REF NO: SD-NI-26
JOB SUMMARY
Analyse user needs and develop, test, maintain, and support secure applications that improve the Company\'s registry and business operations. Apply strong practical PHP development skills to support company\'s environment, related integrations, portals and internal tools, working within vendor support arrangements and approved change controls to protect registry service continuity.
Key Duties and Responsibilities
Requirements analysis and application development
Work with users to analyse processes, document requirements, acceptance criteria and data flows, and identify practical automation and service improvements.
- Develop and maintain PHP applications, services and integrations using maintainable code, approved frameworks and coding standards.
- Build and improve web interfaces and APIs using appropriate HTML, CSS, JavaScript and database technologies; design input validation and robust error handling.
- Estimate work, agree priorities with the Head of Technical Services and demonstrate completed functionality against documented acceptance criteria.
CoCCA and registry application support
- Investigate registry-related application and integration issues, reproduce faults, review authorised logs and configuration, and coordinate resolution with vendor support.
- Maintain approved interfaces, custom tools and integrations around CoCCA; modify vendor-managed components only where authorised and supported.
- Support registrar onboarding and integration testing; build working knowledge of domain lifecycle operations, DNS concepts, EPP and registry data requirements.
- Analyse recurring incidents and implement approved permanent fixes; communicate service impact and workarounds clearly to technical and business users.
Quality security and release management
- Use Git, peer review and automated tests appropriate to the change; conduct integration, regression and user acceptance testing before release.
- Apply secure development practices, including access controls, parameterised queries, secret management, dependency checks and protection of personal data.
- Prepare deployment and rollback plans, obtain change approval, separate development and production access, and verify application behaviour after release.
- Investigate performance and reliability issues using logs and monitoring; coordinate recovery testing and application-level backup validation with infrastructure colleagues.
Documentation collaboration and continuous improvement
- Maintain technical documentation, API specifications, configuration records, release notes, support runbooks and user guidance sufficient for team handover.
- Provide agreed application support and user training; record incidents, changes and known issues in the approved tracking system.
- Identify technical debt and security risks, recommend remediation and provide regular updates on delivery, incidents and application health. Participate in approved maintenance or support cover as required.
Key Performance Indicators
Performance Areas; Performance Measures
Delivery and acceptance
- At least 90% of agreed sprint or monthly commitments accepted by the due date; report scope changes, dependencies and delivery risks promptly.
Code quality and testing
- 100% of production code changes version-controlled, reviewed and supported by proportionate test evidence; track escaped defects and reduce repeat defects against baseline.
Release control
- 100% of production releases have approval, documented validation and a rollback plan; monitor change failure rate and agree an improvement target.
Incident response and recovery
- At least 95% of assigned incidents acknowledged and progressed within severity-based service levels; record resolution or escalation evidence and recurring-issue actions.
Security remediation
- Triage assigned critical findings within one working day; remediate or obtain documented risk acceptance within approved severity-based deadlines; no secrets committed to source control.
Applications integrations
- Complete agreed integration and regression tests before relevant changes; resolve or escalate assigned registry applications issues within agreed service levels and vendor dependencies.
Reliability and performance
- Monitor assigned application availability, error rates and response times against approved service objectives; investigate breaches and track corrective actions.
Documentation and knowledge transfer
- Update relevant runbooks, API documentation and release notes with every material change; complete agreed user training and team handovers.
Person Specification
General Education
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, Information Systems or a related discipline. A strong practical development portfolio is required.
Professional Qualification
- Relevant software development (front-end and back-end), secure coding, cloud, or database certification is an advantage. Practical competence and demonstrable delivery are more important than certification alone.
Work Experience
- Minimum of three years of hands-on software development experience, including at least two years developing and maintaining PHP applications in production. Experience diagnosing faults and supporting business-critical applications is required.
Essential Requirements
- Strong practical PHP skills, including object-oriented programming, dependency management with Composer and experience with a mainstream PHP framework or a substantial existing PHP codebase. PHP experience is mandatory.
- Working proficiency in SQL and relational databases such as MySQL, MariaDB or PostgreSQL; REST APIs; HTML, CSS and JavaScript; Git; Linux-based application environments.
- Evidence of secure coding, debugging, automated testing, peer review and controlled deployment; ability to understand unfamiliar code and maintain existing applications.
Desirable Requirements
- Domain registry or registrar systems, EPP, DNS, XML, payment or business system integrations, CI/CD and container experience are beneficial.
Skills and Competencies
Competencies
- Analytical thinking; structured problem-solving; ownership; attention to detail; security awareness; service orientation; collaboration; clear communication and willingness to learn.
Skills
- PHP development; requirements analysis; API integration; SQL and data modelling; troubleshooting and log analysis; testing; source control; release and rollback planning; technical documentation; explaining technical issues to non-technical users.