This next team in our Meet Our Teams series are true engineers. It’s time to meet the developers behind Rustici Engine.
These engineers don’t have a one track mind. They’re a team of generalists, working with a variety of tools, such as .NET, JavaScript, Java and developer tools, so you’ll usually find them learning something new. Since Engine is a massive product often considered the “plumbing” inside many LMSs and eLearning systems, they’re always on the hunt for bugs to squash, adding new features and making sure Engine is running optimally.
Curious as to what Rustici Engine does?
“Engine is like the engine in a car, if that car were an LMS. A company that wants to build and design their own car (LMS) – but doesn’t want to handle the complexities and knowledge required to build the engine – they can bolt Rustici Engine in and start rolling. It’s an essential component around which everything else is built. The Engine team turns the wrenches in the deepest levels of our products’ mechanics.”
-Ashton Garcia
During the average day, you’ll find the Engine team:
- Steaming through cup after cup of coffee, an energy shot or lots of water.
- Traveling somewhere new to camp or confuse their team as to their current location.
- Sharing adorable cat photos.
- Playing video and tabletop games.
- Crafting art pieces out of wood.
- All the while building and improving Engine features.
While Ben Clark boasts one of the top slots for the longest tenured Rustician, his fellow engineers are relatively new to Rustici. Ashton, Brandon, Cameron and Ruvim all joined after the office reopened in 2021, and we’ve been able to celebrate together with doughnuts, bagels and coffee. Lots of coffee.
Now, let’s meet the team!
Ben Clark – Lead Problem Solver
Ben is the lead plumber – err – problem solver on the Engine team. While Ben is known as “Ben SCORM” around here, he’s most proud of his contributions on another standard. He wrote the initial version of TinCan, which became xAPI. To relax, Ben enjoys going on a nice walk, teaching his kid the ways of Magic: The Gathering and keeping his RPG character, Algabor, from going off the rails.
“I really enjoy finding a solution that helps someone, be it a customer or someone within the company or team.”
Ashton Garcia – Mjölnir of SCORM
Since joining Rustici, Ashton has jumped right in not only working on Engine, but he’s also learning about, and making developments in, our LTI 1.3 implementation. And he put this knowledge to good use during Rustici: The Gathering where he provided valuable help behind the scenes with the LTI session. After a long day coding, Ashton enjoys the great outdoors and can often be found camping, kayaking and climbing.
“I see the impact of my contributions and take satisfaction in having ample opportunity to solve complex problems.”
Brandon Jackson – Coffee-Powered Code Crafter
Brandon currently holds the spot for newest Rustician, but was a software developer at other companies. Having worked here a short amount of time, Brandon has enjoyed getting to know the products and what he’s been able to work on so far. And his team has enjoyed getting to know him as well. Brandon is looking forward to all of the challenges that come with crafting code as a software developer.
“I’m a newer Rustician, so everything has been really cool so far. I’m enjoying learning my new role.”
Cameron Cohu – Codes with Coffee
Cameron joined us fresh out of college. He’s proud to have jumped into his new software developer role with both feet and been giving it his all. Already, he’s learned a lot and taken on the responsibility of setting up Engine’s upcoming webhooks system. When coding, and not coding, Cameron is thinking about coffee. Just the idea of a warm caramel or vanilla latte will brighten his day.
“Diving into a new problem is always fun. With Engine, there’s a massive variety of tech to learn and problems to solve.”
Ruvim Kondratyev – eLearning Engine Mechanic
Ruvim is a software developer who’s already made a big impact by refactoring the build pipeline for Engine. He enjoys working remotely from just about anywhere, including Florida, Colorado, California and Oregon. His favorite part of his role is how our software reaches millions of end users who depend on his work. This also happens to correspond with his most important bucket list item: to make the world a better place.
“It’s the people I work with, and the people who depend on me, that make up the coolest part of my job.”
We’re not saying Rusticians are food motivated or anything, but between the fully stocked office kitchen, the magic whiteboard that conjures up our favorite snacks and burrito train Thursdays on Slack, we do get to know each other’s favorite treats.
If working on one of the product teams as a software developer sounds like something you’d enjoy, check out all of our openings. Or read our Joel Test answers to get an inside look on what it’s like to work as a developer at Rustici Software.
