Fast, durable websites from the Last Best Place
I'm Joel Wilson, a frontend engineer in Helena. For the past nine years I've designed and built websites and apps for watershed councils, trail crews, trout chapters, restaurants, and publishers across Montana, in React, Next.js, TypeScript, and WordPress.
JHW Development LLC Helena, Montana 46.59° N, 112.04° W
Client work
All 24 projectsHow I work
- Accessible by default
- I build to WCAG 2.2 AA: semantic HTML, keyboard and screen-reader testing, axe and Lighthouse checks, sufficient color contrast, alt text, and captions.
- Easy for your staff to update
- Sites run on a content management system, usually WordPress, so the people who know the content can change it themselves.
- Fast on any connection
- Lean pages and optimized images that load quickly on phones and rural connections.
From the lab
Side projects and tools I build to try new things.
- 2026yAzzIA retro-styled browser dice game with twelve ways to play Yahtzee, from the classic to Triple, Kismet, Yatzy, and the 1938 Yacht. Rules, stats, nothing to install.
- 2026Media DownloaderA self-hosted web app that wraps yt-dlp. Paste a link and the file goes into a media library like Jellyfin, to the device you're browsing from, or both. Downloads run on the server with live progress, so you can close the tab and check in from any other device.
- 2026MoshTubeA browser VJ tool that blends two YouTube videos with SVG-filter effects and CSS blend modes. One button, Mosh Me Daddy, pulls new videos from a hand-picked pool and rolls a whole new look; underneath it is a full mixer with effect stacks, a tempo-synced crossfader, a third layer of WebGL patterns and Lottie animations, MIDI learn, and a pop-out output for a second screen. The whole mix lives in the URL, so a shared link opens that exact look with a button to mosh it.
- 2025Barkley PartyAn audio-reactive 3D visualizer built in Three.js: a cartoon dog dances in space while the background shifts from blue to red with the music's volume and bass, and gold crowns drift through the scene.
Have a project in mind?
Tell me a little about your organization and what the site needs to do. Email is the best way to reach me.



