Josef Schwarz

DI(FH) Josef Schwarz

Infra  ·  DevOps  ·  Cloud
Salzburg  ·  Austria
linkedin.com/in/josefschwarz
About

Who I Am

Senior Infra/DevOps/Cloud Engineer with 20+ years of experience. I started as a software developer and evolved into large-scale cloud, Kubernetes, and infrastructure engineering — owning the full platform stack from CI/CD and GitOps workflows through to monitoring and observability.

Certified in AWS, Kubernetes, and Terraform, with a proven track record in multi-cloud operations and high-availability architectures. My focus is reliability, scalability, and developer enablement: making platforms that teams can depend on and build on confidently.

Continuous learning is a core part of how I work. I pick up new technologies quickly, thrive in collaborative teams, and genuinely enjoy the challenge of making complex systems simpler and more robust.

20+
Years exp.
4
Certifications
Skills

Tech Stack

Cloud & Infrastructure
AWS GCP Azure Kubernetes Rancher Amazon EKS Google GKE Linux Cloudflare
IaC & Automation
Terraform Terragrunt Ansible GitLab CI/CD GitHub Actions ArgoCD GitOps
Programming
Python / Django Bash Perl
Monitoring & Observability
Prometheus Grafana Kibana Icinga OpsGenie Sentry Dynatrace Filebeat Vector MetaBase Tableau
Databases & Messaging
PostgreSQL MySQL Elasticsearch Solr MongoDB Redis Valkey RabbitMQ Kafka
Networking & Security
pfSense IPsec OpenVPN cert-manager Let’s Encrypt Okta
Experience

Work History

ChargePoint Inc. / has.to.be GmbH
2021 – 03/2026
Senior Software & Network Engineer · Radstadt (remote)
Cloud, Container & Infrastructure Engineering
  • Collaboration within a globally distributed engineering team and contribution to the design and operation of multi-cloud platforms (AWS, GCP)
  • Administration of Kubernetes clusters (Rancher, EKS, GKE)
  • Implementation of Infrastructure-as-Code using Terraform and Terragrunt
  • Operation of containerized workloads, including scalability, networking and security
DevOps, Automation & CI/CD
  • Development and maintenance of automated CI/CD pipelines and GitOps workflows (e.g., ArgoCD); creation of reusable IaC modules and self-service deployment solutions
  • Automation of configuration management tasks using Ansible; support of collaborative development practices with GitHub and GitLab
Monitoring, Observability & Reliability Engineering
  • Implementation and operation of monitoring and alerting solutions (Icinga, Prometheus, Grafana, OpsGenie)
  • Use of Dynatrace and Sentry for application insights, debugging and performance analysis
  • Operation of centralized logging solutions using Elasticsearch, Kibana, Syslog, Filebeat, Vector
  • Performance optimization, root-cause analysis and zero-downtime upgrades; support for data visualization through MetaBase and Tableau
Messaging, Streaming & Queueing Systems
  • Operation and tuning of messaging platforms such as Kafka (Confluent Cloud), RabbitMQ (CloudAMQP), Redis and Valkey
  • Ensuring high availability, low latency and reliable message delivery
Databases & Storage Technologies
  • Administration of PostgreSQL, MySQL and MongoDB systems
  • Backup/restore, replication, data modeling and query optimization
Backend Engineering & Scripting
  • Troubleshooting of backend services (PHP, Python, Java) and development of automation scripts (Python, Bash), as well as Linux system administration, tuning and troubleshooting
Networking & Security
  • Administration of firewall environments (pfSense) and related policies
  • Operation of IPsec site-to-site connections and on-premise OpenVPN solutions
  • Continuous security hardening and certificate lifecycle management (cert-manager, Let’s Encrypt, Digicert, AWS ACM PCA)
Additional Responsibilities
  • Contribution to cost-optimization; management of identity and access solutions (SSO, SAML, OAuth via Okta)
  • NLB, ALB configuration and DNS zone management
Yelster Digital / Solocal
2010 – 2021
Software Engineer / DevOps Engineer · Salzburg
Backend Engineering
  • Agile development within a complex DRF (Django REST Framework)-based backend web application (Solocal Manager)
  • Backend development of a fast-growing high-traffic platform based on the Perl Catalyst framework, integrating a wide range of external APIs (123people — 1M+ page visits/day)
API Development
  • Specification and implementation of internal REST APIs for backend/frontend communication and external partner integration
  • Development and maintenance of software components integrating large external APIs such as Facebook Graph API, Google My Business API, and various Solocal APIs
DevOps, CI/CD & Cloud
  • Extension and maintenance of GitLab-based CI/CD pipelines
  • Migration of the Solocal Manager backend for local development using Docker
  • Conception, coordination and migration of the Solocal Manager to Google Cloud Platform across all environments
  • Adaptation of the Solocal Manager backend for Kubernetes based on proof-of-concept results
Operations & Reliability
  • Deployments, maintenance, update management, continuous monitoring and ensuring smooth production operations
  • Setup of various HA clusters for services including ELK, RabbitMQ and Redis
  • Service graphs for project-specific services
  • Last-level support for internal and external customers
Databases
  • PostgreSQL administration, query performance analysis and tuning
Team & Tooling
  • Multinational distributed engineering team across multiple squads; company language English
  • Jira, Confluence, GitLab, Git feature branching
3united / Verisign / mms.ag
2004 – 2010
Perl Backend Developer · Salzburg
Messaging Services
  • Design, development and operation of SMS/MMS applications built on Perl-based backend services with IBM DB2 and Oracle as the primary data stores. Responsibilities included message routing, content processing, integration with operator interfaces, and billing/charging workflows for premium and standard messaging services.
Operator Chat Platform
  • Development and operation of a multi-tenant agent chat platform leveraging SMS, MMS and WAP-Push to enable parallel customer interactions.
  • Platform setup, configuration and continuous enhancement
  • Extension of multi-tenant capabilities and integration of new features
  • Backend development (Perl) and DB2-based data persistence
  • 2nd- and 3rd-level support for internal teams and external partners
  • Performance tuning, stability improvements and operational monitoring
Content Download Server
  • Implementation and maintenance of a server platform for mobile content downloads (e.g., images, ringtones, applications), including rights management, billing integration, traffic optimization and reliable delivery under high load.
On-Call Duty & Operational Responsibility
  • Regular participation in on-call rotations to ensure stable 24/7 operations in the company’s own data center.
  • Incident analysis and resolution
  • Coordination with infrastructure, network and storage teams
  • Ensuring high availability and adherence to SLAs
British Telecom
2003 – 2004
Internship & Diploma Thesis · Ipswich, UK
  • Placed within BTexact Technologies, the R&D division of BT, conducting research on grid computing.
  • Diploma thesis: designed and built a prototype for virtual collaborative workspaces.
FH Salzburg – University of Applied Sciences
2002
Tutor · Salzburg (part-time)
  • Tutoring students in PHP, HTML and CSS.
Erzdiözese Salzburg
1998 – 2000
Jugendleiter Dekanat Hallein · Hallein, Salzburg
  • Organisation and coordination of church youth work in the Dekanat Hallein (15 parishes)
  • Multiplier work and involvement in youth centres
Project management Coaching Communication
Certifications

Credentials

CNCF
Certified Kubernetes Administrator
2023
Amazon Web Services
Solutions Architect Associate
2021
Amazon Web Services
SysOps Administrator Associate
2021
HashiCorp
Terraform Associate
2024
Beyond work

Outside the Terminal

Bass Guitar Guitar & Piano Audio Engineering Cycling Cooking Fitness