Senior Software Engineer, Distributed Databases
About the role
In this role, you will own the distributed database systems that run across Cloudflare's edge network and power services such as R2, Durable Objects, and Workers KV.
- Add new features and extensions to the database to meet the needs of R2, Durable Objects, and Workers KV
- Hold the bar on correctness through code review, testing, and staged rollout so defects are caught before customer impact
- Tune performance and resource utilization across staged rollouts and production
- Optimize data placement and replication for our edge topology, and partner with service teams on schema design and query performance
- Build the observability and tooling that make the database supportable across its consumers
Responsibilities
You can expect to interact with a variety of languages and technologies including Go, Rust, Saltstack, and Terraform.
- Add new features and extensions to the database to meet the needs of R2, Durable Objects, and Workers KV
- Hold the bar on correctness through code review, testing, and staged rollout so defects are caught before customer impact
- Tune performance and resource utilization across staged rollouts and production
- Optimize data placement and replication for our edge topology, and partner with service teams on schema design and query performance
- Build the observability and tooling that make the database supportable across its consumers
Requirements
Source-code level experience contributing to a distributed database or distributed storage system. Examples include distributed SQL databases (CockroachDB, TiDB / TiKV, YugabyteDB, Spanner), Raft-based or Paxos-based storage systems (etcd, FoundationDB), wide-column stores (Cassandra, ScyllaDB), document databases (MongoDB), or comparable systems
- Strong programming skills in Go, Rust, C++, or another systems language, with a willingness to be productive in Go for this role
- Deep understanding of distributed systems concepts: consensus protocols (Raft or Paxos), data replication, MVCC, transaction isolation levels, fault tolerance, and partition tolerance
- Experience reading, debugging, and modifying complex codebases under correctness constraints (concurrency, durability, consistency)
- Familiarity with LSM-tree storage engines (RocksDB, LevelDB, Pebble, SlateDB) or comparable storage internals
- Familiarity with storage fundamentals: block devices, filesystems, SSD characteristics
- Experience building and maintaining high-throughput, low-latency systems
- Understanding of network fundamentals as they relate to distributed storage: bandwidth constraints, latency tradeoffs, cross-datacenter replication
- Experience with infrastructure configuration tooling and infrastructure as code
- Experience with monitoring tools (Prometheus, Grafana) and analytics tools (Clickhouse) for operating production database systems
- Strong written and verbal communication skills and ability to explain technical decisions clearly
- Comfortable operating in fast-paced environments with tight deadlines and evolving priorities
Desirable Skills, Knowledge, And Experience
Source-code level experience contributing to a distributed database or distributed storage system. Examples include distributed SQL databases (CockroachDB, TiDB / TiKV, YugabyteDB, Spanner), Raft-based or Paxos-based storage systems (etcd, FoundationDB), wide-column stores (Cassandra, ScyllaDB), document databases (MongoDB), or comparable systems
- Strong programming skills in Go, Rust, C++, or another systems language, with a willingness to be productive in Go for this role
- Deep understanding of distributed systems concepts: consensus protocols (Raft or Paxos), data replication, MVCC, transaction isolation levels, fault tolerance, and partition tolerance
- Experience reading, debugging, and modifying complex codebases under correctness constraints (concurrency, durability, consistency)
- Familiarity with LSM-tree storage engines (RocksDB, LevelDB, Pebble, SlateDB) or comparable storage internals
- Familiarity with storage fundamentals: block devices, filesystems, SSD characteristics
- Experience building and maintaining high-throughput, low-latency systems
- Understanding of network fundamentals as they relate to distributed storage: bandwidth constraints, latency tradeoffs, cross-datacenter replication
- Experience with infrastructure configuration tooling and infrastructure as code
- Experience with monitoring tools (Prometheus, Grafana) and analytics tools (Clickhouse) for operating production database systems
- Strong written and verbal communication skills and ability to explain technical decisions clearly
- Comfortable operating in fast-paced environments with tight deadlines and evolving priorities