Story
The long way here
In sixth grade I wasn't allowed a laptop. I was allowed a Raspberry Pi. So my dad got me the Pi, and I built the laptop: a cigar box from Hobby Lobby, a 7-inch screen off Amazon, a mini keyboard and trackpad, a battery from Best Buy, Velcro and zip ties. It worked. I took it to school like any other laptop. Having a computer I'd built myself felt like a milestone.
I still work the same way: if the tool I want doesn't exist, I build it. What changed is how far the instinct reaches. AI agents let me hit more milestones, faster, in parallel, so the things I build got bigger: a distributed personal computer, a window manager, an app that builds apps. Same instinct as the cigar box. Better tools.
The line from there to here
2015 → 2026
- 2015
The Zachintosh. Sixth grade, a cigar box, a working laptop.
- 2022
Started teaching in January: TA'd Intro to CS at Hendrix College one semester after taking the class myself, as a freshman. Transferred to the University of Tulsa that fall.
- 2023
First LLM research artifacts, sophomore spring. AI Researcher at TU from May 2023, still going. Scholarship Chair of my fraternity chapter that fall: the house GPA rose half a point in one semester.
- 2024
First apps shipped (ChefMind). The negotiation research era: I presented the work through TURC, including to Walmart CEO Doug McMillon.
- 2025
B.S. in CS, Magna Cum Laude, math and psychology minors. A workshop paper at AAMAS 2025 in Detroit. A summer as a SOC engineer. The PhD began that fall.
- 2026
Presented LODA at NASA JPL in March. Weeks later the fleet era began: Loci, then Synapse. Synapse, Husk, HyprMac, and Sidenote are in daily use. AI Developer for an orthodontics practice. Building an Intro-to-AI course launching Fall 2026 at TU and partner high schools. PhD expected May 2029.