Solutions Engineering · San Antonio, TX

Clarity at the Intersection of Systems

A 25-year enterprise closer, retooled for observability. I run the discovery, build the demo, and make the technical case land.

I’m Eric Harris, and everything I’ve ever done well has been storytelling. Selling a car, training a team, framing a photograph, closing a complex deal, walking a customer through a live demo - underneath all of it is the same craft: find what matters, make it make sense, and make someone care. That’s the part of solutions engineering that can’t be taught, and it’s the part I’ve spent 25 years doing.

Over the last eight months I’ve built the technical half to match - AWS, OpenTelemetry, and Dynatrace certifications plus hands-on observability demos - so I bring the sales instinct and the technical ramp to the same role. My edge isn’t out-engineering the engineer. It’s uncovering the real problem, connecting technical truth to operational impact, and helping people move forward with confidence.

Best fit

Commercial or Enterprise Solutions Engineering, where customer discovery, demo fluency, and a fast observability ramp matter more than a traditional engineer-to-SE path.

San Antonio, TX Solutions Engineering Observability AWS OpenTelemetry AI-Assisted Systems

Featured work

Observability & Demos

So let me show you rather than tell you. This is the demo I'd walk a customer through - built observability-first, every step visible - with the cloud and telemetry work underneath it.

Observability-native workflow & public demo pipeline

StoryTime

A local-first pipeline that turns public-domain and Creative Commons texts into audio, generates RSS, and exposes the whole workflow - built observability-first, with process mapping, failure visibility, and a deliberate operator experience.

Why it matters

An end-to-end observability demo I built and can walk through live - process mapping, failure visibility, and a deliberate operator experience. The closest thing on this site to the demo an SE runs every week.

Observability Workflow Design Operator Experience Local-First Demo Architecture

Cloud & telemetry

AWS / OpenTelemetry / Observability Labs

Certification-driven, hands-on work across AWS, telemetry pipelines, distributed tracing, and observability fundamentals - the working layer underneath the featured projects.

AWS OpenTelemetry Tracing Cloud Observability

Verified ramp

Credentials

And the demo isn’t bravado - here’s the paper trail behind it. Real certifications, real dates, still adding to them.

OpenTelemetry Certified Associate (OTCA)

Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF)

Telemetry & Tracing
Issued May 2026 · Expires May 2028 ID · LF-fu7ozzqcoq
Application Performance Monitoring Distributed Tracing +5 more
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Dynatrace Essentials

Dynatrace

Observability
Issued Jun 2026 · Expires Jun 2028 ID · 1c1d2668-c8e2-43ac-be32-a92edc8d3756
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AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Associate

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Cloud Architecture
Issued Dec 2025 · Expires Dec 2028
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AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Cloud Foundations
Issued Dec 2025 · Expires Dec 2028
Cloud Computing Concepts Amazon Web Services (AWS)
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Career Essentials in Generative AI

Microsoft · LinkedIn

Generative AI
Issued Jun 2026
Prompt Engineering AI for Business +1 more
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Ethics in the Age of Generative AI

LinkedIn

AI Ethics
Issued Jun 2026
Artificial Intelligence (AI) Responsible AI +2 more
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Foundations of Cybersecurity

Google

Security
Issued Aug 2023
Cybersecurity
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Certificate in Digital Animation & Media Arts

Victor Valley College

Creative & Media Arts
Earned 2000
Digital Animation Media Arts Visual Storytelling

Currently preparing: Dynatrace Associate · Terraform · Python · Cloud infrastructure · Observability labs

Positioning

Why This Matters for Solutions Engineering

Sales Acumen

25 years of discovery, presentation, objection handling, coaching, and customer trust-building.

Technical Curiosity

Home lab systems, AWS, OpenTelemetry, Dynatrace Essentials, observability projects, and a continuous hands-on ramp.

Customer Pattern Recognition

Experience across automotive, insurance, training, business analysis, and high-consideration customer conversations.

AI-Assisted Execution

AI as leverage, not a substitute for judgment - structured, inspectable, and accountable workflows.

The through-line is practical translation: take ambiguity, identify the real constraint, and turn technical capability into business confidence.

One pattern, many expressions

How the Work Connects

Here’s the thread that ties all of it together - the deal, the demo, the film, the frame. None of these are random builds. They’re the same four moves, every time:

Find the signal. Reduce the noise. Make the system understandable. Help people act with confidence.

Notice the signal, understand the system, tell the story, earn the trust. That’s photography and it’s observability. It’s a sales call and it’s an incident review. In Solutions Engineering the job was never just knowing the tool - it’s reading the customer’s real pain, mapping it to the right path, making the value land, and being someone they trust in the room.

Signal

Find what matters in the noise - in telemetry, in data, in a customer conversation.

