Hpc Systems Engineer

Job Description

UW Information Technology has an outstanding opportunity for HPC Systems Engineer to join their team.

About this Opportunity
Reporting to Director the HPC Systems Engineer is responsible for supporting the HPC efforts for the research computing group and related research computing technologies. This position also provids expertise and support to other endeavors when needed. This position requires a team-oriented professional experienced in managing large IT systems for research using automated and software-defined approaches. This position regularly interfaces with other UWIT teams as well as research customers across campus.
This position requires participation in a 24x7 on-call rotation.
This is an essential position is required to work remotely when the University suspends operations.

Key Duties:
25% Systems Engineering and Development: Design develop adapt integrate manage optimize or deploy monitoring for new or existing systems software or automation to continually improve the performance reliability recoverability manageability and usability of research cyberinfrastructure.

20% Systems Administration: Perform system management functions such as account administration service administration software installation and configuration firmware updates software updates backing up and restoring data improving system and service monitoring or planning and execution of hardware replacements.

15% Operational Monitoring and Troubleshooting: Monitor HPC and related systems health and performance and troubleshoot and resolve issues that impact performance health or reliability.

20% Technical Support: Monitor support ticket and alerting queue; triage respond to and resolve tickets and on-call pages as appropriate.

10% Systems Research Evaluation and Architecting: Research and evaluate new and future technologies. Plan and architect new systems and the evolution and lifecycle of existing systems and clusters. Suggest or advise on new technologies to the Director of Research Computing Operations and other members of the Research Computing Operations team.
5% Training Mentoring and Documentation: Effectively share experience and knowledge with other team members.
5% Other duties as assigned Responsibilities

Required Qualifications
To be considered for this opportunity your application must demonstrate you meet both the minimum qualifications and additional qualifications listed below. Equivalent education and/or experience may substitute for minimum qualifications except when there are legal requirements such as a license certification and/or registration.

Minimum Qualifications
Bachelors degree in computer science information technology scientific engineering or related field or experience
Minimum 4 years experience in Linux system administration experience or substantial experience working with Linux.
Basic knowledge of networking hardware software protocols and concepts. Demonstrated ability to work with minimal supervision both independently and as part of a team.
Demonstrated excellent written/oral communication skills technical documentation skills user liaison skills and personal interaction abilities.
Applicants who do not meet these qualifications WILL NOT be forwarded to the Hiring Manager.

Preferred Qualifications
Knowledge of Containerization platforms (e.g. Docker Apptainer LXC Podman).
Web development skills such as Python and Django.
Security compliance experience such as NIST 800-171 CMMC L2 and FAR to protect data such as HIPAA CUI Export Controlled etc.
Progressively responsible experience as an engineer architect or role with comparable technical responsibilities in a large Linux HPC environment.
Extensive experience with administration of Linux operating systems in a production environment including experience with Red Hat Enterprise Linux or derivatives such as CentOS or Rocky Linux.
Familiarity with SLURM or other HPC scheduler (PBS Pro PBS/Torque SGE/UGE LSF etc).
Experience designing configuring and troubleshooting networks using both Ethernet and high-performance interconnects such as Infiniband (e.g. experience with VLAN MLAG and LACP configurations).
Proficiency in programming/scripting languages in the context of systems engineering or administration preferably including Bash Golang or Python.
Experience in the configuration and use of mass deployment tools such as Warewulf MAAS Foreman xCAT Cobbler or similar.
Proficiency with the use of Git for source control in collaboration with a team with multiple contributors.
Ability to administer and troubleshoot large high-performance parallel filesystems such as IBM Storage Scale (GPFS) Lustre BeeGFS Ceph.
Experience with the use of configuration management tools such as Ansible SaltStack or Puppet.
Experience with monitoring analysis and visualization of metrics telemetry and logs (e.g. Grafana Prometheus splunc elasticsearch rsyslog etc).
Experience in a data center environment (e.g. racking equipment running cables labeling asset tracking).
Experience with AI training and inference.
Experience with timeseries relational and non-relational database management or database query construction (e.g. influx promql redis mongodb postgres mysql nosql mariadb etc).
Scientific background research experience and/or experience in a University setting.

Working Conditions
Requires monitoring of e-mail and trouble ticket system for questions needing immediate response during business hours.
On-call responsibilities for after-hours system outages. Server management will include both production (24x7x365) and development systems.
Open office environment. Hybrid expect to be in the office a minimum of two days per week.
This position requires participation in a 24x7 on-call rotation.
This is an essential position is required to work remotely when the University suspends operations.

About the Team
UWIT is the University of Washingtons central IT organization supporting all three campuses UW medical centers and global research. We partner across the University to power teaching learning innovation and discovery. We are here to serve UW.
The Research Computing Operations group within the UWIT designs implements and operates Linux-based High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters and storage systems to offer UW researchers cost-effective yet powerful high-performance computing options that unlock new possibilities for their research.

Compensation Benefits and Position Details

Pay Range Minimum:

Pay Range Maximum:

Other Compensation:

Benefits:

Temporary or Regular

FTE (Full-Time Equivalent):

Union/Bargaining Unit:

About the UW

Working at the University of Washington provides a unique opportunity to change lives on our campuses in our state and around the world.

UW employees bring their boundless energy creative problem-solving skills and dedication to building stronger minds and a healthier return they enjoy outstanding benefits opportunities for professional growth and the chance to work in an environment known for its diversity intellectual excitement artistic pursuits and natural beauty.

Our Commitment

The University of Washington is committed to fostering an inclusive respectful and welcoming community for all. As an equal opportunity employer the University considers applicants for employment without regard to race color creed religion national origin citizenship sex pregnancy age marital status sexual orientation gender identity or expression genetic information disability or veteran status consistent with UW Executive Order No. 81.

To request disability accommodation in the application process contact the Disability Services Office at or .

Applicants considered for this position will be required to disclose if they are the subject of any substantiated findings or current investigations related to sexual misconduct at their current employment and past employment. Disclosure is required under Washington state law.