SMK Software

What is this all about?

We’re in need of contracted developers who are looking for some contract-based work. You should look at this as a way of earning extra money in your own time, getting some experience and learning about new technologies.

We’re looking at this as a way of getting our work done and ascertaining the skill and potential of developers before we employ them. An offer of full-time employment will be made to any good developers found during this process.

How does it work?

Once you’ve been approved and “contracted”, we’ll present you with what work needs to be done, you’ll quote us in terms of hours and cost. Then we’ll either say yes or no.

How many hours of work?

It’s not full-time employment and the workload itself may fluctuate depending on what projects are currently running. If you have no time to do the work, you don’t have to quote and you may reject our work request.

Can I work from home at night?

Yeah. We don’t care as long as the work gets done.

How much do you pay?

You’re the contractor. You’ll have to determine your hourly rate and present this to us when you quote. Your rate should vary depending on your skill level, experience and expertise. Obviously, if you charge more than you’re worth, we won’t use you. If you charge less than you’re worth, we’ll use you all the time.

What kind of work is it?

The work will vary from project to project. Initially we’re going to give you small, teeny, tiny projects until we have built up some confidence in your abilities. The size or importance of the projects will increase thereafter.

We work mainly in the telecommunications industry and do a heavy amount of work involving systems integration and communications. The work will range from developing custom networking protocol libraries for integration with proprietary systems, to pretty administration GUIs, to working on documentation and even internal company software – such as repository access control, interview testing methodologies and support systems.

What kind of company are you?

We’re a small startup software company. So if things look a little new or unfinished, it’s because we’re still getting to it. We plan to be progressive and be developer orientated. “By developers, for developers”. We are adopting ideas and philosophies from other role-models in the field – such as Google’s 80/20 rule. (20% of your time is spent on a project of your choice. And if your 80/20 project becomes a success, we’ll assist you in spinning off your own startup). Our aim is to make this company an enjoyable place to work. All of this stuff is detailed in our policies and rules: Policies and Rules.

Who can apply?

This offer is open to developers and programmers of all experience levels – senior, junior, hobbiest developers and even university students.

How to apply

Please send your CV, portfolio or a motivational email describing yourself and your abilities to “careers at smksoftware dot com”.

Technical Skills Coverage

If you match any of the below technical skills, please get in touch.

• C and C++ development.
• Linux, Solaris or BSD working knowledge. (essential)
• Experience with revision control systems such as svn and git.
• HTTP, XML-RPC, SOAP experience.
• MySQL, Berkely DB, Oracle experience.
• Java development.
• PHP, HTML on an Apache webserver.
• Ruby and ROR.
• Experience with build systems such as autotools, make and ant.
• Documentation experience with DocBook, XML and XSLT.

Work Coverage

We’ll send work your way depending on your skills and experience. If you’re good at Ruby and Rails, we’ll send you that. If you want to work on databases, we can send you that too.

Personal Skills Coverage

• The candidate must be a self-starter and motivated by learning.
• Good problem-solving and solution skills.
• Independent and self-managing.
• Eagerness to learn.
• Good patience and people skills because you might need to interact with non-technical people.

Hardware and Work Environment

• You’ll work from home or the beach. Intensive projects can be done at our offices if you feel it suites you better.
• Please have your own secure computer.
• You will most likely be required to run Linux, Solaris, OpenSolaris or some sort of BSD for the work involved.
• It would be preferable if you had your own Internet connection.
• Please have decent contact details such as a telephone number, email, etc.