Senior Software Engineer - Polaris & Data Lake Catalog ID-5721

January 31, 2025

Build the future of the AI Data Cloud. Join the Snowflake team.

Snowflake’s vision is to enable every organization to be data-driven. We’re at the forefront of innovation, helping customers realize the full potential of their data with our data cloud. We are now going beyond the traditional data warehouse and helping customers unlock the power of the open data lake house architecture with our Polaris project—an open-source implementation of the Iceberg REST catalog.

As a Senior Software Engineer on the Polaris and Data Lake Catalog team, you’ll play a key role in building and evolving our open and interoperable data lake ecosystem. You’ll work on some of the most complex and exciting challenges in distributed systems, contributing to Snowflake’s mission of providing a truly open data lake architecture, free from vendor lock-in.

AS A SENIOR SOFTWARE ENGINEER, YOU WILL:

Design and implement scalable, distributed systems to enable support for Iceberg DML/DDL transactions, schema evolution, partitioning, time travel, and more.
Architect and build systems that integrate Snowflake queries with external Iceberg catalogs (e.g., AWS Glue, Databricks Unity) and various data lake architectures, enabling seamless interoperability across cloud providers.
Develop high-performance, low-latency solutions for catalog federation, allowing customers to manage and query their data lake assets across multiple catalogs from a single interface.
Collaborate with Snowflake’s open-source team and the Apache Iceberg community to contribute new features and enhance the Iceberg REST specification.
Work on core data access control and governance features for Polaris, including fine-grained permissions such as row-level security, column masking, and multi-cloud federated access control.
Contribute to our managed Polaris service, ensuring that external query engines like Spark and Trino can read from and write to Iceberg tables through Polaris in a way that’s decoupled from Snowflake’s core data platform.
Build tooling and services that automate data lake table maintenance, including compaction, clustering, and data retention for enhanced query performance and efficiency.

OUR IDEAL SENIOR SOFTWARE ENGINEER WILL HAVE:

8+ years of experience designing and building scalable, distributed systems.
Strong programming skills in Java, Scala, or C++ with an emphasis on performance and reliability.
Deep understanding of distributed transaction processing, concurrency control, and high-performance query engines.
Experience with open-source data lake formats (e.g., Apache Iceberg, Parquet, Delta) and the challenges associated with multi-engine interoperability.
Experience building cloud-native services and working with public cloud providers like AWS, Azure, or GCP.
A passion for open-source software and community engagement, particularly in the data ecosystem.
Familiarity with data governance, security, and access control models in distributed data systems.

BONUS POINTS FOR EXPERIENCE WITH:

Contributing to open-source projects, especially in the data infrastructure space.
Designing or implementing REST APIs, particularly in the context of distributed systems.
Managing large-scale data lakes or data catalogs in production environments.
Working on highly-performant and scalable query engines such as Spark, Flink, or Trino.

WHY JOIN THE POLARIS & DATA LAKE CATALOG TEAM AT SNOWFLAKE?

Be part of a pioneering effort to build the most open and interoperable data lake ecosystem in the industry.
Work on a high-impact open-source project that solves real-world data challenges for enterprise customers like Netflix, AWS, and others.
Collaborate with some of the brightest minds in the data ecosystem, including core contributors to Apache Iceberg.
Have the opportunity to innovate in one of the fastest-growing and evolving areas in data infrastructure, where you can make a direct impact on Snowflake’s growth and the broader open-source community.

Every Snowflake employee is expected to follow the company’s confidentiality and security standards for handling sensitive data. Snowflake employees must abide by the company’s data security plan as an essential part of their duties. It is every employee's duty to keep customer information secure and confidential.

Snowflake is growing fast, and we’re scaling our team to help enable and accelerate our growth. We are looking for people who share our values, challenge ordinary thinking, and push the pace of innovation while building a future for themselves and Snowflake.

How do you want to make your impact?

The following represents the expected range of compensation for this role:

The estimated base salary range for this role is $195,000 - $276,000.
Additionally, this role is eligible to participate in Snowflake’s bonus and equity plan.

The successful candidate’s starting salary will be determined based on permissible, non-discriminatory factors such as skills, experience, and geographic location. This role is also eligible for a competitive benefits package that includes: medical, dental, vision, life, and disability insurance; 401(k) retirement plan; flexible spending & health savings account; at least 12 paid holidays; paid time off; parental leave; employee assistance program; and other company benefits.

