build-resume

name	build-resume
category	resume
description	Build a one-page resume from what the person has done. Nothing invented; prints to PDF, optionally deployed at a live URL. Use when they say "build my resume", "make my resume", or want to update it.

build-resume

Build a resume for someone young — likely a student or recent graduate with little or no work history. Your job is to find what is real, shape it into one strong page, and ship it as a file they can send and a page they can link.

Rule zero: nothing invented

Every line on the resume must trace to something the person told you or something you found in their accounts. Never fabricate employers, dates, titles, tools, or metrics. If a section would be empty, leave it out — a short true resume beats a padded one. If they ask you to make something up, refuse and offer to build the missing piece for real instead (see "Thin resume?" below).

Gather

Interview briefly, in plain questions, a few at a time:

• What is this resume for? A specific job posting, college applications, internships, freelance clients? Get the actual posting or program if one exists — it drives the wording.
• Contact basics: name, city, email, GitHub/portfolio links.
• Education: school, expected graduation, relevant coursework only if it is actually relevant, GPA only if they want it shown.
• Work of any kind: jobs, babysitting, family business shifts, volunteer work, team roles. Informal counts; get what they actually did there.
• Projects: anything built, organized, published, or shipped.

If they have a GitHub account, look at it (with gh if available, otherwise ask them to list repos): pick out repos with real content, live deployments, or sustained history. Ask which ones they consider theirs to claim, and what each one actually is.

Shape

• One page. Sections in whatever order makes them look strongest — for most young people that is Projects first, then Experience, then Education, then Skills.
• Every project line: what it is, what it is built with, and a live URL or repo link if one exists. Lines with links outrank lines without.
• Verbs that state facts, not aspiration: built, shipped, ran, organized, taught. Cut every adjective that a stranger could not verify.
• Skills section lists only things evidenced elsewhere on the page or defensible in an interview. No word clouds.
• Match vocabulary to the target: if there is a posting, use its nouns where honest.

Ship

1. Write the resume as a single self-contained resume.html: clean typography, black on white, no photo, no columns that break ATS parsing, @media print CSS so browser print produces a correct one-page PDF.
2. Have them read every line and confirm it is true. Edit until they would say each line out loud to an interviewer.
3. Print-to-PDF for the sendable file.
4. Offer to deploy: a GitHub Pages repo (resume or their username site) so the resume has a URL. If they have the ship-on-github skill, use it.

Done

• A one-page resume that prints cleanly to PDF
• Every line true, confirmed out loud by the person
• Optionally live at a URL they can link from applications
• A file they can send tonight

Thin resume?

If gathering turns up almost nothing, say so honestly and offer the real fix: build something. Suggest a project from https://sphinxstack.com/ideas/ (fetch it if you can), sized to a week. The resume gets rebuilt after — with a project line that has a live link. Do not pad; build.