Walter is developing open-source technology to advance computational biology through scalable workflow execution engines.

Location: Remote (GMT-8 to GMT+5). 3-4 hours overlap with US Central Time (Chicago/Texas) required. Not open to candidates from China, Australia, or similar time zones.

What you will do:

  • Contribute to the development of the Sprocket workflow execution engine and associated Rust crates (wdl, sprocket, crankshaft).
  • Improve and extend the Workflow Description Language (WDL) specification and shepherd changes through the ratification process.
  • Collaborate on the evolution of the Task Execution Schema (TES) with standards bodies and the open-source community.
  • Develop and maintain reference implementations with comprehensive OpenAPI/Swagger documentation.
  • Coordinate progress with the internal computational biology team.

Requirements:

  • 6+ years of senior-level proficiency in Rust with a track record of shipping production code.
  • Experience contributing to or leading open-source projects.
  • Familiarity with workflow engines, scientific computing, or large-scale computation.
  • Ability to work with Rust crates for lexing, parsing, validating, linting, and executing DSLs.
  • Strong skills in API design and specification development.
  • Proficiency with GitHub for project planning and collaboration.

Nice to have:

  • Experience improving specifications using OpenAPI (Swagger) or the utoipa crate.
  • Familiarity with Workflow Description Language (WDL) and Task Execution Schema (TES).
  • Experience with Kubernetes, cloud, or HPC environments.
  • Prior involvement with standards bodies such as GA4GH.

Conditions: Full-time, long-term role commitment; opportunity to work on impactful open-source technology used by scientists worldwide and influence open standards in scientific workflow execution.