Summary
The Wikimedia Foundation is seeking a Software Engineer to join the team supporting the Wikidata Platform — the structured data backbone of Wikimedia projects and a key part of the global open knowledge ecosystem. You’ll help scale and sustain the Wikidata Query Service (WDQS) and related platform services that power tools, features, communities, and research efforts across Wikimedia projects and beyond.
This role combines backend engineering and operations ownership. You’ll implement high-scale, production-grade services while ensuring performance, reliability, and maintainability. Working alongside the rest of the team, you’ll contribute to shaping the future of how the world queries and interacts with structured, linked data.
What You’ll Do
- Help design, build, and maintain backend systems and APIs that power Wikidata’s query infrastructure
- Improve reliability, observability, and automation of the Wikidata Query Service and data pipelines
- Integrate Wikidata Platform services with other systems and data sources across Wikimedia
- Develop features and capabilities to ensure stability and scalability under growing usage
- Monitor production systems, respond to operational incidents and resolve bottlenecks
- Support platform migrations and system upgrades (e.g., triple stores, streaming ingestion)
- Contribute to deployment automation, CI/CD workflows, and service instrumentation
- Participate in code reviews and design discussions
- Document systems and share knowledge with team members and Wikimedia’s broader technical community
Skills and Experience We’re Looking For
- 2+ years of experience as a backend or platform engineer working on distributed systems or data platforms
- Solid understanding of database and/or knowledge graph representation technologies
- Proficiency in Java, C++, or other systems languages
- Experience building and operating production-grade services with SLOs
- Familiarity with modern observability tools (metrics, logging, tracing)
- Familiarity with data processing technologies such as graph databases, search indexes, or data processing pipelines
- Ability to work collaboratively across disciplines and communicate clearly
Nice to Have
- Experience working with knowledge graphs or RDF/SPARQL
- Familiarity with streaming data systems (e.g., Kafka, Flink)
- Comfort with CI/CD pipelines and containerization tools (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes)
- Experience in open source or open knowledge communities
- Familiarity with Wikimedia technologies, Wikidata, or MediaWiki