Elasticsearch - Principal Performance Engineer - Benchmarking

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Elastic is a free and open search company that powers enterprise search, observability, and security solutions built on one technology stack that can be deployed anywhere. From finding documents to monitoring infrastructure to hunting for threats, Elastic makes data usable in real-time and at scale. Thousands of organizations worldwide, including Barclays, Cisco, eBay, Fairfax, ING, Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, The Mayo Clinic, NASA, The New York Times, Wikipedia, and Verizon, use Elastic to power mission-critical systems. Founded in 2012, Elastic is a distributed company with Elasticians around the globe. Learn more at elastic.co.

We are looking for a Principal Performance Engineer to join the Elasticsearch Performance team to focus on helping us understand how Elasticsearch performs and scales under workloads representative of our three main solutions: search, observe, protect. You will have an opportunity to build performance analysis tools, investigate complex performance issues, and socialize performance-engineering best practices throughout the company and our community.

Here are the kinds of questions you'd be helping us answer:

• If a user needs to index 200 gigabytes of Apache logs per day and has a 10-day retention policy, what should that Elasticsearch cluster look like? What if retention is two years?
• How does query performance change as data ages from a hot tier with fast SSDs to a cold tier with slow spinning disks?
• How can we rigorously compare performance between on-premises and Cloud-based deployments of Elasticsearch?

In order to answer these questions, you will help us craft, execute, and interpret realistic benchmarks based on actual usage of our products. You will play a key role in shaping Rally, our macrobenchmarking framework for Elasticsearch, help us define and refine our benchmarking and analysis methodologies, and scale our ability to improve performance across our products.

Some skills, experience, and traits that would help you succeed include:

• Python experience and strong general software development skills. You will be contributing to our benchmarking infrastructure and tooling (such as Rally) which is virtually all written in Python.
• Experience with contemporary software benchmarking methodology is critical to this role. Can you explain what makes a benchmark useful? Can you describe some common pitfalls that people encounter when they try to benchmark a system? Can you explain what statistical methods would be appropriate in a given scenario? Are you familiar with the concept of active benchmarking?
• Strong Linux skills. You should be comfortable on the command line, have experience with observability tools such as iostat, netstat, vmstat, know your way around procfs, etc.
• An understanding of Java and the JVM, or a strong desire to learn. While you will not be writing Java day to day, Elasticsearch is a Java application, and developing a sophisticated understanding of the JVM is critical.
• An ability to go as deep down the stack as necessary to understand a system’s performance. Strong knowledge of operating system internals is a major plus.
• An ability to summarize findings and effectively present takeaways and guidance to audiences of varying technical backgrounds.

Additional Information - We Take Care of Our People

As a distributed company, diversity drives our identity. Whether you’re looking to launch a new career or grow an existing one, Elastic is the type of company where you can balance great work with great life. Your age is only a number. It doesn’t matter if you’re just out of college or your children are; we need you for what you can do.

We strive to have parity of benefits across regions and while regulations differ from place to place, we believe taking care of our people is the right thing to do.

• Competitive pay based on the work you do here and not your previous salary
• Health coverage for you and your family in many locations
• Ability to craft your calendar with flexible locations and schedules for many roles
• Generous number of vacation days each year
• Double your charitable giving - We match up to $1500 (or local currency equivalent)
• Up to 40 hours each year to use toward volunteer projects you love
• Embracing parenthood with minimum of 16 weeks of parental leave

Different people approach problems differently. We need that. Elastic is committed to diversity as well as inclusion. We are an equal opportunity employer and committed to the principles of affirmative action. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender perception or identity, national origin, age, marital status, protected veteran status, or disability status or any other basis protected by federal, state or local law, ordinance or regulation. If you require any reasonable accessibility support, please email candidate_accessibility@elastic.co.

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