Twin Cities, MN

Position Title: Applications Developer

Organization: University of Minnesota’s Polar Geospatial Center

Location: Twin Cities, MN

Organization Overview: The Polar Geospatial Center provides geospatial support, mapping, and GIS/remote sensing solutions to researchers and logistics groups in the polar science community. Their goal is to introduce new, state-of-the-art techniques from the geospatial field to effectively solve problems in the least mapped places on Earth.

Position Overview:  The Polar Geospatial Center at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is seeking an application developer and software engineer to join the Products & Data team. The person in this position will be responsible for building and maintaining data management workflows, developing back-end systems for user-facing web applications, supporting website changes, and streamlining connections between tools and databases. The applicant is expected to develop new tools for interfacing with PGC’s data archive of imagery and Digital Elevation Models (DEMs), as well as update and maintain legacy projects.

The successful candidate must be able to multitask and work on a variety of coding projects both independently and in collaboration with others. The applicant should possess strong problem-solving skills and the ability to learn quickly. Work at PGC is fast-paced and constantly evolving, so the applicant must have good organizational and communication skills.

The PGC developer team uses primarily Python, Bash, and Javascript, with a smattering of legacy PHP. They use Postgres/PostGIS for databases, and their web services are published through GeoServer and ArcGIS Server. They leverage a mix of cloud-based and on-prem resources, tooling including ansible, terraform, and kubernetes, among others.

Duties: 

• Design and Development of automated data ingest and archive pipelines (30%)
• Web application back-end design and implementation (30%)
• Creation of scripts and applications to support team members’ data processing and delivery workflows (20%)
• Collaboration with IT on systems upgrades/maintenance (10%)
• Spatial database and web services design and administration (10%)

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field and 2 years of experience
• Expertise with Python and JavaScript
• Facility working on Linux command line systems
• Experience developing and maintaining web applications
• Demonstrated proficiency working with relational databases
• Expertise with Git or other version control and collaboration tools

Preferred Qualifications:

• Advanced degree or an additional 2+ years of experience in software development
• Experience with testing methodologies
• Experience with geospatial libraries, software, and analysis
• Experience with web mapping technologies
• Experience interacting with HPC systems
• Command of GIS/Remote Sensing fundamentals and concepts

Application Deadline: Open until filled

How to Apply: Please use the online application to view the full job description as well as how to apply.