Kelly Kinkade
Software Engineer
Melrose Park, Illinois, United States
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolKelly Kinkade is a seasoned software engineer with 24 years of experience spanning backend development, network engineering, and IT consulting. Based in Melrose Park, Illinois, Kelly has deep hands-on experience improving systems at companies from Scalable Technologies to Quivern and IFC Credit, blending infrastructure, database analysis, and application development. A long-term open-source contributor to the DFHack project, Kelly has implemented C++, Lua, and Ruby changes that modify game mechanics and automate in-game workflows—demonstrating a knack for low-level memory-aware engineering and practical scripting. Comfortable across the stack, Kelly has driven persistence, data-structure enhancements, and automation features that show an eye for both performance and developer ergonomics. Colleagues would describe Kelly as a pragmatic problem-solver who turns niche technical challenges into reliable tooling.
24 years of coding experience
4 years of employment as a software developer
Indiana University School of LawPurdue University (West Lafayette)Bachelor; Associates, Bachelor; Associates at Indiana University
Github Skills (20)
c-language10
game-engine10
dwarf10
scripting10
game-dev10
dfu10
dfd10
ruby10
lua10
fortress10
modification10
dfm10
game-development10
cprogramming-language10
dfa10
Programming languages (8)
Github contributions (5)
DFHack/dfhack
Mar 2012 - Jan 2023
Memory hacking library for Dwarf Fortress and a set of tools that use it
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:204 reviews, 348 commits, 160 PRs in 10 years 11 months
Contributions summary:Kelly primarily focused on back-end development within the project, making significant changes to the Lua libraries and C++ code to improve the game engine's mechanics. Their work involved enhancing data structures by introducing new features, streamlining processing, and incorporating persistence mechanisms. Moreover, they implemented core changes to control the game, including adding support for new functionalities such as managing the map and creating additional features.
memorydwarfdfhackdwarf-fortressmemory-hacking
DFHack/scripts
Jul 2012 - Dec 2016
DFHack scripts
Role in this project:Backend Developer
Backend DeveloperContributions:34 reviews, 19 commits, 7 PRs in 4 years 6 months
Contributions summary:Kelly primarily contributed to scripting functionalities within the Dwarf Fortress Hack (DFHack) project. The commits show additions and modifications to Ruby and Lua scripts, enhancing gameplay with features like automated crop management, unit management (e.g., removing bad thoughts, fixing naked dwarves), and utility scripts for magma source creation, and job management. These scripts demonstrate a focus on modifying game logic, data manipulation, and automating in-game actions.
dwarf-fortressdfhack
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