Laura Harker
Staff Software Engineer at Google
New York, New York, United States
Summary
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Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolLaura Harker is a Staff Software Engineer with 11 years of experience, currently improving the TypeScript–JavaScript developer experience and build pipeline at Google, including work on the Closure Compiler. She brings deep compiler and type-system expertise from substantial contributions to projects like tsickle (TypeScript→Closure translation) and google/closure-compiler, where she focused on type translation, code generation, and memory/performance optimizations. Previously she helped maintain large codebases and type annotations in the Closure Library and built backend systems at UC Berkeley, combining compiler internals know-how with practical web/backend engineering. Based in New York, she blends rigorous academic foundations in CS and applied math from UC Berkeley with hands-on infrastructure work that quietly prevents subtle type and build-time failures at scale.
11 years of coding experience
9 years of employment as a software developer
BA Computer Science Applied Mathematics, BA Computer Science Applied Mathematics at University of California, Berkeley
Stackoverflow
26reputation
32reached
1answer
0questions
Github Skills (20)
closure10
javascript10
transcode10
google-closure-compiler10
typescript10
type-annotations10
jsdoc10
code-generation10
compiler-design10
transpiler10
typescript-types10
typescripts10
java9
s69
performance-optimization9
Programming languages (7)
Github contributions (5)
google/closure-compiler
Jul 2017 - Jan 2023
A JavaScript checker and optimizer.
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:14 reviews, 1248 commits, 59 PRs in 5 years 6 months
Contributions summary:Laura primarily worked on improving the Closure Compiler, focusing on internal code refactoring and optimization of the compilation process. Their contributions include refactoring of type-related APIs, the removal of obsolete or redundant methods, and introducing various memory usage optimizations. They addressed bugs and performance issues related to class inheritance and method calls during compilation, improving the overall performance of type-based optimization.
javascriptclosure-compileroptimizationtypechecking
angular/tsickle
Mar 2020 - Jul 2022
Tsickle — TypeScript to Closure Translator
Role in this project:Back-end Developer & Compiler Engineer
Back-end Developer & Compiler EngineerContributions:8 commits, 2 PRs, 3 comments in 2 years 4 months
Contributions summary:Laura primarily contributes to the `tsickle` project, which is a TypeScript to Closure Translator. Their work involves fixing bugs related to the output of imported Closure types, refactoring the code to use TypeTranslator for `@extends` and `@implements` blocks, and marking function parameters with default values as optional. The contributions also include removing unnecessary externs in tests and improving code quality by escaping illegal JSDoc and addressing duplicate warnings. The user's focus is on improving type translation and code generation within the context of the TypeScript compiler.
tsickletypescript
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