MSc Software Engineering (Cum Laude) · Former Cisco Engineer · Building programming languages & tools
I'm a software engineer and researcher who loves figuring out how things work under the hood. I grew up in the Seattle area in a Dutch family, took every tech class I could, and never looked back.
- 🎓 MSc Software Engineering @ Universiteit van Amsterdam 🇳🇱 (Cum Laude, 8.2/10) · Thesis grade: 8.5/10
- 🎓 BSc Computer Science (minor Physics) @ McGill University 🇨🇦 (3.0/4)
- 💼 ~6 years of industry + research experience
- 📍 Currently based in Amsterdam · From Seattle → Montréal → Ottawa → Amsterdam
I've worked on build systems and tooling at scale (Cisco), designed programming languages and runtimes (Rust, CL0), and built exploratory programming environments (IGC). I care about performance, clean architecture, and making tools that developers actually enjoy using.
When I’m not coding, I’m into running 🏃, football ⚽, tennis 🎾, travel
Programming Languages (Strongest first):
Python Java TypeScript / JavaScript C# HTML / CSS Rust Bash Go C C++ Swift x64 Assembly PHP
Tools & Technologies:
React Node.js Express MySQL PostgreSQL MongoDB Tailwind Electron Unity SQL Kafka Git Unix
Infra / DevOps / CI/CD:
Jenkins Docker Kubernetes AWS Ansible GitHub Actions Terraform
Concepts:
Software Architecture Algorithms & Data Structures REST APIs RPC APIs Microservices Requirements Engineering Verification & Testing Agile / Software Process Database Design API Design Performance Optimization Distributed Systems DevOps & CI/CD Machine Learning Computer Networks Cloud Computing
Languages spoken: 🇺🇸 English (native) · 🇳🇱 Dutch (intermediate) · 🇫🇷 French (basic)
| Project | Description |
|---|---|
| IGC | Exploratory programming environment balancing IDEs and IPEs (research) |
| CL0 | Distributed, event-based programming language (Rust) |
| Attendunce | Attendance tracking app with cloud infra |
| Tablut AI | AI agent for the board game Tablut (course competition) |
| Mood.AI | Journal app with sentiment-based mood prediction |
| DrawMyThing | Multiplayer “guess what I’m drawing” game |
-
Bridging Incremental Programming and Complex Software Development in Modern Programming Environments
PAINT @ SPLASH 2024 · ACM -
Exploration and Complexity Management in Graph-based Programming Environments
PX @ <Programming> 2025 · OASIcs -
MSc thesis (same title as first paper) · UvA Scripties
Interests: exploratory programming environments, graph-based IDEs, programming languages for distributed/concurrent systems, declarative & reactive execution models.
- Research Engineer @ UvA — CL0 engine (Rust), IGC (React/Node/Electron), 2 papers
- Software Engineer @ Cisco — Build & UAT tooling for IOS-XE; perf and full-stack improvements
- Software Development Intern @ Holland America Group — Incident report analysis (Python, PostgreSQL, JS, PHP)
- CSUS Helpdesk Tutor @ McGill — CS tutoring; 5× TEAM Award
- HackMcGill — McHacks hackathon organizer; director in final year (led team of 27)
- Working on research projects (partly with UvA).
- Open to software engineering and research roles. If you’re hiring or want to collaborate, say hi!
- Site: maxboksem.com — resume & contact
- LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/maxboksem
- GitHub: @MaxMB15
“How much throughput can we really get?” — always worth finding out.