Confirmed Software Development Engineer M/F SLICES-FR

The Centre Inria de l’Université de Grenoble groups together almost 450 people in 26 research teams and 9 research support departments.

Staff is present on three campuses in Grenoble, in close collaboration with other research and higher education institutions (Université Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, CEA, INRAE, …), but also with key economic players in the area.

The Centre Inria de l’Université Grenoble Alpes is active in the fields of high-performance computing, verification and embedded systems, modeling of the environment at multiple levels, and data science and artificial intelligence. The center is a top-level scientific institute with an extensive network of international collaborations in Europe and the rest of the world.

General Context

The SLICES-FR Research Infrastructure (Scientific Large Scale Infrastructure for Computing/Communication Experimental Studies – France) enables the computer science scientific community to experiment with new software and hardware approaches across the entire IoT/networks/edge/cloud continuum. It thus offers a holistic view of the entire data chain, from its capture to its processing, including its transport and storage.

Beyond French borders, SLICES-FR is part of a European dimension: it constitutes the French node of the SLICES-RI Research Infrastructure, which brings together 16 partner countries for operation planned until 2042.

SLICES-FR offers configuration, programming and measurement services on a wide range of heterogeneous equipment. These equipment and services cover various domains: network protocols, radio technologies, Internet of Things, data collection, parallel and distributed computing, as well as edge and cloud computing. The objective is to enable reproducible and responsible research across the entire digital continuum.

Operating an infrastructure of several thousand heterogeneous pieces of equipment distributed across around fifteen sites in France is not limited to providing simple access to remote resources. The ambition of the SLICES-FR engineers is to create the tools needed to experiment with and evaluate current and future digital continuum technologies.

Working Environment

At the national level, the person recruited will join the SLICES-FR technical team, made up of permanent and contract engineers with whom they will have a functional relationship. The team brings together people from several supervisory bodies (Inria, CNRS, etc.) spread across several cities in France.

They will mainly collaborate remotely with the technical team through various digital tools, in particular through regular videoconferences. They will also take part in, on average, 4 in-person meetings per year lasting 2/3 days, held in a French city.

At the local level, the person recruited will be administratively attached to the Inria Grenoble Alpes centre, within the DATAMOVE team located on the Saint-Martin d’Heres campus.

Thus, the work will be supervised both:

• Functionally by the SLICES-FR technical management
• Hierarchically by the local manager of the host structure

The person will have to work on a platform distributed across several geographical sites, with the local support of the support teams.

The person recruited will be responsible for structuring the software engineering of the SLICES-FR technical team. They will also support the technical management in making strategic technical choices regarding software development (languages, architecture). They will also be directly involved in the software development of one or more projects.

The SLICES-FR software projects constitute an information system for managing a research infrastructure composed of multiple experimentation platforms, with thousands of hardware resources: from data-centre servers to connected objects and reprogrammable radio devices. In addition to access to the hardware, reconfiguration and measurement services are provided to users. These hardware and software resources are made available to a broad community of computer science researchers in France and Europe. The components include a user portal, an account and access management tool, an inventory, a resource reservation system, a REST API for controlling all the tools, interfaces with European IS, etc.

We are looking for a person who is able to take a step back from technologies, who can adapt to the existing environment while being proactive and supportive in driving changes. Polyglot, they are open to working with several programming languages.

• Lead the upgrading of the software development methodology (CI, testing, kanban, rituals, etc.) by making choices adapted to the team’s context and by bringing software engineering best practices
• Contribute to defining the technical development strategy in coordination with the SLICES-FR technical directors
• Bootstrap new software projects with best practices
• Participate in technical team meetings and facilitate meetings focused on software development
• Supervise junior development engineers: code review, support

• Very good command of software engineering methods to specify needs upstream and throughout development (UML, Agile methods, SCRUM, Kanban, TDD, DDD...)
• Very good command of at least 2 programming languages among Python, Ruby, Rust, Go
• Excellent command of GitLab, code review, continuous integration
• Ability to supervise a team in a remote context
• Critical experience (advantages and limitations) of AI code generation tools will be appreciated

• Subsidized meals
• Partial reimbursement of public transport costs
• Leave: 7 weeks of annual leave + 10 extra days off due to RTT (statutory reduction in working hours) + possibility of exceptional leave (sick children, moving home, etc.)
• Possibility of teleworking and flexible organization of working hours
• Professional equipment available (videoconferencing, loan of computer equipment, etc.)
• Social, cultural and sports events and activities
• Access to vocational training
• Social security coverage (under conditions)

From 2,692 € (depending on experience and qualifications).