The Easiest Hard Thing I've Ever Built
I wrote [a post on Monday](/2026/02/10/a-hundred-commits-and-a-nap.html) about shipping a hundred commits in a week and collapsing into bed. Then I woke up Tuesday and did it again. This isn't part tw...
Eric Brookfield
Engineering Director & Product Designer
This is a living view of what I'm working on, what tools I use, and what I'm thinking about. Scrub through time to explore my history.
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Tools
Ruby on Rails active
My go-to for web apps. Fast to build, joy to maintain.
Astro active
Perfect for content sites. This site runs on it.
Vue.js active
Preferred frontend framework for complex UIs.
Next.js active
Picket's core. App router, server components, the whole deal.
Neon active
Postgres that provisions itself via API. Makes multi-tenancy trivial.
Fly.io active
Hosting with an API that handles custom domains and SSL. One call.
Stripe active
Connect V2 for marketplace payments. Handles onboarding, KYC, payouts.
Turborepo active
Monorepo without the yak-shaving. Cached builds across packages.
Claude Code active
AI pair-programmer. Every Picket commit is co-authored.
Projects
Patient Data Platform active
Rails 8 system managing sensitive patient records with automated pharmacy data imports.
ericbrookfield.com active
This personal site. Now becoming a temporal exploration.
Podcast RAG System paused
Semantic search across 470+ podcast episodes using ChromaDB and Claude.
Territory Management System active
Comprehensive platform managing 375+ sales territories across multiple therapeutic divisions. Automated transfer scheduling, coverage analytics, and change audit trails.
R&D Pipeline Visualizer completed
Interactive Vue/TypeScript dashboard tracking drug development from preclinical through approval. Embeddable widget with multiple visualization modes.
Clinical Trial Platform completed
Multi-tenant Rails application for clinical trial respondent management. Timestamped verification codes, admin dashboards, comprehensive E2E tests.
Multi-Market Brand Sites active
12+ regulatory-compliant pharmaceutical websites across US, Canada, Germany, and Austria. HLS video streaming, localization, and CRM integrations.
Call Recording Analytics completed
Node.js system for bulk retrieval and organization of Twilio call recordings. SQLite-backed querying with Excel report generation.
VennDgram paused
Interactive Venn diagram editor with daily puzzle challenges. Create, share, and solve visual logic puzzles.
Picket active
Multi-tenant SaaS for farmers markets, CSAs, and small food businesses. Stripe billing, self-service signup, visual page builder, subscription management. Went from single-tenant side project to real platform in one week.
Interests
AI-Assisted Development deep
Design Engineering deep
Micro-SaaS deep
Multi-Tenant Architecture deep
Core Expertise
Skills
15+ years of experience bridging the gap between design and engineering, with deep expertise in building and scaling digital products.
Leadership
- Engineering Management
- Product Strategy
- Team Building
- Agile/Scrum
- Stakeholder Management
- Process Improvement
Development
- Full-Stack Architecture
- API Design
- Database Design
- System Integration
- Performance Optimization
- Security Best Practices
Design
- Product Design
- User Experience
- Interface Design
- Information Architecture
- Design Systems
- Prototyping
Recent Writing
Words & Thoughts
Thoughts on technology, design, and the craft of building digital products.
A Hundred Commits and a Nap
I shipped about a hundred commits last week. Multi-tenant architecture, self-service signup, Stripe billing with tier enforcement, a marketing site with features and pricing pages, product screenshots...
Vaporwave Sunglasses and the Polyend Play+
I have 8,597 audio samples. Kicks, snares, synths, weird textures I downloaded once and forgot about. They live in folders named "Drums_Final_v2" and "MISC_GOOD" and "sort_later." The Polyend Play+ is...
Back to GitHub Actions
Remember when I was excited about [self-hosted CI on Fly.io](/2026/01/31/self-hosted-ci-flyio.html)? That lasted about 24 hours. The setup worked. The runner registered, jobs ran, tests passed. But th...
Self-hosted CI on Fly.io for $5/month
I wanted to use WarpBuild for faster CI, but it only works for organization repos. Mine's personal. So I needed another option. GitHub Actions works fine, but I'm burning through minutes on E2E tests....
Get In Touch
Let's Connect
I'm always happy to chat about interesting ideas, side projects, or what you're building.