A permanent vacancy exists at the University of KwaZulu-Natal on the Westville (Durban) campus for a Principal Tech/ IT Engineer (Research & Academic Support) in the field of Scientific Computing.

This is a senior level position in an exciting and demanding environment where the successful candidate will provide high level Linux technical expertise to the School of Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science primarily on the Westville Campus, Durban.

You must have excellent technical computing knowledge coupled with advanced problem solving and diagnostic skills. A high level of competence with computer hardware and scientific software across various platforms is essential, together with a high level of understanding of networked environments including configuring various IP network services and associated technologies. You will utilise your LINUX/UNIX experience, relevant programming/scripting experience, as well as exposure to symmetric multiprocessing (SMP), clusters, high-performance computing (HPC), server virtualisation infrastructure and storage area networks in executing your duties.

As the successful candidate, you will be responsible for the design, prototyping, rollout and testing of new and innovative systems and computing platforms for teaching and research, and will identify and introduce innovative methods to continually and reliably improve and upgrade efficiency of current systems. Day-to-day, you will be busy administering, configuring, deploying, maintaining, tuning and troubleshooting multiple cross-platform servers, clusters, workstations and associated software, network services and technologies in use by the School, ensuring the efficient running of the School’s teaching and research computing laboratories and associated computing infrastructure.

As a senior member of the technical team, you will need to oversee the implementation of various projects, and will also be expected to react to, and assist with the investigation, diagnosis and resolving of complex technical issues and requests involving a wide spectrum of specialised hardware, network, and software solutions across the School.
You will engage with academics, researchers, postgraduate students and support staff across all disciplines of the school, where you would be expected to offer expert consulting advice, provide knowledge transfer and create solutions to solve various problems.

You may infrequently be required to travel amongst the different campuses to provide the required support.
Minimum Requirements:
• A degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering or related field
• A minimum of 5 years relevant work experience of which at least 2 years have been in a senior role, and at least 2 years have been in a LINUX/UNIX environment
• Exposure to server virtualisation infrastructure and storage area networks
• Exposure to compute clusters and High Performance Computing (HPC) environments
• Administering a heterogeneous network using any one of Active Directory, eDirectory, LDAP,NIS, or similar
• Hands-on technical competence and proven troubleshooting and configuration of hardware and software on various computing platforms including desktop, workstation, server, SAN, network, and cluster environments
• Experience in the compilation and installation of opensource libraries and code
• Programming experience in any of BASH, C, C++,C#, JAVA, PYTHON, PERL, PHP, RUBY or related programming or script language
• Exposure to an RDBMS (e.g. MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle, Informix, or Sybase)
• Solid understanding of IP networking and experience in configuring various IP network services and associated technologies such as firewalls, PXE etc
The total remuneration package is market related and will be dependent on the qualifications and experience of the successful applicant. Some of the benefits include a provident fund, medical aid, and disability insurance.