~/alex-stout
Alex Stout
Dad · engineer · the guy who opens up the broken thing
I build stuff — for work, for clients, and for the four people I live with. Half my projects start with one of my kids asking “why does it do that?” and end with us elbow-deep in something on the kitchen table.
Web apps and AI tools by day. Home videos, science fair projects, and a house full of sensors the rest of the time. It’s pretty much all the same itch.
$ whoami
Most of my best projects start with one of my kids asking “why?”
Salt Lake City, married, two kids. Our house is the lab — Home Assistant running the place, a Raspberry Pi watching the garden, and whatever the current science-fair experiment is taking over the dining room. When the dryer quit, the kids and I pulled it apart with a multimeter and a YouTube video instead of buying a new one. (It was the thermal fuse. We won.)
I’ve been a software engineer for 13+ years — I’m the guy behind the Goal Zero app and the connected Yeti power stations — but honestly the projects I love most have my kids’ fingerprints on them. Sometimes literally.
$ ls ~/projects
Stuff we’ve built
Everlife Media
2024 — PresentMy own studio for turning life’s moments into media families keep — documentary memorial films, tape/photo digitization, and bespoke event-experience tech. Started with a film for my dad.
bensfilm.live
2024A living memorial site for my dad’s video work — the project that became the heart of Everlife. Documentary-style storytelling, published for family to keep forever.
Oscars Party App
2023A live ballot + leaderboard webapp for Oscar-night parties — pick winners, score in real time, talk trash with friends. Built for fun, used every February.
The Home Lab
OngoingMy house is a test bench: Home Assistant tying it all together, ESP32 + Raspberry Pi sensors and automations, HomeKit/Matter everywhere. Where I prototype the IoT ideas that show up in client work.
$ tail -f devlog
Latest writing
// Devlog launching soon. In the meantime — follow /blog.
$ echo $CONTACT
Got a project, a weird problem, or a box of old home videos?
I like building things and I like figuring things out — for work or just because. If you’ve got something fun, something broken, or some tapes you’ve been meaning to save, say hi.