About

Hi, I’m Alex. I work as a data scientist for Microsoft Azure, where I analyze telemetry and run experiments to discover and test methods of improving the developer user experience.

Prior to this, I worked as a business data analyst, sales & marketing analyst, and IT systems analyst at a couple of different logistics companies.

I’m currently a student in the Master of Science in Computer Science and Engineering program at the University of Washington Bothell. Prior to this, I was a self-taught programmer, so I’m doing this to fill in gaps in my knowledge of computer science fundamentals, and to get exposure to the basics of low-level systems programming in C/C++.

In the realm of data science, reproducibility is one of the areas I’m most passionate about. When putting together an analysis for a paper or presentation, it’s tempting to do things in a manual fashion, but scripting your process goes a long way toward building credibility. I want to make that easier for myself and others.

I’ve contributed Python web programming and cloud DevOps support to Curate Science, a non-profit site for encouraging transparency and reproducibility in academic research publications.

I majored in Chinese Language and Literature and spent my sophomore year of university in Chengdu, Sichuan. I still read and speak Mandarin every day. I’m fascinated by Chinese history, it’s one of my favorite conversation topics.

I want to someday make a significant contribution to the field of computing, perhaps by starting a new programming language, framework, database, or combination of these, that makes data analysis much faster and easier. I’ll use my blog to document what I learn as I go along.