Systems Engineer - Web Platform

Pax Andromeda; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Pax Andromeda in San Francisco is seeking an experienced engineer with a deep background in both web technologies and native stacks to join our open-source engine project.

You will work across C++ and JavaScript, binding native primitives to high-level constructs, with a focus on performance and cross-boundary design. This is a hybrid role based in San Francisco, offering the chance to shape core platform capabilities.

Qualifications

• Requires experience in C++ and JavaScript across native and web stacks.
• Experience embedding JS engines and bindings is preferred.
• Strong background in performance-sensitive systems software.

Responsibilities

• Bridge native primitives to high-level constructs for the engine.
• Move between native and JS boundaries on a daily basis.
• Own significant portions of the product and contribute to frameworks and tooling.
• Work across WebKit/WebCore-style bindings or similar stacks.
• Collaborate to optimize performance and reliability.

Skills

C++

JavaScript

JS engine embedding

Graphics

Media playback

Networking

Wayland

Windows

IPC

Build tooling

Virtualization

Debugging

Security

Job description

Summary

We’re Pax Andromeda, a well-funded startup based in San Francisco. We’re building a new open-source application engine on top of web technologies, and we're looking for an experienced engineer with a deep background in both web tech and native application stacks.

Systems Engineer – Web Platform

Summary

We’re Pax Andromeda, a well-funded startup based in San Francisco. We’re building a new open-source application engine on top of web technologies, and we're looking for an experienced engineer with a deep background in both web tech and native application stacks.

Responsibilities

We are looking for a hybrid web/systems engineer with experience in both C++ and JavaScript. We are developing frameworks and tooling that bind native system primitives to high-level constructs, based on WebKit, pushing as much implementation as possible up into the JavaScript layer (and maintaining native performance). We move between the two sides of the stack daily, so comfort in both is essential.

The problem domain is expansive and multidisciplinary. You will build and own significant portions of the product but we don’t expect you to come in with knowledge across 100% of the surface area.

You will be a great fit if you have deep experience in two or more focus areas in the list below and are comfortable owning them on both sides of the native/JS boundary. This list is by no means exhaustive.

Skills

Requires experience in both C++ and JavaScript.

• JS engine embedding and bindings: JSC / WebCore embedding (or V8/SpiderMonkey/similar), code generation, libclang, IDL, marshalling between native and JS types


• Graphics: Skia, Metal, Vulkan, CoreGraphics, WebGPU, web and system compositors


• Media playback: hardware decoding (VideoToolbox, VA-API), GStreamer, direct scanout


• Networking: libcurl, QUIC, OS networking primitives, split network-process architectures


• Wayland: client and server implementations, extensions


• Windows: application frameworks, drivers, WINE, DirectX


• IPC: shared memory, UNIX domain sockets, Mach ports, D-Bus, command serialization


• Build tooling: CI, CMake, multi-platform builds, artifact distribution


• Virtualization: virtio, libvirt, hypervisors


• Debugging: LLDB, gdb, Chrome Dev Tools protocol


• Security and performance: cross-cutting across any of the above

You Might Be a Good Fit If

• You have a passion for delivering high quality experiences to users


• You have experience in a similar stack or problem space


• You have experience building concurrent software systems


• You have the ability to find creative solutions to complex performance problems: the web platform lets developers do crazy things, users expect things to be fast even if the website wasn’t built in the most optimal way.


• You care about company culture, engineering culture, and best practices.