Join our small but mighty Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team on a critical, high-impact 6-month contract. We are seeking an exceptional Senior Software Engineer with deep expertise in Linux systems and OS packaging to spearhead a vital fleet-wide upgrade. This is a chance to make a lasting architectural contribution, ensuring the stability and performance of our core platform for years to come.

You will be embedded within a focused team responsible for the core health, scalability, and performance of our production environment. We value deep technical ownership, collaborative problem-solving, and continuous improvement. While your daily focus will be on execution, you will interact closely with various adjoining platform teams, including other highly senior engineers, making this role a fantastic opportunity to collaborate across the engineering organization.

About The Role

This 6-month contract role is a hands-on technical position focused on the complete lifecycle of our critical operating system upgrade. Your primary mission will be to ensure a seamless transition of our vast fleet of Virtual Machines from the current OS to the latest LTS release.

Responsibilities:
OS Package Development: Rapidly port, update, and package existing in-house and third-party software for compatibility with the newer Ubuntu operating system.
Packages include: PHP, PHP libraries/extensions, proprietary Golang applications, and self-hosted versions of tools like Apache2, cURL, Prometheus exporters, and various others.
Testing & Quality Assurance: Design and execute thorough functional and foundational compatibility tests to ensure the stability and completeness of all new OS packages before deployment.
Troubleshooting & Debugging: Proactively diagnose and resolve complex packaging, build, and integration issues, helping to minimize or eliminate downtime during the migration process. Ability to dig into systemd startup failures and co-located service dependencies will also be useful.
CI/CD Interaction: Modify existing CI/CD configurations (build and release pipelines) as necessary to successfully build, test, and release the new OS packages without disrupting the current production environment.
Collaboration: Work effectively with the SRE team and neighboring platform teams to integrate configuration management changes and resolve any inter-team dependencies.

Requirements

Senior-Level Linux Expertise: Minimum 7+ years of experience working with and deeply understanding Linux operating systems, preferably Ubuntu or Debian.
Deep OS Packaging Mastery: Demonstrated, hands-on experience in creating, maintaining, and troubleshooting complex OS packages (e.g., .deb, .rpm) for modern Linux distributions.
Polyglot Packaging Experience: Proven track record in packaging software across multiple languages/ecosystems, including PHP (libraries/extensions) and Golang applications.
Can hit the ground running, bringing a depth of experience that reflects true seniority in Linux systems engineering.
CI/CD Fluency: Strong working knowledge of CI/CD concepts and the ability to modify existing pipelines (e.g., Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Buildkite) for package build, test, and release processes.
Advanced Troubleshooting: Exceptional debugging and root-cause analysis skills for complex, system-level issues arising from OS, library, or package incompatibilities.

Preferred

Configuration Management Experience: Prior hands-on experience with Chef or a similar configuration management system (e.g., Puppet, Ansible).
Experience with monitoring and observability tools, particularly those like Prometheus and Grafana, and packaging their exporters.

Hours and Location:

M-F, 40 hours
This role is 100% remote

We offer a competitive salary range for this position. Most candidates who join our team are hired at the median of this range, ensuring fair and equitable compensation based on experience and qualifications.