Hard engineering challenges Staz has solved — real stories, the kind interviewers ask about.
The drawer refactor (dv01)
Staz refactored a legacy monolithic drawer system into a new drawer
component built with Framer Motion, with intelligent reactivity — it
auto-adjusts to expanding sidebars. He created a custom useDrawer hook
using the messenger pattern so any open drawer closes before a new one
opens (solving the classic double-drawer problem) with no central state
registration. The component was added to the Component Library as
plug-and-play.
The state-management overhaul (dv01)
Staz led an overhaul from a monolithic, tangled state system to a dual strategy: use-case-specific hooks for localized state plus a global Redux store. That unlocked building an issuer dashboard and improved modularity and team agility.
Firefighting on rotation (dv01)
Staz takes week-long PEOD (Product Engineer On Duty) rotations — novel urgent bugs and time-sensitive customer requests, often fixed and delivered within 24 hours.
The overnight launch screen (breathing.ai)
The night before a Web Summit presentation in Portugal, Staz built a brand-new login/signup screen from scratch, working until 7am for a 7:30am presentation. Deployed and tested 30 minutes before showtime. It worked flawlessly.
The biodata Chrome extension (breathing.ai)
Staz developed a Chrome Extension that personalized the screen experience using biodata and AI: live webcam video streamed to AWS, an ML Lambda processed frames from S3 and returned breathing rate and heart rate to the frontend. The hard part was optimizing FPS for accurate readings without high cost or slowing the browser. The goal: detect stress in remote workers and recommend meditation or breathing techniques.
Teaching without touching (freelance)
Staz consulted for a Government Organization on a React/TypeScript web app where he was not legally allowed to touch the code. So he taught their staff over video calls and guided them to build and deploy the feature themselves.
The 3-hour interview app (dv01)
While on the road on vacation, Staz built a React app aggregating CSV data with charts and filters as a 3-hour interview challenge. He passed — that's how he got the dv01 job.