This Portfolio, Powered by Its Own API

The idea

A portfolio for a backend-leaning developer has a chicken-and-egg problem: the best way to prove you can build reliable systems is to point at one - but a static site proves nothing. So I made the site itself the proof. Everything you see here - the projects, the tools, the live visitor stats, the contact form - is served by a REST API I built, deployed on infrastructure I configured. The portfolio is its own demo.

The stack

• Fastify + TypeScript for the API, with Drizzle and PostgreSQL for data.
• Zod schemas as a single source of truth - one schema validates each request, serializes the response, and generates the interactive OpenAPI docs, so the docs can never drift from the code.
• Next.js for the front end, rendering from the live API.

What a "real" API needs

Beyond the happy path, the API ships the things production systems actually require:

• Structured, request-scoped logging so every log line is traceable.
• Prometheus metrics and liveness/readiness probes for health and monitoring.
• Per-route rate limiting and SSRF protection on outbound-request tools.
• A full test suite (Vitest) that runs against a real Postgres in CI.
• A background worker driving the uptime monitor and WebSockets powering the live webhook inspector.

Deployment

The whole system is containerized with Docker Compose (web, API and database on one private network), fronted by nginx terminating TLS and routing / to the web app and /api to the API. App and database ports are bound to loopback so only nginx can reach them. HTTPS comes from Let's Encrypt, and a strict security-header policy earns the site an A on its own Endpoint Inspector tool. Shipping a change is a single command that rebuilds the images, runs migrations and swaps the containers in.

What it demonstrates

End-to-end ownership: schema design, a clean and documented API, security and observability baked in, a real test suite, and the full path from a container to a public HTTPS URL. You don't have to take my word for the backend - you can browse the live docs and see every endpoint.

I wrote about a couple of the patterns behind it: One Zod Schema, Three Jobs and Deploying a Full-Stack App to DigitalOcean.