle balancing density with content, but I eventually landed on a layout that made everyone happy.

Working with a mechanical engineer, I built a PHP backend that supplied the React frontend with the proper tools based on your search parameters. The history tab and localStorage ensures you can make any modifications you need.

Used by thousands of machinists

It's not just me - machinists from around the world rely on the tool to generate reliable parameter recommendations. It's proudly displayed on the front page of their website!

Get real-time information on everything.

Sidekick's map shows you what's happening in campus, in real time, right now. (Go on, check it out!)

By everything, I mean everything.

Find dining halls with your favorite foods on the menu.
Check when the next bus is coming.
See if there's an open laundry machine.
Is that food truck still on campus?
Any cool parties happening tonight?
What was that noise I just heard?
And more...

Stay in the loop

Every campus social media feed is here, thanks to Sidekick's content curation. Never miss anything that's going on!

Custom backend tooling

Using Vite imports, I created a custom backend API to make it much easier to create apps. Simply create a few components and they'll seamlessly integrate themselves with the website!

A labor of love

I thought I'd also highlight one of my more fun projects! I've been working on creating Astral Chain mods for years - it's a game I'm really passionate about. This tool is built upon months of reverse engineering work and looking into the game's files - even building upon a previous Quest Editor I made in pure JavaScript back in 2021!

A "Quest" is Astral Chain's proprietary format for running game logic. They control waves of enemies, change in-game variables, and can trigger all sorts of fun stuff. If you've played the game, Red Cases and Blue Cases are both "quests", but they're not limited to the cases you see! Even when you're not taking down a chimera or giving a child ice cream, they're constantly running in the background.

At their core, they're made up of Binary XML files - a proprietary format that a few smart people figured out how to extract. The Quest Editor takes this format and runs with it, abstracting it into an easy-to-use editor!

Explore the game

The editor runs completely in your browser and lets you view and edit cases from the game. Check out enemy sets that are spawned, or areas that detect the player. You can even load multiple quests at once and export them as a single mod!

Dive deep into the code

You can edit in-game logic to make the game's quests play as you wish! Play cutscenes, change global flags, spawn enemies, anything! They're extremely powerful, but the block-based coding library Blockly makes it easy to understand. (Yes, the Task system really works like that!)

Tasks are complex, and they loop every game tick until stopped. I've been the only one to research how they work, and it's quite rewarding to see code I wrote work in the game. Remember, all of this data is just an XML file, and the game is very picky about what you put in it!

You can even see the questionable coding decisions the developers needed to make in order to work with its constraints...

Make new adventures

When you're ready, export your mod directly into the game and start playing!

While Astral Chain is an incredibly niche game (it's been out for over 5 years), I've already made a couple mods that community members have enjoyed. It was how I learned a lot of my low-level programming experience before I ever took a Computer Science class - and it's just plain fun to mess around in my favorite game!

I discovered a critical vulnerability in the laundry machines on campus, and worked with the SlugSecurity club to help responsibly disclose it.

Check out the writeup

I also led design and helped develop an app for the non-profit Sea Otter Savvy, which helps you connect with other sea otter fans, find wildlife viewing hotspots, and report disturbances. You can read the case study I wrote below. The app is free to download on the App Store right now!

Check out the case study