Principal Software Engineer

Job Requisition ID #

26WD101115

Autodesk is looking for a Principal Software Engineer to provide technical leadership for a new Electron and Chromium-based desktop platform for Autodesk web applications. In this hands-on individual contributor role, you will define the platform architecture, lead complex technical decisions, and guide engineers building the Electron runtime, Windows integrations, automated delivery systems, and shared platform capabilities.

You will combine deep technical expertise with broad influence, helping the team deliver a secure, maintainable, and reusable desktop platform while remaining actively involved in design, implementation, debugging, and code review.

Responsibilities

• Platform architecture and technical direction - approximately 30%: Define and evolve the architecture of the Electron desktop platform, including process boundaries, native capabilities, application interfaces, security controls, runtime configuration, and product integration patterns
• Hands-on platform engineering - approximately 25%: Design, prototype, implement, and review complex functionality across Electron, Chromium, Node.js, TypeScript, Windows APIs, and supporting native components
• Technical leadership and mentoring - approximately 20%: Guide engineers through design and implementation decisions, mentor team members, review complex changes, establish engineering standards, and help the team develop expertise in desktop platform engineering
• Cross-team integration and platform adoption - approximately 15%: Work with product teams and Autodesk platform teams responsible for security, identity, software distribution, telemetry, crash reporting, graphics, and other shared capabilities
• Operational readiness and engineering quality - approximately 10%: Partner with quality and release engineering to define release gates, runtime upgrade policies, observability, supportability, and production-readiness requirements
• Own the overall technical architecture of the shared desktop platform and ensure clear boundaries between reusable platform capabilities and product-specific functionality
• Define secure communication patterns between hosted web applications and privileged desktop functionality, including process isolation, inter-process communication, native API exposure, navigation controls, and application trust boundaries
• Establish the strategy for using and upgrading Electron and Chromium, including supported versions, configuration and build options, runtime feature enablement, compatibility assessment, and response to security updates
• Keep the platform as close as practical to supported upstream Electron and Chromium capabilities, avoiding unnecessary customization and long-term maintenance burden
• Lead the design of native Windows capabilities such as application lifecycle management, hardware and system-information access, GPU preference, protocol handling, operating-system integration, and enterprise deployment behavior
• Define stable interfaces through which Autodesk web applications can consume desktop capabilities without creating product-specific implementations or forks
• Work with the P3 Senior Software Engineer to break larger platform objectives into technical designs, implementation plans, dependencies, and incremental deliverables
• Provide technical guidance and mentorship to the P2 Software Engineer, helping them develop deeper expertise in Electron, Chromium, Node.js, Windows, debugging, and secure application design
• Partner with the team's SDET and CI/CD/Release Engineer to ensure the platform is testable, buildable, reproducible, diagnosable, and capable of being released through automated delivery pipelines
• Define technical requirements for build, packaging, signing, release promotion, rollback, and runtime qualification while leaving day-to-day pipeline implementation with the engineer responsible for CI/CD and release automation
• Work closely with Autodesk application-security specialists to develop threat models, address security findings, apply Electron and Chromium security best practices, and ensure privileged desktop functionality is exposed safely
• Collaborate with specialist graphics and rendering teams on interfaces and requirements related to memory, GPU selection, hardware visibility, and runtime capabilities while keeping graphics implementation within the owning teams
• Lead evaluation of new Electron and Chromium releases, significant runtime capabilities, Windows platform changes, and other technologies that may affect the platform
• Diagnose the most difficult technical issues spanning Electron, Chromium, Node.js, Windows, application lifecycle, memory, security, installation, and hosted web applications
• Use profiling, crash diagnostics, runtime tracing, native debugging tools, and Chromium developer tooling to understand complex system behavior
• Write and review architecture decision records, technical designs, platform interfaces, operational runbooks, and engineering standards
• Proactively identify architectural risks, technical debt, reliability concerns, and opportunities to simplify the platform before they become delivery or support problems
• Ensure technical decisions consider the needs of future Autodesk products as well as the immediate requirements of Forma
• Help establish an onboarding model that allows additional Autodesk web applications to adopt the desktop platform through well-defined configuration and integration points
• Participate in hiring and help establish the technical bar for engineers joining the team

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience
• Strong software engineering experience with JavaScript or TypeScript and Node.js
• Significant experience designing and delivering complex software systems or platform capabilities
• Experience with Electron, Chromium-based applications, desktop application development, or comparable systems-level application platforms
• Strong understanding of application architecture, process boundaries, asynchronous systems, security, and software lifecycle management
• Experience leading technical design and implementation across multiple engineers
• Ability to take ambiguous or open-ended technical problems from investigation through architecture, implementation, and production delivery
• Strong debugging skills across multiple components, processes, or technology layers
• Experience with automated testing, continuous integration, source control, code review, and modern software delivery practices
• Experience communicating technical trade-offs and influencing decisions across engineering teams
• Demonstrated ability to mentor engineers and raise engineering quality through technical leadership

Preferred Qualifications

• Deep experience with Electron architecture, including main, renderer, and preload processes, context isolation, inter-process communication, and security configuration
• Strong understanding of Chromium architecture, runtime configuration, feature flags, release lifecycle, and developer tooling
• Experience with C++, native Node.js modules, or interoperability between JavaScript and native platform APIs
• Experience developing software using Windows APIs or other systems-level Windows technologies
• Experience diagnosing memory, process, performance, startup, or crash problems in Chromium-based or native desktop applications
• Familiarity with Electron or Chromium build tooling such as GN and Ninja
• Experience with Windows application packaging, installers, code signing, updating, and enterprise software deployment
• Experience designing shared APIs, SDKs, runtimes, or platform components consumed by multiple products or engineering teams
• Experience with desktop application threat modeling and secure application architecture
• Experience