Software Engineer III · Bangalore, India
Riya Sharma
Software engineer with 5 years of experience shipping across the stack — web, mobile, open source, and the AI systems in between. These days that means being a core engineer on RapidNative, turning prompts into real mobile apps; before that, design systems and GlueStack UI at GeekyAnts. I write about the engineering behind it.
5 yrs shipping web & mobile · 1,500+ commits across RapidNative · open-source contributor: browser-metro, Lifo, GlueStack UI
## featured work
RapidNative ↗
The fast, collaborative AI-native mobile app builder. Real mobile apps from a prompt — native device capabilities, real-time collaboration, clean Expo code export, and publishing to the App Store and Play Store. I own the editor, orchestration, support and global-services areas.
orchd ↗
Open-source, self-hosted, scale-to-zero workload orchestrator (a Fly.io alternative) that runs RapidNative's cloud dev environments: one Go daemon, Docker + gVisor isolation, a hostname per workload, ~0.9 s wake from idle. I own its integration into RapidNative.
Read the write-up →Lifo ↗
Open-source browser-native operating system in TypeScript (537+ GitHub stars): Unix-like shell, virtual filesystem, 60+ commands. I've landed 50 commits — the tunnel command with WebSocket HMR proxying, the browser-metro bundler integration and its web-preview fixes, and a run of @lifo-sh/core releases.
browser-metro / reactnative-run ↗
Open source: run React Native in your browser — write, bundle and preview with HMR, Expo Router and npm support, all client-side. browser-metro is the Metro-inspired bundler, rnrun a drop-in for the Expo dev server. I shipped web shims for native-only packages, Metro-parity error semantics, TS/Flow-aware error reporting and bundle-cache invalidation across 88 commits and releases 1.0.8 → 1.5.3.
RapidNative Deployment Service
Node/Express service that snapshots a generated project and builds it for real devices — EAS cloud APK and store builds, <slug>.rapidnative.app preview domains, Expo Go dev hosts, and env injection into served bundles.
tinbase ↗
Supabase-compatible backend in a single Node binary (auth, PostgREST, storage, realtime) that gives every RapidNative runtime its own database. I wired it into the editor for full-stack projects, and into cloud dev workspaces — migrate/seed self-healing, stable keys in generated Expo env, and env injection into served bundles.
GlueStack UI ↗
Open-source universal component library for React & React Native (5,000+ GitHub stars) — helped build components and frontend architecture during my time at GeekyAnts.
riyasharma.dev ↗
This site. Next.js 16 App Router with an MDX blog, per-post Open Graph images, RSS feed and sitemap, light/dark theming, and a resume that renders from one data file to both the web page and a headless-Chrome PDF.
Aqua Delivery Hub
Water-delivery platform I built independently (2021-22) with three role-based portals — customers ordering refills, delivery partners managing orders and routes, and an admin dashboard overseeing orders and partners.
## latest writing
orchd is the open-source orchestrator behind RapidNative's cloud dev environments. One Go daemon, one hostname per workload, suspended when idle, awake in about a second. Here's the model in three diagrams, and what it taught me about building on top of it.
Everyone is racing to make AI agents write more code. Working on RapidNative taught me the opposite lesson — generation is cheap, and knowing the code actually works is the hard part.
Why this site exists and what I'll write about here.
## about
I started building for real users in college — a water-delivery platform I designed and shipped solo — then joined GeekyAnts in 2022 and grew into a Software Engineer III, going from building design systems and helping build GlueStack UI (open source) to owning the editor, orchestration, support and global-services areas of RapidNative, where my code runs every time someone turns a prompt into a working mobile app.
What gets me excited is the layer most people never see: how a React Native bundle runs inside a browser, how an LLM agent decides what code to write, how a billing system stays honest, how an APK gets built and shipped from a cloud workspace. I like owning problems end to end — the feature, the infra under it, and the edge cases nobody wrote down.
