John Gabriel Martinez

Student

I am currently pursuing a B.S. in Computer Science at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, with experience in software engineering, frontend development, and interactive application design through academic and personal projects. I expect to graduate in Fall 2027.


Interests: Interactive Media, Game Development, UI/UX Design, Software Engineering, Cybersecurity, Web Application Development


Projects

Vintage Barbershop Responsive Webpage Spring 2026

A responsive business landing webpage built with React, Next.js, Bootstrap, and TypeScript to practice modern frontend development and UI design.

React Next.js Bootstrap TypeScript Responsive Design Frontend Development

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UH GameLink Spring 2026

A responsive web application designed to help University of Hawaiʻi students connect with other students through shared gaming interests.

Next.js React TypeScript Prisma PostgreSQL Playwright ESLint Vercel Software Engineering

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React Tic-Tac-Toe Game Spring 2026

An interactive Tic-Tac-Toe game built with React featuring adjustable board sizes, move history tracking, and a computer opponent.

React JavaScript CSS Game Development State Management Frontend Development

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Essays

Learning What Software Engineering Actually Means

06 May 2026

Introduction Before taking ICS 314, I mostly viewed software development as simply writing code that worked. My previous programming experience focused heavily on assignments completed individually, where the goal was usually to produce the correct output as efficiently as possible....

Software Engineering Agile Project Management Configuration Management Development Environments ICS 314

Learning Software Engineering Alongside AI

05 May 2026

I. Introduction Artificial intelligence has become increasingly common in education, especially in computer science and software engineering courses. Tools such as ChatGPT, GitHub Copilot, and other AI assistants are now capable of generating code, explaining concepts, debugging errors, and helping...

Artificial Intelligence Software Engineering ICS 314 ChatGPT Debugging TypeScript Next.js

The Work Behind The Work

28 Apr 2026

Guessing the Work Before Doing the Work Before working on UH GameLink, I viewed effort estimation as a rough guess rather than a real software engineering practice. It sounded simple in theory: look at an issue, predict how long it...

Effort Estimation Project Management Software Engineering AI Assistance

Building With Blueprints

25 Apr 2026

Patterns Hidden in Plain Sight When people first hear the phrase design patterns, it can sound more complicated than it really is. It brings to mind advanced theory, abstract diagrams, or secret techniques only senior engineers understand. In reality, design...

Design Patterns React Next.js Software Engineering

Final Project Proposal

30 Mar 2026

Proposers John Gabriel Martinez, Ella Self, Mason Vuong, Peyton Young, Tuan Do The Problem At UH Mānoa, a lot of students don’t have access to a car, but still need to run errands regularly. Whether it’s going to Costco, Walmart,...

Software Engineering Nextjs

UI Frameworks: Painful at First, Worth It Later

19 Feb 2026

The Part Nobody Talks About I’ll be honest: learning a UI framework felt like a pain in the ass at first. When we started using Bootstrap 5, it slowed me down a lot compared to just writing raw CSS. Instead...

Bootstrap 5 UI Frameworks Software Engineering

See all 10 essays