Infrastructure Software Engineer, Metadata Services
Dropbox
full-timePythonRustJava
Dropbox
Originally posted at greenhouse · Apply on the company's site for the best experience.
<h2>Role Description</h2> <div>As a Software Engineer on the Metadata team, you’ll build and operate the large-scale distributed databases that every Dropbox service depends on. Metadata systems are mission-critical, in the live path for all user operations and must meet stringent requirements for latency, durability, and transactional consistency.</div> <div> </div> <div>You’ll design and evolve the core infrastructure that manages Dropbox’s databases at scale, enabling fast, reliable access to data for millions of users and hundreds of internal services. This work spans distributed systems, replication, caching, and transactional database systems.</div> <div> </div> <div>You’ll collaborate closely with engineers across Infrastructure and Product teams to ensure the metadata layer meets business needs and continues to scale with Dropbox’s growth. This is an opportunity to leverage your expertise in distributed systems and grow into broader technical leadership.</div> <div> </div> <div><span class=" author-d-16z86ztz122z98z81zz82zz85zunv3z82zpqfnlamz84zz82z1lz85zz72zz76zwmz68zz71z5r6ijz83zqxz67zz74zz83zpkbz72z"><span class=" author-d-iz88z86z86za0dz67zz78zz78zz74zz68zjz80zz71z9iz90z95lz89zy6z71zz79zz84zz68zyz69zupz72zz79zcz69zz76zkz79zp1z66ztz67zxz71zz89zz86zz71z">Our Engineering Career Framework is </span><span class="attrlink url author-d-iz88z86z86za0dz67zz78zz78zz74zz68zjz80zz71z9iz90z95lz89zy6z71zz79zz84zz68zyz69zupz72zz79zcz69zz76zkz79zp1z66ztz67zxz71zz89zz86zz71z"><a class="attrlink" href="https://dropbox.github.io/dbx-career-framework/" target="_blank" data-target-href="https://dropbox.github.io/dbx-career-framework/"><u>viewable by anyone outside the company</u></a></span><span class=" author-d-iz88z86z86za0dz67zz78zz78zz74zz68zjz80zz71z9iz90z95lz89zy6z71zz79zz84zz68zyz69zupz72zz79zcz69zz76zkz79zp1z66ztz67zxz71zz89zz86zz71z"> and describes what’s expected for our engineers at each of our career levels. Check out our blog post on this topic and more </span><span class="attrlink url author-d-iz88z86z86za0dz67zz78zz78zz74zz68zjz80zz71z9iz90z95lz89zy6z71zz79zz84zz68zyz69zupz72zz79zcz69zz76zkz79zp1z66ztz67zxz71zz89zz86zz71z"><a class="attrlink" href="https://dropbox.tech/culture/sharing-our-engineering-career-framework-with-the-world" target="_blank" data-target-href="https://dropbox.tech/culture/sharing-our-engineering-career-framework-with-the-world">here</a></span><span class=" author-d-iz88z86z86za0dz67zz78zz78zz74zz68zjz80zz71z9iz90z95lz89zy6z71zz79zz84zz68zyz69zupz72zz79zcz69zz76zkz79zp1z66ztz67zxz71zz89zz86zz71z">.</span></span></div> <h2>Responsibilities</h2> <ul> <li>Design and maintain distributed database systems providing low-latency, strongly consistent data access</li> <li>Implement and optimize replication, consensus, and caching mechanisms to meet availability and performance goals</li> <li>Operate production systems, including participating in the on-call rotation, ensuring high availability and data durability</li> <li>Collaborate with infrastructure and product teams to assess current and future use cases and requirements, supporting the development of a mid- to long-term roadmap that reflects these needs</li> <li>Contribute to system design reviews, postmortems, and reliability improvements</li> <li>Write high-quality, efficient code in Go and Rust for performance-critical systems</li> </ul> <p>On-call work may be necessary occasionally to help address bugs, outages, or other operational issues, with the goal of maintaining a stable and high-quality experience for our customers.</p> <h2>Requirements</h2> <ul> <li>BS, MS, or PhD in Computer Science or related technical field involving coding (e.g., physics or mathematics), or equivalent technical experience</li> <li>5+ years of professional software development experience</li> <li>Experience designing and implementing software using distributed systems fundamentals: replication, consistency, partitioning, and fault tolerance</li> <li>Experience building databases, storage systems, or large scale data infrastructure</li> <li>Proficient in programming and debugging across a range of languages such as Python, Go, Rust, C/C++, or Java</li> <li>Familiarity with consensus and coordination systems <span class=" h-lparen">(e.g.</span> Raft, Paxos, ZooKeeper, etc)</li> <li>Strong debugging and performance analysis skills</li> </ul> <h2>Preferred Qualifications</h2> <ul> <li><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qowz82zfwz66zwgz76zz77zz88zoz67zz83z1z87zpoz80zz84zsz83zx8z67zz66zz84zz76zz74z7z83zz72zz86z">Familiarity with Semaphores and Mutexes</span></li> <li>Experience building distributed databases or storage systems</li> <li>Practical experience with and deep understanding of data structures used in storage systems <span class=" h-lparen">(e.g.</span> LSM trees, B-trees, Hash Indexes)</li> </ul> <div> <h2><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qowz81zz86z7z65z9wz73z7z75z6emz81zz70z4oz65zrz86z4dnz72ztz67zvoz67zl91">Durable Skills</span></h2> </div> <p><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu">AI fluency means using these tools to </span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu"><em>amplify</em></span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu"> human judgment, not replace it. We believe people with these skills will thrive as work and technology</span> <span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu">continue to evolve:</span></p> <ul class="listtype-bullet listindent1 list-bullet1" data-testid="bullet-list" data-test-indentation="1"> <li><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu"><strong>Awareness:</strong></span> <span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">U</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu">nderstand </span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">yourself</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu"> and others</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">.</span></li> <li><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu"><strong>Judgment:</strong></span> <span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">E</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu">valuat</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">e</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu"> information and mak</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">e </span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotuz85zdz87z113tz83zz67z5n8qpz80zpz89zoz69zcz76zz87zz88zz88z5gsnz85zu">decisions in complex situations</span><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84zo2qotv4sz81zsz68zwz85z3z78zbz88z2z76zpz74z2v1z75zz67zz85zjlvz122zz122z6oaz84z">.</span></li> <li><span class=" author-d-1gg9uz65z1iz85zgdz68zmqkz84z