Snowflake is growing fast, and we’re scaling our team to help enable and accelerate our growth. We are looking for people who share our values, challenge ordinary thinking, and push the pace of innovation while building a future for themselves and Snowflake.

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Common Interview Questions And Answers

1. HOW DO YOU PLAN YOUR DAY?

This is what this question poses: When do you focus and start working seriously? What are the hours you work optimally? Are you a night owl? A morning bird? Remote teams can be made up of people working on different shifts and around the world, so you won't necessarily be stuck in the 9-5 schedule if it's not for you...

2. HOW DO YOU USE THE DIFFERENT COMMUNICATION TOOLS IN DIFFERENT SITUATIONS?

When you're working on a remote team, there's no way to chat in the hallway between meetings or catch up on the latest project during an office carpool. Therefore, virtual communication will be absolutely essential to get your work done...

3. WHAT IS "WORKING REMOTE" REALLY FOR YOU?

Many people want to work remotely because of the flexibility it allows. You can work anywhere and at any time of the day...

4. WHAT DO YOU NEED IN YOUR PHYSICAL WORKSPACE TO SUCCEED IN YOUR WORK?

With this question, companies are looking to see what equipment they may need to provide you with and to verify how aware you are of what remote working could mean for you physically and logistically...

5. HOW DO YOU PROCESS INFORMATION?

Several years ago, I was working in a team to plan a big event. My supervisor made us all work as a team before the big day. One of our activities has been to find out how each of us processes information...

6. HOW DO YOU MANAGE THE CALENDAR AND THE PROGRAM? WHICH APPLICATIONS / SYSTEM DO YOU USE?

Or you may receive even more specific questions, such as: What's on your calendar? Do you plan blocks of time to do certain types of work? Do you have an open calendar that everyone can see?...

7. HOW DO YOU ORGANIZE FILES, LINKS, AND TABS ON YOUR COMPUTER?

Just like your schedule, how you track files and other information is very important. After all, everything is digital!...

8. HOW TO PRIORITIZE WORK?

The day I watched Marie Forleo's film separating the important from the urgent, my life changed. Not all remote jobs start fast, but most of them are...

9. HOW DO YOU PREPARE FOR A MEETING AND PREPARE A MEETING? WHAT DO YOU SEE HAPPENING DURING THE MEETING?

Just as communication is essential when working remotely, so is organization. Because you won't have those opportunities in the elevator or a casual conversation in the lunchroom, you should take advantage of the little time you have in a video or phone conference...

10. HOW DO YOU USE TECHNOLOGY ON A DAILY BASIS, IN YOUR WORK AND FOR YOUR PLEASURE?

This is a great question because it shows your comfort level with technology, which is very important for a remote worker because you will be working with technology over time...

DISCLAIMER

AS A SENIOR SOFTWARE ENGINEER, YOU WILL:

OUR IDEAL SENIOR SOFTWARE ENGINEER WILL HAVE:

BONUS POINTS FOR EXPERIENCE WITH:

WHY JOIN THE POLARIS & DATA LAKE CATALOG TEAM AT SNOWFLAKE?

Common Interview Questions And Answers

1. HOW DO YOU PLAN YOUR DAY?

2. HOW DO YOU USE THE DIFFERENT COMMUNICATION TOOLS IN DIFFERENT SITUATIONS?

3. WHAT IS "WORKING REMOTE" REALLY FOR YOU?

4. WHAT DO YOU NEED IN YOUR PHYSICAL WORKSPACE TO SUCCEED IN YOUR WORK?

5. HOW DO YOU PROCESS INFORMATION?

6. HOW DO YOU MANAGE THE CALENDAR AND THE PROGRAM? WHICH APPLICATIONS / SYSTEM DO YOU USE?

7. HOW DO YOU ORGANIZE FILES, LINKS, AND TABS ON YOUR COMPUTER?

8. HOW TO PRIORITIZE WORK?

9. HOW DO YOU PREPARE FOR A MEETING AND PREPARE A MEETING? WHAT DO YOU SEE HAPPENING DURING THE MEETING?

10. HOW DO YOU USE TECHNOLOGY ON A DAILY BASIS, IN YOUR WORK AND FOR YOUR PLEASURE?

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