In 2019, the Infectious Diseases Institute (IDI), in collaboration with Makerere University’s Colleges of Computing & Health Sciences and the Office of Cyber Infrastructure and Computational Biology at the United States’ National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), established the African Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics & Data-Intensive Sciences (ACE) in Uganda. This center is one of only two such facilities on the African continent, the other being located in Mali. The ACE operates under IDI’s research program, one of six core programs within the institute. Its mission is to serve as a sustainable center of excellence, leveraging High Performance Computing (HPC), bioinformatics, data science, and visualization to advance health research and training across Africa.

Job Summary
The ACE is seeking a proactive and enthusiastic recent graduate to join us as a junior systems administrator. This graduate trainee position offers a unique opportunity for a motivated individual to kickstart their career in server systems administration. The graduate trainee in server systems administration is responsible for supporting the management and maintenance of server systems. This role involves configuring, maintaining, and troubleshooting server hardware and software to ensure optimal performance, as well as providing technical support to ACE server users and staff.

Key Responsibilities
• Install and configure server software and hardware.
• Manage network servers and technology tools.
• Set up accounts for new ACE HPC users.
• Provide technical support to ACE HPC users
• Monitor performance and maintain systems.
• Troubleshoot issues and outages.
• Ensure security through access controls, backups, and firewalls.
• Upgrade systems with new releases and models.
• Develop expertise to train staff on new technologies, such as Slurm.
• Build and maintain an internal wiki with technical documentation, manuals, and IT policies.
• Attend cyberinfrastructure and change request meetings.
• Provide IT technical support to bioinformatics lecturers and trainers during workshops held at the ACE.
• Perform any other duties assigned by supervisors.

Academic Qualifications
• Bachelors of Science in Software engineering
• Bachelor’s of Science in Computer Science

Person Specification
• A recent graduate (within the last year) with a Bachelor of Science in Software Engineering or Computer Science from a recognized university.

Proficient in Linux/Unix and Python programming languages.
• Knowledge of R and JavaScript programming languages.
• Knowledge of operating systems, specifically Windows and Linux.
• Familiarity with server hardware.
• Familiarity with cloud computing platforms such as Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and AWS.
• Understanding of networks, including Local Area Networks (LAN) and Wide Area Networks (WAN).