Backend Engineer (C), Tenant Scale: Git

The Tenant Scale: Git team at GitLab focuses on the Git capabilities that underpin repository access, with a strong connection to Gitaly and the upstream Git project. The team contributes directly to open-source Git, improves GitLab's use of Git in production, and helps shape the technical direction for performance, correctness, and maintainability. Team members collaborate asynchronously across regions, balancing internal engineering needs with active participation in public open-source discussions. For more on the domain this role supports, see the Team Direction Page.

Introduction

As a Backend Engineer on the Tenant Scale: Git team, you will contribute to one of the most widely used foundations of modern software development. This role focuses on enhancing Git and Gitaly's capability, reliability, and efficiency for GitLab's platform users. You'll contribute directly to upstream Git, help shape technical direction, and connect open-source community discussions with GitLab's product needs.

Reporting to the Git team lead, you'll work across Git and Gitaly to deliver changes that improve repository access, performance, and long-term maintainability. This is a unique opportunity to influence an essential open-source project and the systems GitLab uses to serve repositories at scale, guiding efforts that affect Git's future direction. Projects include contributing new features and fixes to upstream Git and adapting Gitaly to leverage new and existing Git capabilities.

Responsibilities

• Participate in architectural discussions and technical decisions related to Git and Gitaly, driving implementation choices that improve correctness, performance, and maintainability.
• Contribute features, bug fixes, and performance improvements to upstream Git aligned with team and community goals.
• Adapt Gitaly to effectively use Git capabilities, integrating new features to enhance scalability, efficiency, and long-term maintainability.
• Bridge discussions in the open-source Git project with GitLab's product direction and engineering work.
• Scope tasks, estimate effort, and describe implementation plans that support team priorities and enable predictable delivery.
• Test and validate features with a focus on correctness and reliability to minimize regressions and ensure stable production use.
• Collaborate with team members, contributors, and the Git ecosystem.
• Represent GitLab as a constructive participant in the open-source ecosystem, fostering productive relationships with the Git community.

Requirements

• Experience building instrumented, observable software systems.
• Knowledge of Git internals, including its code and data structures, or practical experience operating Git servers.
• Experience writing and testing production-quality code in C.
• Experience contributing to open-source projects, including Git or similar systems, and working effectively in public collaboration spaces.
• Familiarity with Go for backend development.
• Understanding of Linux internals such as processes, memory management, input/output, and filesystems.

Nice to Have

• Interest or experience in large-scale or distributed systems.
• Experience with storage formats, graph theory, or highly available production environments.
• Transferable backend or infrastructure experience.

About Company

The Tenant Scale: Git team at GitLab focuses on the Git capabilities that underpin repository access, with a strong connection to Gitaly and the upstream Git project. The team contributes directly to open-source Git, improves GitLab's use of Git in production, and helps shape the technical direction for performance, correctness, and maintainability. Team members collaborate asynchronously across regions, balancing internal engineering needs with active participation in public open-source discussions. For more on the domain this role supports, see the Team Direction Page.