What company do you currently work for?
I've been working at Amazon for a year and a half now and live in Austin, Texas, USA. Before that, I worked for two years in Canada in Vancouver for the same company, but on a different project.
What position do you hold?
Officially, my position is called Software Development Engineer II. Amazon has a slightly different structure compared to most companies in Ukraine and Europe.
What are your responsibilities?
My main responsibilities are pretty standard for a full stack developer: design, development, testing, integration, analysis, support. Usually, at Amazon, the technology stack mainly consists of AWS products such as DynamoDb, SQS, SNS, Lambda, Fargate, Redshift, S3, etc.
I am a part of Last Mile. We are engaged in products that are related to the delivery of shipments from station to door. One of these products is called Amazon Flex, which is like an Uber for delivering orders from Amazon. I mainly deal with the systems that are responsible for pricing for this application.
Tell us about the most challenging and interesting project you are proud of?
What I am working on now seems to me to be the most interesting. We have hundreds of thousands of users and their number is constantly growing. All systems must be as reliable and expandable as possible. Our main goal is to offer a price that is sufficient to motivate courier drivers to accept orders, while minimizing costs for Amazon. This balance is achieved, among other things, by using machine learning to predict a fair price.
What projects have you participated in?
Among the publicly available ones, Network Traffic Analyzer (NTA) is quite well-known among Western network administrators. https://www.solarwinds.com/netflow-traffic-analyzer
I worked on this product when I lived in the Czech Republic, where I moved at the invitation of SolarWinds. It was an interesting year and a half until I was invited to Amazon in Vancouver. There, I worked on a variety of projects related to cataloging products on the Amazon website.
What role did ITSTEP Academy play in your life?
My programming teacher at IT Step, Dmytro Barabash, sparked my interest in the subject. All the knowledge I gained undoubtedly came in handy when I was looking for my first job. In addition, the Academy helped me to master the basics of system support and design, which have come in handy many times.
I met interesting people and learned a lot. I don't even know what I would be doing now if I hadn't joined the Academy many years ago.
What advice can you give to students who are currently studying at the Academy?
I can advise the following:
1. Learn algorithms - they will help you develop logical thinking and understand how everything works;
2. Learn English - it will help you find a good job, communicate with customers, and continue your studies;
3. Read the documentation - you can find a lot of interesting things there.
And in conclusion, I want to share 3 of the 10 so-called "leadership principles" embedded in Amazon's corporate culture, which, in my opinion, will be most useful for beginner developers:
- Learn and be Curious
- Dive Deep
- Insist on the Highest Standards