Off the clock, I'm usually building something anyway — side projects, or pushing new AI coding tools to their limits to see where they actually break. Punjab raised me, Bangalore keeps me busy.
## what i do
AI-powered products
LLM pipelines end to end — multi-provider routing, agent prompts and tool semantics, prompt-to-app code generation, streaming (SSE) previews, and metering what every generation costs.
React Native, deeply
Beyond screens: an in-browser Metro-compatible bundler, web shims for native-only packages, Expo SDK fleet upgrades, and EAS pipelines that ship real APKs and store builds.
Platform engineering
The unglamorous parts that make products trustworthy — billing and credits, preview domains, cloud dev workspaces, deployment pipelines, admin and support tooling, and design systems.
## toolbox
Frontend & Mobile
AI & Tooling
Backend & Data
Developer Tools
edu: B.E. Computer Science Engineering · Chitkara University · 2023
## experience
Software Engineer III · Shaper Studio IncOct 2025 - Present▸
- ▸Core engineer on RapidNative, an AI-native mobile app builder used by 30,000+ users to generate 39,000+ React Native apps; top contributor with 1,500+ commits across the Next.js platform, in-browser bundler, deployment service and orchestrator.
- ▸Own four platform areas end to end — Editor, cloud runtimes (orchd workload orchestration on Docker + gVisor), Support tooling and Global Services — leading technical design, setting engineering standards and mentoring engineers on AI-assisted workflows.
- ▸Built the editor's core: in-browser app preview (Lifo virtual OS in an iframe, browser-metro bundler tooling), multi-artboard design canvas, SSE-streamed code generation, and one-click cloud dev preview on scale-to-zero container workloads.
- ▸Designed and shipped the billing and credits system on Stripe for hundreds of paying teams: 140,000+ AI generations metered, admin-configurable pricing, discounts, refunds and top-ups.
- ▸Open-source contributor across RapidNative's public stack: 88 commits and releases 1.0.8 → 1.5.3 on browser-metro / reactnative-run, the in-browser React Native bundler (web shims, Metro-parity error semantics, regression suite); own the integration of orchd, the scale-to-zero orchestrator.
Software Engineer II · GeekyAnts India Pvt LtdAug 2024 - Sep 2025▸
- ▸Architected and contributed to Shaper Studio, an AI-powered platform for automated app generation; joined RapidNative in its first months with 180+ commits to the editor, chat, preview iframe and HMR pipeline.
- ▸Designed and implemented AI-driven features via REST APIs and built scalable frontend applications in Next.js, React and TypeScript.
- ▸Optimized global state management with Redux, cutting unnecessary re-renders and strengthening frontend-backend integration for AI workflows.
Software Engineer · GeekyAnts India Pvt LtdAug 2023 - Jul 2024▸
- ▸Helped build GlueStack UI, GeekyAnts' open-source universal component library for React and React Native (5,000+ GitHub stars), on frontend architecture and components.
- ▸Developed and scaled reusable design systems for Applaunchkit, GeekyAnts' app starter kit.
- ▸Refactored and optimized legacy frontend systems; raised code quality through code reviews and shared component standards.
Software Developer Intern · GeekyAnts India Pvt LtdMay 2022 - Jul 2023▸
- ▸Built a Spotify-inspired full-stack application with React and Firebase: authentication, real-time data and dynamic UI components.
- ▸Implemented backend features and REST APIs in Laravel and PHP.
Freelance Full-Stack Developer · IndependentOct 2021 - Apr 2022▸
- ▸Designed and built Aqua Delivery Hub solo: a water-delivery platform with three role-based portals (customer ordering, delivery-partner routing, admin dashboard).
- ▸Owned the full stack: React + Vite frontend, Firebase authentication and Firestore data model, shadcn/ui and Tailwind CSS component layer.
Let's build something.
Open to interesting problems in developer tools, React Native, and AI-powered products. The fastest way to reach me is email.