j2htmx

Technologies : Java

Synopsis : htmx extensions for the j2html library

I learned of htmx and hyperscript while browsing literature on the origins of REST API design, and instantly saw the value in the use of HATEOAS(Hypermedia As The Engine Of Application State) in modern, distributed applications. I Had also previously learned of and used j2html, a typed HTML generator based on java. I Created this extension to combine these 2 libraries together in order to be able to create fullstack web applications using using j2html, javalin, and htmx. More on this library can be found here

Javalin

Technologies : Java+Kotlin(Javalin), Javascript(Vue)

Synopsis : Improved and maintained the Vue plugin for the Javalin Library

I Came across Javalin while searching for lighter frameworks to use for smaller projects and internal tools. Javalin is a simple, no-CDI, code-first config lite framework for rest api’s in java and other JVM languages. Simple, Easy to learn, and performant, I enjoyed using Javalin for writing my rest apis. As part of the library, there was a plugin that added Server-Side Routing for vue-based components without needing a build toolchain for javascript, using the client-side template parsing and building from vue.. I added a dependency resolver & optimizer, making the pages served smaller, by sending only the components that will be rendered in the page, reducing some pages from 20kb Gzipped to 8 kb Gzipped, meaning that the server-side routing had significantly reduced cost and improved load times, and kept the sizes of individual pages constant even if the frontend of the application as a whole gets bigger. Additionally, I added support for Vue3, as the plugin only supported Vue2. These technologies were key in my success at my job as a DevOps engineer, allowing me to build tools fast and with a high ROI, with a decent user experience for my users(which are usually Devs and QA engineers). The Project can be found Here. More details on JavalinVue & It’s use can be found here.

EasyBus

Technologies : Java

Synopsis : Extensible Event Bus with Multiple Backing Implementations

Working in Domain-Driven Design, one of the key techniques that are utilized is the useage of domain events in order to do orchestration and choreography. In a large and distributed environment, It makes sense to use a message queue/broker or event queue in order to satisfy this. However, in Domain-Driven Design practice, and by extension, in Microservices practice, its usually a good idea to get started with a Monolithic application and move your way into a distributed one.

However, when doing so, I found no satisfactory in-memory event busses for Java. A Few candidates spring to mind, such as JBus, but it had its own efficiency problems(such as the lack of caches for reflected methods and no scanning). So I decided to implement my own event bus, based on annotations and classpath scanning for handlers and events. The project itself is simple - annotate a few classes, and have a method with a specific signature ready, and then just pass in the packages you want to search for, and your events will be handled, and I even threw in some async handling for good measure. However, I used this project as a chance to polish up my knowledge of Java Reflections, and the Reflections library. I also took it as a chance to learn more about writing compile-time annotation checkers, and even included one in the library in order to verify that the annotations used are correct and the events being looked for made sense. Additionally, the bus can be backed by user-defined implementations, and includes implementations for a mongodb-backed bus and a rabbitmq-backed one. The Project Can be Found Here

Reveal-Control

Technologies : Java, Javascript

Synopsis : Plugin for reveal.js allowing presentation control from a secondary device

I have always enjoyed using the “everything-as-code” approach to any problem that can be solved by it, as to me, it greatly reduces cognitive load and tool switching. Reveal.js falls into this category of tooling, which allowed me to also create presentations as code.

However, reveal.js lacked in remote control functionality, which is why I wrote Reveal-Control, a server + frontend plugin that allows one to control a reveal.js slideshow from a secondary device, including a mobile one, allowing a smoother presentation experience for both the presenter and audiences in person. More about this project Here

Javalin Mithril

Technologies : Java

Synopsis : Created a Plugin for Javalin that uses mithril.js to create Multi-page applications.

The Idea for this plugin started off as a challenge : Could I write some form of a package and import system? Initially, I wanted to apply this to RE:DOM, as it was also a simple javascript framework. However, After discussing with the maintainer of javalin, he advised me to redirect my work and do this for mithril.js, which was a better known and used Web framework. What resulted was a plugin that allowed for server-side routing and state injection, while having a strong focus on class-based design for fronted frameworks. The name-spaced component system I built in this plugin allows for significantly larger projects compared to JavalinVue, and the Import system allows for very small and optimized web pages to be served. The maintainers of Javalin have accepted this project into their org, and the project can be found Here and is available on Maven Central.

OpenMyMed

The OpenMyMed project came about during the onset of the Covid-19 Pandemic. Inspired by the Open Source Covid-19 Supplies groups that popped up and the global Maker movement, I decided to participate in this by providing software-solutions to help streamline the processing of medical data and to create a lower barrier of entry to EMR systems and other related services. The goal was always to be easy to self host and to build on, rather than to be complete or efficient, and to create community-local healthcare apps and services. The Organization Home can be found Here

Access.MD

Technologies : Java(Javalin,Hibernate), Vue.js, Android(Java)

Synopsis : An ICPC-2e based EMR and Telemedicine Platform

Access.MD started its life out as a covid-19 remote patient followup app, and grew overtime to become a telemdicine platform, including vitals checking using IR spectromtery from mobile cameras.

We started out as a team of 3 software engineers, 3 doctors, and an experienced IT/Business consultant to help us streamline our branding. The webapp itself was initially built on RE:DOM using JSX templates(my favourite JS stack, as it allows me to be react-like while having a much simpler lifecycle) , as I was the only person with any JS experience at the time, but was eventually migrated to React.Js. We collaborated with some electrical engineers and academics during our initial stages of development, and it was truly the first cross-functional team I ever lead, with people from all kinds of backgrounds from several countries. While I did handle the backend development and operations (hosting, builds, etc), The experience I gained from this project was more in Product Management, Team Leadership, and Communication, having to be at the epicenter between technical people and domain experts for the duration of the project. The project is currently looking for contributors, and I am still doing light maintenence work on it.

