Colin Mcewan
Staff Compiler Engineer at MediaTek USA Inc.
City of Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolColin Mcewan is a Staff Compiler Engineer based in Edinburgh with 17 years of experience designing and implementing compiler technology and processor-aware toolchains across semiconductor leaders including MediaTek, MStar, Analog Devices and Broadcom. He combines deep expertise in microarchitecture synthesis and compiler backends—grounded in PhD-level research—with pragmatic production engineering on complex SoC toolchains. Colin contributes to open-source projects like the Hydrogen drum machine, where he’s improved UI consistency and audio engine performance, reflecting a rare blend of low-level systems skill and user-facing sensitivity. Known for tackling tricky bugs such as instrument remapping and missing-sample handling, he focuses on reliable, high-performance implementations that matter in real hardware and software stacks. Outside engineering he’s an aviation and space enthusiast, drummer, and committed community contributor, which informs a collaborative and curious approach to problem solving.
17 years of coding experience
10 years of employment as a software developer
PhD (cand), Microarchitecture Synthesis (computer architecture), PhD (cand), Microarchitecture Synthesis (computer architecture) at The University of EdinburghBEng, Electronics and Software Engineering, BEng, Electronics and Software Engineering at University of Glasgow
Github Skills (7)
debug10
c-language10
cprogramming-language10
ui-design10
qt10
audio9
mach8
Programming languages (9)
Github contributions (5)
hydrogen-music/hydrogen
Sep 2019 - Dec 2022
The advanced drum machine for Linux, macOS, and Windows
Role in this project:
Full-stack Developer
Full-stack DeveloperContributions:5 releases, 87 reviews, 344 commits in 3 years 4 months
Contributions summary:Colin primarily contributed to the user interface and functionality of the drum machine application. They focused on integrating various components of the pattern editor, including the ruler, piano roll, and instrument list, connecting their scroll events to the main scroll bar for consistent UI interaction. They also addressed several bug fixes, including fixing issues with instrument remapping and providing better handling for song data with missing samples and also improved performance by optimizing the underlying audio engine.
git-repositorydrummidiopen-sound-controldrum-machine
MediaTek-Labs/llvm-project
Apr 2021 - Apr 2024
The LLVM Project is a collection of modular and reusable compiler and toolchain technologies. Note: the repository does not accept github pull requests at this moment. Please submit your patches at http://reviews.llvm.org.
Contributions:47 reviews, 28 PRs, 85 pushes in 3 years
compilerscompilationtechnologiesclangsubmit
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