Engineering resilient enterprise infrastructure & exploring cloud & AI.
I’m Tony Herrera, a Systems Engineer focused on network infrastructure at Boehringer Ingelheim, where I’ve spent 7 years on the enterprise network and now specialize in wireless design and Operational Technology (OT) networking. Outside work, I build serverless systems on AWS with Terraform.
Projects & Architecture
A selection of cloud-native deployments, live small-business websites, and open-source tools.
Serverless Web Platform: Portfolio & Family Business Sites
One serverless architecture running three production sites: this portfolio and two websites for my family's Atlanta businesses.
- Static Next.js on CloudFront and S3, with forms running through API Gateway, Lambda, DynamoDB, and SES.
- Each site is an isolated Terraform stack in a shared AWS account, for about $0.50–3/month per site.
- Every submission is saved even if its email lands in spam; CORS, honeypots, throttling, and a CloudFront-only origin header keep bots out.
More details
One serverless architecture powering three production sites: tonyherrera.org and two websites for my family's Atlanta businesses, a luxury mobile bar caterer and a custom cabinetry shop. Each is a statically exported Next.js site distributed via CloudFront and S3, with form intake orchestrated through API Gateway, Lambda, DynamoDB, and SES, deployed as its own isolated Terraform stack in a shared AWS account. Site copy, prices, and business details live in typed content files, so updating a site never means touching layout code.
Key Outcome: Zero server maintenance and roughly $0.50–3/month per site. Every submission is saved to DynamoDB even if the email lands in spam, while strict CORS, honeypot fields, API throttling, and a CloudFront-only origin header keep bots out. One pricing file drives the catering site's package cards, comparison table, and live estimate calculator, and its deploy script refuses to publish while placeholder content remains.
Obsidian Plugins: Dictionary, Library & Watchlist Notes
Three open-source Obsidian plugins that turn lookups into notes built from your own templates: Dictionary Notes for words, idioms, and quotes; Library Notes for books; and Watchlist Notes for movies, TV shows, and anime.
- Dictionary Notes: definitions from Free Dictionary API, Wiktionary, or Merriam-Webster, Spanish from Wikcionario, idioms, and Wikiquote quotes with disputed or misattributed ones labeled.
- Library Notes: Open Library search by title, author, or ISBN with no API key (Google Books optional), covers saved in the vault, and a Dataview table of the whole library.
- Watchlist Notes: TV shows from TVmaze and anime from MyAnimeList with no API key, movies with a free TMDB or OMDb key, posters saved in the vault, and Dataview tables of everything you watch.
- 294 offline tests between them (103 + 67 + 124) that replay recorded API responses, CI on Node 22 and 24, provenance-attested release builds, and no note ever overwritten.
Dictionary Notes
In Obsidian's community directory
Library Notes
In Obsidian's community directory
Watchlist Notes
In Obsidian's community directory
More details
Dictionary Notes builds a dictionary in your vault from three kinds of lookups: definitions, idioms, and quotes. Pick a result from a filterable list and it becomes a note built from your own template. Definitions come from Free Dictionary API, Wiktionary, or Merriam-Webster, and Spanish words can be defined in Spanish from Wikcionario or explained in English, with suggestions for missing accents and base forms (corrí → correr). Idioms come from Wiktionary with forgiving search, and quotes from Wikiquote by keyword, author, or topic.
Library Notes keeps a library in your vault. Type a title, an author, or an ISBN, pick the book, and it creates a note from your template, saves the cover image in your vault so it shows offline, and lists the book in a library note with a Dataview table of all your books. Open Library works out of the box; Google Books is optional with your own free API key, and if one source fails or finds nothing the next one is tried. A command marks a book as read or unread, and another rebuilds the library table, even in a library note you made yourself.
Watchlist Notes does the same for movies, TV shows, and anime. TV shows come from TVmaze and anime from MyAnimeList (through Tenrai, with Jikan as a backup) with no account or API key, and movies from TMDB or OMDb with your own free key. Each title becomes a note with its poster saved in the vault, and a library note keeps Dataview tables of your movies, TV shows, and anime with watched status and where each one streams. Anime notes can be named by their English, romaji, or Japanese title.
Key Outcome: All three are listed in Obsidian's Community plugins directory, MIT-licensed, built in CI with build-provenance attestation, and covered by offline tests that replay recorded API responses (103, 67, and 124). Each falls back to a backup source automatically, explains offline and lookup errors in plain language, and never overwrites an existing note.
word: canción
part-of-speech: sustantivo femenino
phonetic: [kãnˈsjõn]
(Música) Composición musical que se canta.
About & Résumé
My story, work history, skills, and a one-page résumé to download.
Drone Lab
Gorilla Whoop Whoop: learning FPV on a 21-gram drone, from Linux firmware to a lot of crashes.
Screeps
An AI agent on my own server writing a Screeps bot: its build log, its safety rails, and the server itself.
Let's build something resilient together.
Whether you want to discuss enterprise networking architectures, AWS cloud automation, open-source ideas, or just talk tech and trails—drop me a line below or reach out directly.
Email Directly
herrera9604@gmail.comLocations
New Haven, CT • Atlanta, GA
Serverless Event Pipeline
Submissions hit an Amazon API Gateway HTTP API and are processed by AWS Lambda, which screens out bots with a honeypot field, stores each message in Amazon DynamoDB, and emails it to me through Amazon SES.