The problem
I'm working toward AWS Solutions Architect Associate and the CompTIA certifications while running a household of five. Study time comes in ten-minute gaps, often somewhere without a good connection. Commercial prep is expensive, spread across sites, and rarely matches the current exam version.
- Short sessions that still move the needle.
- Works offline, on a phone or a laptop.
- Exam-accurate: current exam codes, questions tagged to the official exam domains.
- Tells me what to study next, instead of me guessing.
What I built
Library
Every course's modules and lessons, with a mini-quiz after each topic and a searchable course switcher.
Arena
Timed exam simulators for each certification, with pass thresholds and high scores.
Gym
Flashcards, an architecture lab of design scenarios, and sales role-play scenarios.
Smart Path
Progress across every track, and a link straight to your weakest exam domain.
Daily Flash + Sprint
Short daily lessons per track, plus a Kanban/Scrum "war room" for sprint practice.
Everywhere
An installable web app that works offline, an Android build, and an audio lecture script for every module.
Tracks: AWS SAA-C03 · CompTIA A+ (220-1201/1202) · Network+ (N10-009) · Security+ (SY0-701) · Cloud+ (CV0-004) · Professional Scrum Master I · Sales Engineering.
How it's built
- Courses are plug-ins. Each certification is one self-contained file. A loader finds and merges them at runtime, so adding a course needs no app code changes.
- Stable identities, not positions. Progress, links between modules and quiz history are keyed by course and module id. An early version keyed them by position, which would have silently scrambled everyone's progress the first time a course was reordered. I found that and fixed it.
- Questions tagged to the real exam domains, so Smart Path can find your weak area. When exams were revised (Network+ N10-009, A+ 220-1201, Cloud+ CV0-004) I re-labeled the content and filled domain gaps.
- Truly offline: no CDN, bundled fonts and a service worker, so it loads on a plane.
The honest part
I built all of this and then… didn't open it. More features weren't going to fix that, because the blocker was starting, not content.
So I brought the questions to me. The same question bank now feeds Jake, the AI from my Park Family OS. Every night at 20:00 he quizzes me in Discord, one track at a time, with spaced repetition that brings back what I missed. My study streak shows on the family kiosk, so my kids cheer me on.
The app became the library, and Jake became the coach. The conversations are where I learn, and the nightly quiz is where I prove it worked.
What it taught me
Solve the real problem. "Make the app better" was the wrong question. "Why don't I open it?" was the right one, and the answer wasn't in the app.
Design for change. Exams get revised every couple of years. Content that's modular and tagged to official domains survives that, and content that's hard-coded doesn't.