About me

Hey! I'm Tania Rascia. I currently work full-time as a Senior Software Engineer, and I also build open-source projects for fun. I went through a successful career change in 2014, and previously I worked as a banquet chef, kitchen manager, line cook, and just about any other back-of-the-house kitchen position you can think of.

I taught myself how to make websites first as a hobby, and later as a professional programmer. I've been documenting everything I learn since I began, and the site grown to the point that it helps millions of people every year learn new things. I've been featured in the official React docs, won 3rd in Personal Dev Blog of the Year, and written dozens of articles for other publications.

I also like to make open source projects, all of which can be found on GitHub. A few I'm proud of are:

  • A Chip-8 emulator in JavaScript, which I wrote about here.
  • Laconia, an app I built to learn how to write secure authentication from scratch using model-view-controller architecture.
  • TakeNote, an in-progress notes app for the web.
  • Primitive, a simple CSS framework built on Sass.
  • New Moon, the world's greatest web development code theme (for VS Code).

I hope you love the site, and if there's anything you want to talk about with me feel free to drop me a line at hello@taniarascia.com. (Emails regarding ads, sponsored posts, link-sharing, etc. will be ignored.)

Aside from coding, I enjoy playing strategy games (computer and board), biking, hiking, camping, playing and listening to music, beer, and coffee.

Philosophy

Read about my website philosophy. I believe in keeping a site with no ads, affiliates, sponsors, tracking, analytics, and social media. It's just you and me.

Timeline

  • 1989: Born in Chicago, the youngest of four and the only girl.
  • 1994 – 1997: Family gets our first computer, a PC running DOS then Windows 3.11, then back to DOS for a while after my brother deleted Win.exe. I use the computer a lot, mostly drawing things on MS Paint and playing WarCraft.
  • 1998 – 2005: My brother takes me to the library, and I discover the internet. On the first day, I make an email address and learn the meaning of "lol". I draw things at home, save them to floppy disks, and upload them online. I join and create tons of forum throughout the years. I make websites for the guilds I'm part of, made-up Digimon, my art, myself, video games, and anything else I'm into.
  • 2005: I make a website about Seona Dancing, Ricky Gervais's failed eighties duo musical endeavor. (This seems to be one of the few sites the Internet Archive has retained.)
  • 2007: I graduate high school. With no specific plans, ideas, or aspirations of what I should do with the rest of my life, I go to college for Culinary Arts.
  • 2007 – 2010: College. I work part time as the web developer for the school newspaper, but somehow fail to recognize that it would be a good career fit for me. I also work several kitchen jobs in this time period, like banquet chef at D&B.
  • 2010 – 2014: More serious kitchen manager and chef jobs. Joe Martin, a bartender and entrepreneur, invites me to intern at his web development company when I decide to change careers. I work as a line cook at Namco's Pac-Man restaurant in the meantime.
  • 2015: I start this blog. I do a couple of odd web design jobs on Craigslist before getting my first full time web developer job.
  • 2017: After two years, I quit to solo travel around Europe for a couple months, visiting 15 countries while writing for DigitalOcean.
  • 2018: Work as a PHP developer.
  • 2019 – Present: Working as a Senior Software Engineer for a large corporation.

Blogroll

I've met a lot of really cool people since I became a programmer, many of whom also have other careers in their past. Here are a few fellow devs who have blogs and porfolios.

Publications

A list of some of the articles I've written outside of this website.

Miscellaneous

Other pages on the site that don't fit anywhere else.

Songs

I like to sing, play accordion, and record music sometimes. Here are a few that I've recorded.

Some quotes

“Tania writes extremely clear, concise tutorials. It's no exaggeration to say that I wouldn't currently have a job in development without this site. So thanks for ruining my life, Tania.”

– Craig Lam
Software Developer @ KPV LAB

“What I find most impressive is the way Tania contributes to our chaotic and blossoming field. Her personal website contains an overwhelming amount of in-depth articles, all with a focus on empathy and beginner-friendliness that webdev is sorely lacking.

– Ben Schroeder
Lead Front End Developer @ Esri