Another great thing about this project is that it touched on several areas of interest to me, both from a technology and an application domain point of view. The Project can be Found Here, with more extensive design and collaboration docs Here

Open-Fleetr

Technologies : Java(CRUDLets), JQuery

Synopsis : Ambulance Tracking and Dispatch system with reccomendation

Open-Fleetr was my second open source contribution. It wasthe first software I fully specified and delivered. The application itself was a tracking and dispatch application, with a rudimentary reccomendation system for ambulances and other emergency services. The application posed interesting questions and challenges, some of which I still have no answers to - such as creating navigation paths for vehicles that are allowed to go against street directions and into restriced areas. However, I learned much from this project in availability and replication - my main takeway in knowledge from this project was in creating scalable and realtime systems, as the system itself was run on multiple machines, and at the same time, be able to provide real-time notifications and updates to dispatchers and drivers via websockets.

The project needs a re-write, but I want to persue it further, using more standard technology (I built this over CRUDLets), and to enable medical providers to better utilize their resources. The Project can be found Here

Redom-App

Technologies : RE:DOM, ES6

Synopsis : Micro SPA fraemwork

redom-app was a weekend project that was an answer to this question I had : What is the smallest Single Page Application framework you can create? The answer was around 3 kilobytes compressed, with 2KB going to redom and about 1KB going to the compressed router and middleware(which can be optimized further with more strict minification). My main takeways from this project were how routing works internally inside SPAs and how middleware injection works in JS. It was a fun weekend project, and I eventually published it to NPM and use it for whatever lightweigt and weekend projects come to mind that need a simple UI. While it does have opinions on URLs and Middleware Capabilities, It mostly came down to common sense and practice, and was a fun project overall. I pushed this project to NPM for people to reuse. The Project can be found Here

JeSSE

Technologies : Java(Servlet, Jackson)

Synopsis : Implementation of the SSE standard in Java

Often times, when I was working, I needed to use Websockets or Server-Sent Events. Usually, since these are handling application events from other places or database events, it was near-impossible to use the JAX-RS Event Sink or similar JEE features. Therefore, I usually wrote my own implementations of SSE using the plain servlet API each time.

After some time, I decided to write a more standard library for this. The idea was to go against JEE ideals of having everything injected based on context and externally configured. JeSSE delegates the management of SSE sessions and users to the developer, giving them more fine-grained control on authentication(instead of relying on the servlet container), and event delivery (instead of posting events globally or to one user). It allows developers to Push Events to users even from background threads, allowing … creative solutions such as database polling to expand the capabilities of legacy systems and adding RTC capabilities to them. I would eventually revist this project at a later stage, and refactor it for code quality and add testing and coverage as part of a Masters Project. The library is pushed on maven central and is useable by all. The Project Can Be Found Here

CRUDLets

Technologies : Java(Servlet,JDBC)

Synopsis : A Conventions-based REST api framework and ORM

CRUDLets was my first foray into open-soruce work. I was working on a dispatch system for ambulances which I would later transfer to the openmymed organization to continue work on at a later time. For my own learning experience, and to get as much knowledge as possible, I decided to explore more deeply the cocnepts behind REST api frameworks and ORMs, and how they are build and behave.

To do that, I worked with the 2 lowest level APIs I could still deal with at the time : JDBC, and the ServletApi. What I ended up doing was creating a very strict conventions-only REST api framework and ORM with a rudimentary query language and role concept. the REST api framework only allowed CRUD operations, and the name itself, was a combination of “CRUD” and “Servlet”(the name RESTLets, was unfortunately taken).

I Learned much from that project. The skills I got from it, from using IO Streams, Serialization/Deserialization, Writing DSLs and Fluent APIs, and Java Reflections, were a keystone in my career, and would come up again several times druing it, especially when it came to debugging problems in other frameworks such as Hibernate or Jersey due to how similar the working concepts behind them were to my own work. It was a great learning experience, and I did manage to ship a project based on it. The Project can be found Here

Qahwagi

Technologies : Java(Javalin,Hibernate), RE:DOM, Flutter, Docker

Synopsis : Delivery App for coffee shops based on proximity

Qahwagi Started off as a fun idea we had while we were sitting down. When corona set in, and we saw that everything was moving towards delivery, we saw an opprotunity to move into the market and began working on the application. The idea is simple : it provides poeple with a way to discover nearby coffee shops to their office or home, and to order from those shops. The application is still work in progress, but is nearing completion and will be available on app stores very soon.

AbuTaxi

Technologies : Java(Jersey,Jackson,Jongo), JQuery.

Synopsis : Application to manage taxi office operations

AbuTaxi was a client project for my family business. As we are in the fields of telecommunication, specifically, in the field of 2-way radio and RoIP, we often are in contact with people in the construction, transport, and security industries. One such client, with a taxi office, requested from us to handle their IT operations and to enable them to more efficiently manage their orders and customers. For that, we created a custom application that allows them to

  • Manage their taxi licenses
  • Manage Drivers
  • Manage their vehicles & maintenance actions
  • Manage their wireless radios(handsets)
  • Manage their orders
  • Produce reports on customers, orders, and drivers
  • Manage their customers

The application is still in its beta-stages, but is nearing completion and being taken to production.

Volunteer Work

  • I’m an organizing Member of the palestinian open source community. My duties include handling IT Operations and Software development for the group, Planning and Notation, giving webinars and creating e-learning content, in addition to professional outreach.

  • I’m a proponent of open education, and as such, have published several course notes of my own for general public (see the education section of this website)

  • I volunteer for arduino workshops with children whenver possible, and have given them as a volunteer with the AM Qattan foundation.