Cost to run the college's website
A Drupal 11 rebuild that shipped more features, faster.
Hank Karpinen
Full-stack engineer · Pullman, WA · open to roles
I rebuild the
software nobody
wants to touch.
Six years ago I was a manual tester writing bug reports. Today 16,000 students, faculty and staff use systems I rebuilt from scratch.
The 30-second version
What that actually amounted to.
students, faculty and staff use software I built or rebuilt
cheaper to run, every year, after one platform rebuild
separate legacy systems replaced by one application
less code left behind in every app I modernized
AWS Solutions ArchitectAWS Cloud PractitionerCertified ScrumMaster.NET · React · AWS · Postgres
Before → after
Three things
measurably changed.
Code to maintain per app
Same features, a quarter of the places a bug can hide.
Time to design a system rewrite
I built an AI tool that does the slowest part of the job.
months to yearsdays
How I got here
Four jobs. One consistent
job description.
- 012020—21
Learned how software fails
Manual tester at QualityLogic. A year spent watching exactly how shipped software breaks.
QualityLogic · Boise, ID
- 022022—24
Automated it away
100+ automated tests against live environments for a national consumer brand — and a front-row seat to a monolith being split apart.
Scentsy · Meridian, ID
- 032024—25
A unified experience for all of campus
Ten disconnected systems became one app used by 1,600 people — RA logs, WiFi access, student elections. Then rebuilt the public website for 80% less.
The College of Idaho · Caldwell, ID
- 042025—now
Doing it at scale
Modernizing decade-old applications for a university of 15,000 — the campus directory, the hazardous-chemical disposal system, a statewide study portal.
University of Idaho · Moscow, ID
The part I'm proudest of
I didn't just do the slow work. I built the tool that removes it.
Rewriting an old system is mostly archaeology — reading code until you understand what the business really does. That phase is where these projects die. Mine reads the codebase, extracts the real business concepts, designs the architecture, and scaffolds it in whatever stack you're targeting.
- 01Read the legacy codebase
- 02Extract the real business concepts
- 03Design a proven architecture
- 04Scaffold the new system — in days
Chapter 05 · you're standing in it
So I built one more, to show you.
This site runs on a suite of apps I built end to end: shared-living tools for bills and chores, a community forum, expense tracking, and a couple of open utilities. It's all running: seven services, thirty-plus screens.
See how it works →One click and you're inside.
No signup, no email.
The demo account resets nightly and nothing you do persists. You'll be in within seconds.
01Open to all
Weather
Search any city, flip °F/°C, see it on a live map.
Open →02Open to all
Convert
Length, mass, temperature, volume, speed, area, data.
Open →03Demo login
Household
A shared ledger for roommates — expenses, splits, chores, calendar.
Sign in →04Demo login
Forum
Threaded discussions with live votes and moderation queues.
Sign in →05Demo login
Finance
Personal expense and income tracking with real categorization.
Sign in →Find the system everyone works around instead of with. Replace it without the business going dark.
Ships end to end, alone
Interface, API, database, cloud, deployment. This whole website is the proof.
Deploys in minutes, hands-off
One merge builds, ships and scales itself. Releases stopped being an event.
Starts from how it breaks
Four years in QA first. Reliability is where I begin, not what I patch later.
Talks to the people affected
Certified ScrumMaster. I scope with stakeholders and run the ceremonies.
Got a system nobody
wants to touch?
Mid-level and senior full-stack roles · Remote, hybrid or onsite · Pullman, WA