Krish
Shah
Product Engineer · Systems Builder
Second-year CS student who learns by shipping real internet products. I build systems people actually use — prediction platforms, gamified learning, engagement engines. I obsess over user behavior, product engagement, and system architecture.
Crictalx Polls
Fantasy Cricket Prediction & Gamification Platform
Started as a friend group manually creating prediction polls every IPL match day. Highest scorer, top wicket taker, match winner. Every single day, manually.
The repetition was painful. So I automated it. Then kept building — confidence scoring, streak bonuses, reward boosts, analytics. What started as a group chat solution became a full gamification platform with 2,847 votes and active daily usage.
Product Screens
System Evolution
Engineering Decisions
Why Flask over Django?
Needed minimal overhead for rapid iteration. Django's ORM was overkill for SQLite + manual query patterns I was already comfortable with.
Why SQLite in production?
At 50 concurrent users, SQLite handles the load. WAL mode + connection pooling. Will migrate to Postgres when it actually becomes a bottleneck, not before.
Feature Set
BrainBrew
Multiplayer Gamified Learning PlatformMultiplayer quiz ecosystem with real-time quiz battles, XP progression, and performance analytics. Built to make studying competitive and addictive.
260+ users in 48 hours. First time building real-time multiplayer state management. The matchmaking logic was rewritten three times.
WanderLux
wanderlux.kreesh.me →Frontend craft exercise. Cinematic scroll transitions, immersive destination layouts, interactive trip calculator.
SpiceGarden
spicegarden.kreesh.me →ASP.NET learning project. Admin panels, reservation flows, role-based auth, responsive design with jQuery Mobile.
Observations from Building
Things I learned by shipping, not by reading.
“Users don't read instructions”
When I launched Crictalx, I wrote detailed guides for every feature. Nobody read them. I redesigned the entire flow to be self-explanatory. Usage went up 3x.
— learned shipping crictalx v1.0, march 2024Gamification needs real stakes
Adding XP and badges to BrainBrew didn't change behavior. Adding confidence scoring — where you stake points on your certainty — did. People need skin in the game.
— brainbrew, april 2024Ship the ugly version first
Crictalx v1 was a single Flask route with hardcoded polls. It was embarrassing. But my friends used it daily. That feedback loop taught me more than any tutorial.
— crictalx v0.1, february 2024Streaks are underrated
Adding a streak counter to Crictalx increased daily return rate significantly. People came back not because of new features, but because they didn't want to break their streak.
— crictalx v1.3, may 2024Architecture evolves, not designed
I tried to design the perfect database schema before writing any code. Rewrote it three times anyway. Now I start messy and refactor once I understand the actual data patterns.
— crictalx v2.0, 2025The best features come from complaints
Share cards, reward boosts, and analytics dashboard — all came from friends complaining about something missing. Real users generate better roadmaps than planning sessions.
— all projects, ongoingSystems Patterns I Gravitate Toward
Types of Problems I Enjoy
Current Workbench
Crictalx 2.0
active — 65%Scoring engine rewrite, team leagues, analytics overhaul
ML Fundamentals
learning — 30%Regression, classification, neural nets. Building to understand.
Deployment Pipeline
experimenting — 40%Docker, CI/CD, automated deploys for all live projects
Student OS
planning — 15%Productivity system for how CS students actually work
Currently
Say something
Project ideas, opportunities, or just systems talk.