Software Engineer II (Machine Configuration)

We want people who are passionate about designing and operating secure systems at scale

We are looking for an experienced, motivated, adaptable, empathetic systems engineer who is comfortable working remotely. You will report to the Engineering Manager of the Machines::Configuration team, and act as a contributor to the team’s various missions:

OS: Maintain DigitalOcean’s internal Ubuntu images + package archives

Chef: Help maintain and support DigitalOcean’s internal Chef ecosystem

Service Deployment: Help design new ways to deploy services quickly and safely to infrastructure systems using Nomad

Automated Maintenance: Help automate server maintenance using StackStorm, AWX, and Python

In addition to driving our primary missions forward, we do a lot of odd jobs. For example:

• We support other teams who build deb packages with our packaging expertise
• We help other teams produce GPU images by leaning on our imaging expertise
• We roll updates out to our entire fleet every quarter
• We maintain patched versions of system software, when necessary, and contribute those patches upstream where possible
• We participate in hack-a-thons and produce many important emojis

Our team has a big scope, but don’t let it deter you - we’re a group of kind folks. More than anything, we’re looking for someone empathetic, motivated, and driven to grow with us. Also, we’re looking to expand our team’s Chef expertise. If you have Chef experience, that’s a bonus!

DigitalOcean’s Internal Culture and Tooling:

DigitalOcean teams communicate primarily via Slack. Machines::Configuration makes light use of Jira and GSuite. We strive to make our work-life balance comfortable, and aim to scope work appropriately so that everyone works at a healthy pace. You can expect to be on-call periodically once you are ready, but shouldn’t expect to be paged often.

DigitalOcean’s observability platform comprises Prometheus, Grafana, Alertmanager, and Elasticsearch. Knowing any of these tools is a bonus, because every service at DO is generally expected to use this platform.

The Machines::Configuration group is an arm of the Infra::Fleet organization. We are aimed at boosting productivity by enabling our engineers to rapidly and reliably deliver software and configuration running on our infrastructure, while keeping our fleet homogenous. The Infra::Fleet group, supported by the Senior Director of Infrastructure Engineering, is made up of a diverse group of nearly sixty engineers located across the US, Canada, and Europe.

The Machines::Configuration group accounts for approximately 10% of the Infra::Fleet group. Within Machines::Configuration, there are growth opportunities along several tracks (i.e. Tech Leader, Subject Matter Expert (SME), Project Management, Engineering Manager, etc).

What You’ll Be Doing:

As an engineer, you will spend your day-to-day on:

• Writing and testing code, and deploying it from staging to production
• Participating in large multi-quarter projects and efforts
• Demonstrating your amazing work to tons of lovely engineers
• Participating in our work prioritization processes
• Responding to Slack messages & keeping up with various streams of conversation, including triaging user support requests
• Participating in company-wide hackathons
• Spending 5-20% of your time on innovation, education, or open source projects

For example, here are some things we’ve spent our time on in the past few years:

• Developed a new internal system that fully automated the reprovisioning of hypervisors
• Developed a new internal tool to generate a minimal Ubuntu image from scratch
• Wrote and upstreamed patches to Debian’s image build tooling (debootstrap)
• Backported an upstream systemd patch onto Ubuntu’s packages, building them internally
• Developed a dependency resolution validator based on Debian/Ubuntu’s tooling
• Worked with other teams to expose package installation status in our observability platform
• Supported the execution of upgrading our fleet from bionic to focal and jammy

What We’ll Expect From You:

If you don’t meet all of the expectations below, that’s okay! Submit an application, and be sure to include a cover letter telling us why you’d be a good fit for our team.

• Significant experience administering Linux servers
• Familiarity with deb packaging, archive administration or image building is a plus
• Moderate experience with Python, Ruby, or Golang
• Familiarity with git
• Familiarity with shell scripting
• Familiarity with continuous integration systems and concepts
• Familiarity with Github Actions or Concourse is a plus
• An interest in contributing work upstream
• Excellent written and verbal English communication skills
• Comfort executing in an asynchronous remote environment
• Transparency, honesty, and openness to constructive feedback
• A desire to work with a respectful and inclusive team

Why You’ll Like Working for DigitalOcean:

• We reward our employees. The base salary range for this position is between $150,000-$160,000 based on relevant years of experience and skills. The salary range for this role is specific to candidates located within the U.S. and will vary for candidates outside the U.S.. The salary range for this position is based on relevant years of experience and skills. Employees may qualify for a bonus in addition to base salary; bonus amounts are determined based on company and individual performance. We also provide equity compensation to eligible employees including grants of equity upon hire and the option to participate in our Employee Stock Purchase Program.
• We value development. You will work with some of the smartest and most interesting people in the industry. We are a high-performance organization that is always challenging our teams and employees to continuously grow. We maintain a growth mindset in everything we do and invest deeply in employee development through formalized mentorship and other internal programs. We provide all employees with reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and education.
• We care about your well-being. In addition to cash and equity compensation, we also offer employees a competitive array of benefits. In the United States, these include health insurance, flexible vacation, retirement benefits, a generous parental leave program, and additional resources to support employees' overall well-being. While the philosophy around our benefits is the same worldwide, specific benefits may vary in other countries due to local regulations and preferences.
• We value diversity and inclusivity. We are an equal opportunity employer and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

*This is a remote role

#LI-Remote