About Me
Hi, I’m Dana.
Senior software engineer. 25+ years modernizing software. Helping Central New York small businesses do the same: fast, simple, and fear-free.
My Story
25 years of modernizing software. Now I’m bringing it home.
I started in 1996, on my own, building websites for myself and for small businesses around me. There was no roadmap back then. No frameworks, no tutorials, nobody to ask. You figured it out yourself or it didn’t work. That is still how I approach anything I haven’t seen before, and it is why I have never been afraid of somebody else’s mess.
In 1999 I went professional at the Air Force Research Laboratory in Rome, NY. In April 2004 I moved to Champaign, Illinois and joined the Construction Engineering Research Laboratory, where I stayed until late 2014: ten years as a contractor for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, building accredited applications that were funded by and tailored to the workflows of other federal agencies, NASA, the Department of State, GSA, and Naval Facilities Engineering Command among them. I held a Top Secret clearance in both posts. Fifteen years of federal work in total, on systems that were not allowed to fail.
Late in 2014 I moved to the private sector: seven years as a senior developer at CF Webtools, modernizing legacy platforms for clients across industries, and most recently eCommerce as a senior engineer, the same world many small businesses are either running in or trying to figure out.
Central New York is home, and it is where I am again. For more than 25 years I’ve been paid to modernize other people’s software. Small business owners in our area are asking the same question my enterprise clients have always asked (how do we get out in front of this?) and getting the same confusing answers. I started this practice to give them a straight one.
Credentials at a glance
The short version, if you’re skimming.
Experience
25+ years building web applications
Security
Held Top Secret clearance, 15 years on accredited DoD systems
Currently
Senior eCommerce Developer, Valley Vet Supply
Previously
7 years senior developer at CF Webtools
Certification
Adobe Certified Professional, ColdFusion
Based in
New Hartford, NY (Central New York)
Common Starting Points
Four patterns I build most, and plenty more I can.
Every engagement gets shaped around your business. Tell me what’s broken. I’ll tell you what to build.
AI Chatbot
Answers the same five questions your phone rings for all day, and captures the after-hours leads you keep losing to voicemail.
Process Automation
The Monday-morning admin ritual, the invoicing, the reminders, all handled quietly in the background so you get your week back.
Real-Time Insights
A simple live dashboard that shows what’s actually happening in your business today, not six weeks from now.
Smart Assistants
Drafts your emails, handles your scheduling, writes your social posts from two-line notes. You edit and send.
How I Work
Six things I hold myself to.
Every engagement, every client, every time.
Direct. No jargon.
Plain language, always. If I can’t explain what I’m doing in a sentence, I shouldn’t be doing it.
Fixed price. No surprises.
Clear scope up front, one number, no hourly billing. You know what you’re paying before I start.
Your tools. No new platforms.
I work with what you already use: your website, your email, your CRM. Nothing new to learn.
Fast. Measured in days.
Most engagements go live in around 7 days from approval. Small business pace, not agency pace.
Selective. Not for everyone.
I only work with owners I can truly help. If you’re not a fit, I’ll tell you on the first call.
Honest about AI.
Straight talk on what AI can and can’t do today. No hype, no magic, no promises I can’t keep.
Where I’m Spending My Learning Time
Staying ahead of the autonomous wave, so you don’t have to.
The AI wave moves fast, and most of it is noise. I spend my evenings sorting the useful from the hype: what’s actually production-ready, what’s a demo, and what’s going to matter in a year. My clients don’t need to chase trends. They need someone who’s already chased them and knows which ones are worth the weight.
Autonomous and agentic workflows
AI that handles multi-step work end-to-end, not one-off answers. This is where the real productivity gains are coming from in the next year.
Modernizing legacy platforms
Bringing older systems up to today without a full rewrite. I’ve done this for federal and enterprise clients for 25 years. The playbook works for small business too.
eCommerce automation
Selling online without drowning the back office. This is literally my day job. I see what works and what doesn’t at real scale.
Local and private AI options
For businesses that can’t or won’t send customer data to a cloud. On-prem and hybrid setups are getting viable. I’m tracking what’s ready now.
Previous Federal Work
Where I learned to build things that have to work.
Not small-business work, but the reason I know what rigorous, secure, maintainable software looks like. Fifteen years as a federal contractor across two labs, holding a Top Secret clearance at both.
Air Force Research Laboratory
Rome, NY · 1999–2004
Construction Engineering Research Laboratory
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers · Champaign, IL · 2004–2014
The applications I built at CERL were funded by and tailored to the workflows of:
Ready to Modernize?
Free 30-min assessment · Fixed-price · Delivered in around 7 days
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