Derek Armstrong - Staff Software Engineer and Solutions Architect

I Lead Teams, Architect Systems, and Ship Solutions

Staff engineer and solutions architect with 10+ years leading teams and delivering production systems at scale. I bring the technical depth to design the right solution and the people skills to align teams, unblock engineers, and drive it across the finish line. From payment platforms handling millions of daily transactions to AI and LLM tooling — I own the problem end-to-end, from whiteboard to production.

🤝 Connect with me
Featured Projects
NCR Voyix Pay — Worldpay Payment Processing Integration featured image

NCR Voyix Pay — Worldpay Payment Processing Integration

Led the Worldpay payment processing integration for NCR Voyix Pay, building the webhook and data pipeline infrastructure that handles millions of transactions daily across retail …

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Blog
clean-term: A Minimal Oh My Zsh Theme That Actually Works Everywhere featured image

clean-term: A Minimal Oh My Zsh Theme That Actually Works Everywhere

Every terminal theme I tried either broke across fonts or added visual noise I did not need. So I built a 14-line ASCII-safe Oh My Zsh theme that works anywhere.

Derek Armstrong - Staff Software Engineer and Solutions Architect
Derek Armstrong
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How I Bridged CLI AI Agents to Apple's Walled Garden featured image

How I Bridged CLI AI Agents to Apple's Walled Garden

Apple apps are locked down with no APIs, but SQLite local databases and AppleScript let CLI AI agents bridge Reminders, Notes, Calendar, Mail and more — no cloud, no API keys, just …

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Self-Hosting Plausible Analytics with Podman and Cloudflare Tunnels featured image

Self-Hosting Plausible Analytics with Podman and Cloudflare Tunnels

How I deployed self-hosted Plausible analytics on a podman server, routed it through Cloudflare tunnels, and integrated it with my Hugo site — with a backup strategy that actually …

Derek Armstrong - Staff Software Engineer and Solutions Architect
Derek Armstrong
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Self Hosted AI: Actually Running Local LLMs for a Multi-User Household featured image

Self Hosted AI: Actually Running Local LLMs for a Multi-User Household

How self-hosted AI became the final piece of my homelab puzzle, delivering true parallel processing for multi-user setups and unlocking the real superpower of knowledge management.

Derek Armstrong - Staff Software Engineer and Solutions Architect
Derek Armstrong
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Bookshelf Highlights
Clean Architecture: A Craftsman's Guide to Software Structure and Design featured image

Clean Architecture: A Craftsman's Guide to Software Structure and Design

Uncle Bob reveals timeless architecture rules that eliminate framework dependencies, maximize testability, and enable systems to evolve gracefully across decades.

By Robert C. Martin

TECH
9
LEAD
8
GROW
7
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Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software featured image

Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software

The foundational text teaching platform architects to model complex business domains through patterns that unite technical implementation with strategic organizational design.

By Eric Evans

TECH
9
LEAD
8
GROW
7
Read more
The Pragmatic Programmer: Your Journey to Mastery featured image

The Pragmatic Programmer: Your Journey to Mastery

Timeless principles for software craftsmanship that transform good programmers into pragmatic engineers who consistently deliver flexible, maintainable code.

By David Thomas, Andrew Hunt

TECH
9
LEAD
8
GROW
9
Read more
The Staff Engineer's Path: A Guide for Individual Contributors Navigating Growth and Change featured image

The Staff Engineer's Path: A Guide for Individual Contributors Navigating Growth and Change

Master technical leadership without management authority by understanding role expectations, strategic thinking, and making everyone around you better.

By Tanya Reilly

TECH
8
LEAD
9
GROW
7
Read more