me
Hi there! My name is Selamawit, but you can call me Selam. I’m a graduate from USC in Industrial and Systems Engineering with a focus in Operations. Some might say I’m a rolling stone, and they would be correct! My poor suitcases have been dragged through many long-distance moves.
I’m from the heart of the US and gateway to the west, St. Louis, Missouri. Highly recommended for the (free) St. Louis Zoo and the best City Museum you’ll ever go to. Also toasted ravioli will change your life, if it hasn’t already. I’m the proud aunt of seven (seriously) of the cutest girls you will ever see and the youngest of four sisters. Basically, I’m surrounded by women. But hey, who’s complaining. You can bribe me at any time with good Ethiopian food, pad thai–actually just good food in general.
Like any true millenial, I spend waaaaaay too much time on my computer/on the internet. Google is by far my favorite website because I have a lot of questions and the internet is a black hole of entertainment. Send me any interesting articles or funny memes to make my day. I also take travel recommendations: I’m currently looking into South America and the Middle East.
Speaking of, traveling is extremely important to me. Beyond the great Instagram shots, there’s so much to learn from the world. I’m a big fan of learning and broadening my perspective, both personally and professionally. While I’d like to end up in western Europe for a variety of reasons, every society and culture I’ve encountered has taught me some valuable lessons. I’m fortunate enough to have been raised and educated around people from a variety of different culture accross the globe.
Follow me on my social media, and if you REALLY want to get on my good side, make me look good on LinkedIn.
this site
This website has undergone many phases and improvements since its inception in winter 2016. Originally, I had hard coded each page using HTML/CSS and light javascript. With my rudimentary knowledge from a web dev class at USC, the site was rather basic but set a solid foundation to build on. In fact, the site wasn’t even optimized for mobile devices until January 2017.
In the beginning there was no blog section, but in November 2019 I decided that my words should be recorded, so I added an instance of WordPress in a subdirectory so that every other page could remain hard-coded. In Fall 2020, I realized that maintenance was a huge chore because of this, so I created a second instance of WordPress for the static pages. This version was short-lived, and I combined instances in December 2020 after loads of research!
This website used to utilize the free hosting providers ihostfull (2017-2019) and InfinityFree (2020-early 2021). As of April 2021, I have migrated over to Google Cloud using their click to deploy instance of WordPress. While the process was infuriating, my site load times have drastically decreased and I learned oodles about how websites actually work and are rendered! Plus, I still don’t pay for hosting! At this point, I refuse. I only pay for my domain name.
Outside of the technological realm, this website does have a purpose. On top of showing my skillz in web development, it also is good practice for me. It also allows me to present myself in a professional manner to potential employers and people I want to impress. I also like the idea of using it to keep track of my projects as my portfolio continues to grow.