Personal site / engineering notebook / systems curiosity
Software with real constraints is still the most interesting kind.
I’m Sheldon Lewis. I spend most of my time around systems-level development, databases, backend services, network tinkering, and automation that should quietly do its job instead of demanding applause.
This version of the site is less polished in the generic portfolio sense and more aligned with what I actually like building: dependable tools, understandable infrastructure, and product work that does not lose touch with the technical reality underneath it.
Engineering focus
- Systems, backend, database, and infrastructure work with enough low-level context to debug the path underneath the interface.
- Comfortable around deployment, performance, reliability, and failure modes when real systems stop following the happy path.
- Product judgment shaped by practical constraints: useful interfaces, observable behavior, and maintainable defaults.
Right now
- Refining personal infrastructure and automation that is quiet when it works.
- Exploring the overlap between systems thinking and product-facing application work.
- Keeping one foot in lower-level engineering while still shipping practical interfaces.
Recent notes
View all- Building a remote MCP time server
May 30, 2026
- The runner was the recovery path
May 23, 2026
- A note on performance in the registry control plane
May 19, 2026
Focus
The themes that keep showing up in my work.
I tend to gravitate toward projects where infrastructure, product decisions, and operational reality all have to coexist.
Systems and data
Low-level thinking, careful performance tradeoffs, and software that stays understandable under load.
Networks and firmware
Customizing open-source router operating systems and treating the home network like a living engineering project.
Home automation
Building controllers and flows that feel dependable instead of “smart” in the annoying sense.
Hybrid and web apps
Shipping product surfaces that connect clean UI decisions to solid backend behavior.
Selected work
Not brand names. Actual lanes.
Most of the interesting things I work on are not marketing-friendly product names. They are recurring technical lanes with enough depth to keep evolving.
Personal Infrastructure & Self-Hosting
I run and maintain a small personal infrastructure stack across cloud VMs, Raspberry Pis, Docker and Podman hosts, private registries, reverse proxies, Cloudflare Tunnels, and self-hosted services.
VMs, Raspberry Pis, containers, ingress, and maintainable self-hosting.
CI/CD, Image Builds & Private Registry
I build deployment pipelines for personal services using Forgejo runners, Docker buildx, multi-arch images, registry caching, and a private Docker registry I host myself.
Forgejo runners, buildx, multi-arch images, tagging, and registry debugging.
OpenWrt, Router Systems & Network Debugging
I experiment with OpenWrt on Linksys WRT and Velop hardware, focusing on upgrades, package systems, crash debugging, WireGuard and tunnel behavior, and network reliability.
Embedded Linux, OpenWrt upgrades, WireGuard, crashes, and recovery paths.
Home Automation & Local-First Control
I build and tune Home Assistant automations with Docker deployment, Bluetooth presence, smart plugs, weather-based conditions, and schedule-based control.
Home Assistant, local-first automations, BLE presence, and reliable control.
Working style
I like building things that can be explained, observed, and repaired.
That usually means fewer flashy claims, more instrumentation, better defaults, and a healthy suspicion of unnecessary abstraction.