Senior Software Engineer, Storage
Required skills
- database internals
- SQL latency
- availability issues
- query plans
- execution paths
- storage engine
- compaction
- caching
- I/O
- traffic prioritization
Nice to have
- real-time data experiences
- data interfaces
- database expertise
- Transactional Storage Services
- core storage infrastructure
- online data systems
Role summary
The Online Data organization at Airbnb is seeking a Senior Software Engineer for the Transactional Storage Services team. This role focuses on the core storage infrastructure for Airbnb's online data systems, specifically a horizontally scalable, open-source NewSQL database running on Kubernetes. You will join the Database Kernel team, responsible for the performance, reliability, and stability of the NewSQL engine. Your work will involve deep dives into database internals, diagnosing and fixing SQL latency and availability issues, analyzing query plans, tuning storage engines, and collaborating with open-source vendors on upstream contributions. Experience with database storage layers, query execution engines, SQL, and distributed systems is essential.
Airbnb was born in 2007 when two hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to over 5 million hosts who have welcomed over 2 billion guest arrivals in almost every country across the globe. Every day, hosts offer unique stays and experiences that make it possible for guests to connect with communities in a more authentic way.
The Community You Will Join
The Online Data organization helps Airbnb's builders create real-time data experiences through intuitive data interfaces and tools, with no database expertise required. Within Online Data, the Transactional Storage Services team owns the core storage infrastructure behind Airbnb's online data systems.
We design, build, and operate a new source-of-truth, horizontally scalable, open-source NewSQL database running on stateful Kubernetes. It holds Airbnb's critical user, listing, and financial data.
You'll join the Database Kernel team, which owns performance, reliability, and stability for Airbnb's NewSQL engine at scale. The team's work centers on the storage layer and query execution engine, and also covers consensus and shard management. In this role you'll dig into database internals to diagnose and fix SQL latency and availability issues. You'll also work closely with our open-source database vendor on root cause analysis and upstream contributions.
Examples of the Difference You'll Make
Your Expertise
Our Commitment To Inclusion & Belonging:
Airbnb is committed to working with the broadest talent pool possible. We believe diverse ideas foster innovation and engagement, and allow us to attract creatively-led people, and to develop the best products, services and solutions. All qualified individuals are encouraged to apply.
We strive to also provide a disability inclusive application and interview process. If you are a candidate with a disability and require reasonable accommodation in order to submit an application, please contact us at: reasonableaccommodations@airbnb.com. Please include your full name, the role you’re applying for and the accommodation necessary to assist you with the recruiting process.
We ask that you only reach out to us if you are a candidate whose disability prevents you from being able to complete our online application.
Equal Employment Opportunity:
Airbnb values diversity & belonging and is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. All individuals seeking employment at Airbnb are considered without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, age, gender, sex, marital status, ancestry, physical or mental disability, veteran status, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, or any other legally protected characteristic.
How We'll Take Care of You:
Our job titles may span more than one career level. The actual base pay is dependent upon many factors, such as: training, transferable skills, work experience, business needs and market demands. The base pay range is subject to change and may be modified in the future. This role may also be eligible for bonus, equity, benefits, and Employee Travel Credits.
Pay Range$196,000—$230,000 USDReasonable Accommodations: We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations throughout the recruitment process for applicants with disabilities. If you need assistance, or an accommodation, please let your recruiter know once you are contacted about a role.
A Note on Recruiting Scams: Scammers sometimes pose as Airbnb recruiters to get money or personal information from candidates. A few things that will always be true for Airbnb’s hiring process: our open roles are posted on Airbnb’s Career’s Page at careers.airbnb.com, and our recruiters correspond only from @airbnb.com or @ext.airbnb.com email addresses. Our recruiters will never ask for your Social Security number, bank account details, passport, or payment app information while you are interviewing. We’ll also never ask you to pay a fee, send money, deposit or cash a check, or purchase work-related equipment (such as a company laptop) during the interview process. We encourage candidates to remain vigilant of these recruiting scams and not share sensitive information if you do not believe an individual is actually affiliated with Airbnb.
Sample Airbnb interview questions
- 1
Design a group chat application
system designmedium - 2
Build a machine learning pipeline for distributed environments.
system designmedium - 3
Create a distributed A/B testing framework for scalable testing.
system designmedium - 4
How would you design a ticketing platform
system designmedium - 5
How would you design a real time ranking system for Fortnite
system designmedium
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