Alongside my day job, I take on a small number of freelance projects — usually teams who need hands-on engineering help with Go, distributed systems, or cloud infrastructure.
I'm selective about what I take on. I'd rather do a few things well than spread myself thin, so if your project isn't a good fit for my skills, I'll say so.
What I can help with
Backend engineering and system design — I build services in Go: APIs, workers, data pipelines, event-driven architectures. I'm comfortable taking a blank repo to production, or picking up an existing codebase and making it better.
Cloud infrastructure — Most of my experience is with Google Cloud — Cloud Run, Compute Engine, Cloud Functions, BigQuery, Pub/Sub, Cloud Storage. I design, build, and operate cloud-native systems that scale without becoming a maintenance headache.
Data and integration — Real-time pipelines, Kafka producers and consumers, database design and migration (mostly PostgreSQL), and connecting systems that were never meant to talk to each other.
Architecture and technical strategy — Sometimes you just need someone to look at what you've got, work out what's working, and help plan what comes next: architecture reviews, technology choices, migration planning.
My primary stack is Go, PostgreSQL, Kafka, and Google Cloud, with Docker, Terraform, GitHub Actions, and gRPC alongside. I've spent time with Rust too, though Go is where I'm most productive.
How I work
I like to stay close to your team and codebase rather than working in isolation — I just do it on my own schedule. That might mean evening commits, async code reviews, or catching up on Slack outside your usual hours. I'm based in the UK (GMT), and engagements typically run from a few weeks to a few months.
Get in touch
If you think I could help with something you're working on, the easiest way to start is to book a short call — no commitment, just a conversation about what you need and whether I'm the right person for it.
You can also reach me by email at aran@aran.dev.