Colin McDonnell
📍 Open Source · TypeScript validation that feels like native language syntax
Who
We don't know much about Colin McDonnell's personal story yet, but his approach to API design reveals someone who thinks deeply about developer experience. His work on Zod shows a programmer who understands that validation code shouldn't feel like a chore.
The Moment
McDonnell saw TypeScript developers writing validation logic twice — once for runtime checks and again for type definitions. He built Zod to collapse that duplication into a single, elegant declaration that works at both compile time and runtime.
What It Does
Zod lets you describe the shape of your data once, then automatically validates incoming data against that schema while providing TypeScript types. If you say a user has a name and email, Zod ensures the data actually matches that structure and gives your editor perfect autocomplete.
Impact
With 89,241,227 weekly downloads, Zod has become the validation library of choice for modern TypeScript applications. It's powering data validation in everything from small startups to major enterprise applications, handling millions of API requests every day.
Connections
Zod has become a foundational piece of the modern TypeScript stack, integrated into frameworks like tRPC and used by countless libraries that need rock-solid data validation. It's the kind of tool that makes other tools possible.