Greetings! I'm Alex Metzger.
A University of Washington Computer Science and Mathematics major with interests in violin, tennis, and machine learning
Learn about what I do
A University of Washington Computer Science and Mathematics major with interests in violin, tennis, and machine learning
Learn about what I doClick the links to learn more. Checkout my Linkedin for more details.
Currently working with Doctoral Student, Ananditha Raghunath, Dr. Anderson (UW), Dr. Dillon (Cornell), and Dr. Jess Rudder (UChicago).
I love exploring new technologies to become a better software developer. I do a lot of programming and I am always working on some sort of side project. See github for my published projects
Experience teaching Academic Subjects for Elementary through High School Level
Taken Violin Lessons for 15 years
Given
Violin Lessons
for 5 years
Click the image for a demo of the specific project if available. Click the title for the source code.
NPM package to automatically manage SQLite database schema changes through a Django-like migration system but framework agnostic and with JavaScript+CLI integration. The library solves the issue of updating a production database schema without losing data or having to manually write/execute SQL queries. Used in production by attendqr.com.
A mini client-side web framework that allows creating webcomponents and managing reactive state with Signals directly in HTML.
Data processing tools for the University of Washington's Design Build Fly team. Helped our team get 3rd place in the 28th national DBF competition.
Made as an intern at Gooey.AI, this quickly became their top 3 tool with 30K+ uses within the first two weeks and has landed branding deals and social media exposure for the company. It is made using Stable Diffusion models with Controlnets (deployed using Docker and Kubernetes) and also involved making a URL shortener using Django.
A commercial version of the attendance scanner made for SYSO coded in collaboration with Claire Li. Quick attendance system powered by QR codes. Manages identity using OAuth2 and Firebase, stores data using SQLite, and has electronic payments/subscriptions using the Braintree payment gateway.
I wanted to see if I could develop and deploy a small web application in a few hours (spread across 5 days) without any frameworks, nor referencing my old projects, and keeping google searches to a minimum. So I challenged myself to do it with this simple Tierlist Maker. The only thing I had to google was the compression library and icon API as I had never used those before (and these were non essential features anyways). As an added bonus, it is completely ad free and runs locally in the browser.
A customized assessment software to enhance Cascade Enrichment's K-12 tutoring curriculum developed in collaboration with Claire Li. The tests are commercially available online and rely on UI/UX design, accessibility principles, Javascript, and a Google Form based backend for collecting and autograding responses
The website for a tutoring company I cofounded. Designed and coded in collaboration with Claire Li. Uses Firebase for static file hosting and user-authentication. Uses Deta for the backend
My old youth orchestra (SYSO) needed a way to automate taking attendance for their hundreds of students. I wrote a QR-code based system (hosted on Glitch) that allows people to scan their QR code at a scanning station (any authorized smartphone)
A classic web-based Tetris game with no ads. Has PWA capabilities so it can be downloaded and used offline. Simple learning project to explore game-loops, touch controls, and online leaderboards using a hosted database.
A word game inspired by the popular Wordle but with ocean themed background graphics. Coded in collaboration with Claire Li. A live demo of a similar game I coded on my own can be found here: lawdle.web.app (the challenge is to guess the state/country of the absurd law, or in a different mode select the AI generated law)
This chrome extension enhances toebes.com to allow autogeneration of Cryptographical Puzzles (Code Busters tests for Science Olympiad to help my teammates practice) by simply selecting a type of cipher (affine, ceasar, RSA, Baconian, etc.).
One of the challenges we faced in Science Olympiad was standardizing the way teams test the WiFi antennas they build. So I created a program with a nice GUI to make this easy. It can be downloaded on the Microsoft Store where it now has more than three thousand aquisitions.
The challenge here was to write a 3D rendering engine completely from scratch (down to the drawing of individual pixels) using only the CPU (so no help from the graphics card). This project taught me a lot about the math behind projection matrices, lighting, 3D transformations, and optimizing algorithms (parallel triangle drawing routines, frustrum culling, and more).
This Science Olympiad challenge involved building and programming a sensor and its circuitry from scratch (using only basic circuit components and DIP) to measure salt concentration in water samples. I used a Raspberry Pi microcontroller to communicate via the I2C protocol to a NAU7802 ADC chip reading a voltage divider circuit. With proper callibration, probe submersion, and luck it is capable of less than 1% measurement error.
Interested in working together on a project? Want to talk about a cool machine learning application or an exciting math fact? Let me know!