Systems

Understand how the pieces connect, where they fail, and why it matters.

Story

Explain complex things so people actually follow - and act.

Trust

Earn confidence through clarity, evidence, and follow-through.

Selected work

Things I've Built

Same four moves, different mediums. Each of these was a real problem I wanted solved - a mobile cockpit, a multi-model review system, a continuity engine for AI video - and each one shipped.

AI-assisted workflow governance & multi-model review system

RoundTable

A local-first Progressive Web App for coordinating multi-model AI work through phase gates, critique layers, review loops, and explicit state management - structured AI usage with human judgment still in control.

Why it matters

Shows AI fluency, process governance, and disciplined execution.

React TypeScript Vite PWA Local-First LLM Workflow

Native Android app · time-sensitive workflow execution

ApplyWindow

A native Android execution cockpit for time-sensitive workflows. It stages inputs, reminders, documents, checklists, and a live WebView into one mobile workspace, then records submission timing without ever auto-submitting. The point is disciplined preparation, human-in-the-loop execution, and reliable evidence under pressure.

Why it matters

Native Android engineering, human-in-the-loop AI use, workflow orchestration, and spec-driven delivery of a complete, shipped app.

Kotlin Jetpack Compose Room AlarmManager WebView Android

Windows desktop app · visual continuity for AI video

StoryBoard

A shipped Windows desktop app that treats visual continuity as state management for AI video production. It organizes storyboard keyframes, emotional beats, artifact bundles, and persistent 3D reference assets so each scene has a source of truth before it becomes an AI-generated shot.

Why it matters

Shows source-of-truth design for creative systems - using persistent references, scene order, and production state to reduce continuity drift and make AI video workflows easier to direct, review, and trust.

Electron React Three.js AI Video State Management 3D References

Ramping in public

Technical Learning Labs

And I’ll show you the early rungs too, not just the finished work. This is where the technical ramp started - built in public, one commit at a time.

Public build log · daily execution

10-Day Python Sprint

Ten consecutive days of Python, built and documented in public - one folder per day, from core syntax to a working CLI log-analysis tool. A timestamped trail of commits that shows real, progressive growth toward automation-adjacent work.

Why it matters

Consistency, public accountability, and daily execution - the same repeatable process behind the larger projects.

Python Daily Execution CLI Tooling JSON Refactoring Public Build

Foundational fluency

Python CLI / Log Analyzer Lab

An early self-directed Python lab: CLI design, parsing, branching logic, file handling, and debugging. Phase-gated learning with earned technical perspective - not tutorial-following.

Python CLI Logs Debugging Foundational Fluency

15+ years of hands-on

Home Lab & Systems Background

I’ve run personal systems and home lab environments for more than fifteen years - Windows, Linux, and FreeBSD / TrueNAS-style storage, media services, GPU systems, home networking, and local experimentation, including local AI.

I don’t present this as formal SRE experience. It’s evidence of long-running technical curiosity, troubleshooting discipline, and hands-on systems thinking - the habit of taking things apart, watching them fail, and putting them back together better.

Environment

Windows / Linux / FreeBSD Home networking Storage & media systems GPU experimentation Local AI experimentation Troubleshooting mindset

Perspective, in writing

Field Notes & Articles

When I’m working something out, I write it down. These are the notes where I think through observability, AI, and what customers are really buying.

Observability · Data Platforms

Snowflake × Observe and the Rise of Data-First Understanding

A reflection on what Snowflake’s Observe acquisition signals about AI-native, data-first observability - and the role of understanding in platform value.

Observability AI Data Platforms Technical Strategy

Data · Execution Systems

The Elephant in the Room: The Data Execution Layer

A field note on why data strategy cannot stop at storage, dashboards, or insight - the real leverage comes from connecting understanding to execution.

Data Execution Layer Systems Thinking Business Value

AI · Reasoning

DiffusionGemma, Memory Palaces, and the Shape of Thought

An exploration of text diffusion, pattern coherence, and what alternative model foundations may suggest about the future of language interfaces.

AI LLMs Reasoning Technical Writing

Seeing what matters

Visual Storytelling

I opened by saying everything I do well is storytelling. This is where it started literally - a Certificate in Digital Animation & Media Arts in 2000 - and it has shaped how I make complex systems clear ever since.

Photography is part of my technical storytelling practice. A good image demands both artistic instinct and systems thinking - light, timing, composition, constraint, and signal selection.

The same discipline shows up in Solutions Engineering: helping people see what matters.

Photography Portfolio

A visual body of work built on the same principles as customer-facing technical work: signal, composition, clarity, and story.

Get in touch

Let’s Connect

Open to Solutions Engineering conversations, demos, and technical storytelling problems worth solving.

Eric Harris·San Antonio, Texas·[email protected]