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Web Developer, Harvard Library Innovation Lab, Cambridge, MA

Posted September 20, 2019

We’re hiring a developer to help us radically improve educational resources in the legal field (and beyond)!

 

About the Job

You’ll take the lead in building H2O, our platform for open legal textbooks and other resources. You’ll dive right away into ongoing efforts to enhance our annotation and export tools and modernize H2O’s frontend. You’ll develop new features to help faculty authors make new textbooks and to help students save thousands of dollars every year. When technical issues pop up, you’ll get to the bottom of them and own the solution.

 

This job is open source web application development with an emphasis on usability, accessibility and reliability. You’ll spend most of your time working in VueJS, Django, Python and Postgres. The work draws on a mix of technical expertise and calls for versatility, enthusiasm for discovery and learning and a founder-like approach to problem-solving. You can expect to grow in your strengths and competence in this job and to have the support of LIL’s close-knit team as we tackle challenges together.

 

Here are some examples of the work we’ve done recently on H2O, which might give you a better idea of what you’ll be doing:

  • Introduce a Docker-based development environment;

  • Migrate annotation functionality from server-side to client-side using VueJS for speed and reliability;

  • Make annotations robust against changes to the annotated HTML using Diff Match Patch and document-based offsets;

  • Integrate H2O with the powerful API made available by our Caselaw Access Project;

  • Enhance export flexibility and reliability by adding Pandoc;

  • Improve accessibility of H2O’s student-facing features;

  • Rewire H2O’s server-side architecture in Python / Django to improve maintainability and to better align H2O with LIL’s other projects and expertise.

 

This is a glimpse of our recent work preparing H2O for use by some of the most interesting and influential authors in the legal community, including Lawrence Lessig, Jonathan Zittrain, Jeannie Suk-Gersen, Charles Fried, Randall Kennedy, Tim Wu and many others. We’re eager for your experience to join ours and to see how much further we can take H2O together!

 

As a member of LIL, you’ll also have the opportunity to contribute to other impactful projects, like the Caselaw Access Project and Perma.cc, and to pursue your own research, experiments and explorations, which we call “sketches.” We’re proud of our big projects and the impact they have, but we also cherish the flexibility and autonomy of being a lab in an academic setting. And we are very serious about cultivating a fun, supportive and welcoming work environment.

 

About You

We’re looking for an experienced candidate who’s eager to own the primary technical responsibility on a project like H2O. Self-directed makers who seek input, feedback and discussion yet don’t require constant supervision thrive in LIL. We value initiative and accountability, and we’re looking for someone who’ll be quick to understand the “plot” of H2O and excited to take responsibility for carrying the story forward.

 

We want a strong, diverse team that reflects different backgrounds, experiences, and identities. Our team members all have unique histories, unusual career trajectories and an eclectic array of interests and influences that enhance their work. The work and well-being of LIL and the Library are strengthened profoundly by the diversity of our network and our differences in background, culture, experience, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, and much more. We actively seek and welcome applications from people of color, women, the LGBTQIA community, and persons with disabilities, as well as applications from across the spectrum of educational and professional backgrounds.

 

How to Apply

To apply for this position, please review the additional information and complete the application available here. We’ll review your materials and be in touch within a few days.

Thanks so much for your interest in joining LIL!