I'm David Handel-Ding.
The Basics
I live in rural Upstate New York. I am a software engineer.
I have had a lot of hobbies over the years, but these days, my favorite thing to do is to be outside in nature doing something. I live in a really beautiful, dynamic, and abundant place, and I try to make the most of it, whether it's gardening, foraging, hiking, skiing, or anything else in the great outdoors.
I am extremely lucky to be married to a wonderful man named Rob. He is a chef, and if you're interested in eating his food, you can check out his website.
More Details
I was born in the Midwest, and hopped around a few places as a kid before my family finally settled in sunny San Diego, where I stayed through high school.
I did my undergraduate studies in math and computer science at Caltech in Pasadena. As is commonly said there, it was a total fire hose of information, and you drink what you can. I had a really great time (for curious fellow Techers, I was in Ruddock and Dabney).
While at Caltech, I did internships at Lockheed Martin, AIG, and Google. Additionally, I was a waiter for house dinners, and a teaching assistant for several classes.
Upon graduation, I moved across the country to New York, where I began working at Google full-time, on backend data quality and infrastructure. In the meantime, I also earned a part-time Master's in machine learning from Columbia. Additionally, I took a brief break from Maps to do a rotation with a machine learning research team in the Bay Area, where I published a paper in NIPS.
After four years at Google, I decided I wanted a change of pace. I started seeking out opportunities at smaller companies, whereupon a friend connected me with Citizen. I learned a ton about software engineering and startup life in general there, and worked there for a little over two years before moving on. From there, I landed my current role at Cockroach Labs, where I work today, helping build out support for the product on various cloud platforms.