Systems Engineering · Kotlin · TypeScript · Rust · Python

John Noecker Jr.
I build systems that don't wake you up at 3am.

Systems engineer with 15+ years building production-grade software. Recent projects span distributed game servers, desktop applications, forensic linguistics toolkits, and AI asset pipelines — across Kotlin, TypeScript, Rust, and Python — all with architecture and testing as first-class concerns.

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200K+ lines across 4 production systems

27K+ lines of tests — deterministic, parity, integration

Kotlin · TypeScript · Rust · Python

gRPC · Redis · PostgreSQL · Prometheus · Grafana

Tauri 2 · React 19 · PixiJS · Claude API · FLUX

Published: 3 PyPI packages (mowen)

Recent projects

Production-grade systems across different stacks — architecture, testing, and scalability as first-class concerns.

AmbonMUD

Production-grade MUD game server with tick-based engine, dual telnet + WebSocket transports, React/PixiJS web client, and horizontally-scalable distributed architecture with gRPC engine/gateway separation.

88K+lines

376files

26Ktest lines

18DB migrations

Kotlin Coroutines Ktor gRPC PostgreSQL Redis React 19 PixiJS 8 Prometheus Docker

Single-threaded coroutine engine eliminates concurrency bugs by design
Three deployment topologies (standalone, engine, gateway) from one codebase — scale horizontally without code changes
Deterministic testing via injected clock — simulate hours of game time in microseconds
Write-coalescing persistence chain reduces I/O by orders of magnitude under load

Ambon Arcanum

Desktop world-builder for MUD game servers with visual zone editing, AI image generation, LLM-powered content tools, cloud asset sync, and a bespoke baroque design system. Built in 10 days.

38K+lines

186files

200+test cases

39IPC commands

TypeScript Rust React 19 Tauri 2 Zustand XY Flow Tailwind CSS Cloudflare R2 Claude API

Format-preserving YAML round-trip I/O retains comments and key ordering for human-edited files
AWS Signature V4 signing implemented from scratch — zero SDK dependencies
Content-addressed asset storage with SHA256 deduplication and CDN sync
6 isolated Zustand stores with per-field selectors prevent re-render cascading

mowen (墨紋)

Full-stack authorship attribution toolkit — clean-room Python successor to JGAAP, used in the identification of J.K. Rowling as Robert Galbraith. Published on PyPI as three packages.

13K+lines

95components

658tests

20corpora

Python FastAPI SQLAlchemy React 19 Zustand TanStack Query Docker PyPI

Zero required dependencies in core — optional extras for NLP, transformers, PDF, Chinese segmentation
70-experiment parallel validation against JGAAP: 87% match to float epsilon, every divergence documented and traced
Generic Registry[T] pattern — adding a pipeline component is one file and one decorator
Dual execution paths: traditional histogram-based stylometry and modern transformer embeddings

AmbonMUD-Visualize

AI-powered visual asset generation pipeline — two-stage Claude + FLUX pipeline enforcing a cohesive design system across hundreds of game assets. Built in 8 days.

15K+lines

56files

6asset types

384sprites

TypeScript Rust React 19 Tauri 2 Claude API Runware.AI FLUX WASM

Two-stage AI pipeline: Claude for prompt engineering, FLUX for image synthesis
Multi-layer style enforcement ensures visual consistency across hundreds of assets
Pluggable LLM and image generation providers — swap without code changes
Client-side background removal via WebAssembly — no server round-trips, no per-image cost

Engineering approach

Patterns that recur across every project.

Testing as infrastructure

26K test lines in AmbonMUD. 658 tests and a 70-experiment parity suite in mowen. 200+ validation cases in Arcanum. Deterministic clocks, round-trip fidelity checks, format-preserving serialization tests. Testing proportional to what's at stake.

Architecture for change

Pluggable event buses (in-memory, Redis, gRPC). Provider-agnostic AI (Claude, Runware, OpenRouter). Generic registry patterns. Composable persistence chains. The next feature is a new file, not a rewrite.

Right tool for the job

Kotlin coroutines for single-threaded game engine concurrency. Rust for native desktop IPC and binary signing. Python for scientific computing and NLP pipelines. TypeScript for reactive UIs and canvas rendering.

Stack

Tools and technologies across recent project work.

Languages

Kotlin, Java, TypeScript, Rust, Python, SQL, Protobuf

Backend

Coroutines, Ktor, gRPC, FastAPI, Spring Boot, Node.js, Jackson, Hoplite

Frontend

React 19, PixiJS 8, xterm.js, XY Flow, Zustand, TanStack Query, Vite, Tailwind CSS

Desktop

Tauri 2, Rust IPC, Win32 API, cross-platform native apps

Database

PostgreSQL, Redis (Lettuce), SQLite, DynamoDB, Exposed, SQLAlchemy, HikariCP, Flyway

AI / ML

Claude API, Runware.AI / FLUX, OpenRouter, HuggingFace Transformers, spaCy, NLP pipelines

Infra

AWS (Lambda, EC2, S3, DynamoDB, API Gateway), Docker, GitHub Actions, Prometheus, Grafana, Cloudflare R2

Quality

JUnit, Vitest, pytest, deterministic testing, coroutine testing, integration suites, parity validation

Timeline

Where I've been, and the kinds of problems I've owned.

Noecker & Associates

Staff Software Engineer (Independent) · Aug 2020 — Present

Staff-level scope: architecture, delivery, production support.
AWS backend + serverless with Spring Boot (Java/Kotlin) and Node.js (TypeScript).
Legacy-to-cloud migrations aligned to AWS Well-Architected practices.
Deployment time reduced by 60% via Jenkins + Docker pipeline improvements.

Enzyme

Senior Software Engineer · Jan 2019 — Jul 2020

Greenfield platform (TypeScript, React, Node.js) for FDA 510(k) data extraction workflows.
Document processing systems with correctness + auditability requirements.

Signifyd

Software Engineer · Aug 2016 — Dec 2018

Backend throughput/latency improvements via caching + performance tuning.
~$100K/month recurring data cost reduction via vendor evaluation.

Juola & Associates

Software Engineer · Aug 2010 — Jul 2016

Forensic/legal analysis systems with reproducibility + defensibility under scrutiny.
Peer-reviewed research, $1.6M grant contribution, and two U.S. patents co-authored.

EVLL (Applied Research)

Software Engineer · Aug 2010 — Oct 2014

Authorship attribution for high-profile cases; tooling + open-source work (JGAAP).

PROTEUS Technologies

Software Engineer · May 2009 — Aug 2010

Unified data processing system achieving 1000x reduction in processing time.

Education & credentials

Duquesne University

B.S. Computer Science · B.A. Mathematics

Graduated summa cum laude; valedictorian in Liberal Arts, Computer Science, and Mathematics.

Georgia Tech

Graduate coursework (CS)

Advanced coursework in machine learning, artificial intelligence, and robotics.

AWS Certified Solutions Architect — Associate

Aug 2023 — Present

Patents

Authorship Technologies

U.S. Patents: US-11605055-B2, US-10657494-B2

Contact

If you're looking for a systems engineer who ships, I'm easy to reach.

linkedin.com/in/jnoecker