01 / The source
Start with what is there.
ABS school enrolments, one published worksheet at a time.
| Year | Place | Sector |
|---|---|---|
| 2025 | SA | Government |
| 2025 | SA | Catholic |
Aaron Li · Data, systems & a little curiosity
Making sense
of data.
I connect the numbers, the systems and the people behind them — and build things that make work easier.
Choose your atmosphere. Then make yourself at home.
The stories behind the colours
Aaron’s pick. Blue meets gold. I’m a spark person by nature, so I borrow a little water and a little metal: water for learning, metal for structure — and yes, the occasional “well done” is lovely too. Think midnight water and antique gold: a little wisdom, a few good rules, and room to shine.
Ternus Red is a playful nod to John Ternus’s burgundy sweater at Apple’s September 2026 keynote and the iPhone 18 Pro Burgundy finish. Mate XT 2 Purple and Pura X Green take cues from Huawei’s Mate XT 2 and Pura X colourways. The other palettes borrow their mood from iPhone 17 Pro Cosmic Orange, a silver RIMOWA case, a midnight MacBook Air, iPhone 16 Ultramarine and Galaxy S25 Ultra Titanium Jadegreen. These are my own web palettes, not manufacturer colour specifications.
Apple Newsroom · Mate XT 2 · Pura X · Cosmic Orange · RIMOWA Silver · MacBook Midnight · Ultramarine · Galaxy Jadegreen
Avatar supplied by Aaron. Product images: Apple, Huawei, RIMOWA and Samsung, linked above. John Ternus photograph: Apple, via TechRadar’s 9 September event coverage.
A little room to unfold
A number is only the beginning.
Scroll to open a question, find the structure, and see what the numbers can tell you. Scroll back to fold it away.
Scroll to unfold, or take the controls.
Work, selected.
Four stories. Take a closer look.
Familiar on the surface.
Connected underneath.
I designed a shared application around how the team already worked.
Unanimous steering-group endorsement.
Explore the designA change here.
An impact over there.
I connected migration checks to reporting needs using metadata queries and diagrams.
Dependencies made visible to the delivery team.
Trace a changeSame filename.
Both applications kept.
I built a recruitment workflow around its users and the things that can go wrong.
Recruitment workflow in use.
Try an awkward scenarioShow the next step.
Keep the details private.
I made editable markers, arrows and covers in a tool colleagues already knew.
A reusable PowerPoint annotation toolkit.
See the toolkit in actionAbout me
Curious about systems.
Motivated by people.
I'm Aaron — a data science graduate with a commerce background, working across data and business processes in South Australian government.
I like the space between technical and business teams: understanding how people work, making the logic visible, and building something they can use and maintain.
A little more of the story
At the Department of Treasury and Finance, I work across data and business processes, from understanding reporting needs to improving repetitive work.
Before government, I worked across community data, industry research and start-up support in Australia and China. That mix keeps me interested in both the detail and the wider decision it informs.
What keeps me going?
Making work a little easier.
Making life a little happier.
Always learning
Foundations to build on.
Selected learning in data, programming and AI, applied alongside practical work.
About you
Enough about me.
Your turn.
A small detour into a different kind of pattern. Explore the Chinese Four Pillars tradition through your own birth date, with a little cultural context and a question to think about.
Let’s start with you ↗