Square Enix Limited
Senior DevOps Specialist • Jun 2020 — Present
As a result of Eidos' sale to Embracer Group in 2022, new challenges arose, necessitating the implementation of innovative tools to facilitate a seamless transition in service management and uphold a smooth user experience.
- Completely rebuild services out of Eidos-hosted hardware into VMware cluster(s) and entirely into Terraform and Ansible.
- Migrate previously manually executed changes into Terraform, Ansible, and if needed, Kubernetes.
- Migrated 1,000+ websites into new Kubernetes clusters, relocating both databases and localised storage (using a cephfs).
- Move the Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager setup from 'best effort' checks into Terraform, allowing for automated updates to certificates, etc.
- Created internal Terraform Modules to automate a number of tasks previously done manually.
Square Enix Limited
DevOps Engineer • Jan 2019 — Jun 2020
Worked as part of a small team that handles the backend infrastructure for western titles.
With my team, some of the major changes that I've worked on are:
- Migrated backend game services from being deployed via Debian packages to a Kubernetes based deployment via Flux.
- Worked with both MongoDB and Google Cloud to plan for releases of upcoming titles.
- Implemented Terraform (with an s3 backend) to setup both VMWare and GCP infrastructure.
Antstream Ltd
DevOps Engineer • Aug, 2017 — Dec 2018
Joined the small team at Antstream with a view to improving their existing setup and processes.
During my time, some of the major changes I brought in where:
- Implemented monitoring and alerting via Grafana and InfluxDB with alerts pushed to VictorOps.
- Automated the building of iOS, Android, and Windows UWP apps, ensuring they're available within their respective stores.
- Implemented Two-Factor Authentication on critical systems where possible.
- Reduced infrastructure costs by eliminating unused services, while also improving the scalability of critical services.
Multiplay (UK) Ltd
DevOps • Mar, 2014 — Jul, 2017
- Helped architect and deploy an automated cloud scaling system used by titles like Titanfall 2.
- Automated the deployment of both Windows and Ubuntu game servers via both Packer and Puppet.
- Assisted in migrating version control from svn to git and helped setup quality control checks via Jenkins, Virtualbox, and Docker for git commits.
- Was a project manager for a data centre migration from Interxion to Telehouse, interacting with suppliers, data centres, and customers to ensure the migration was completed smoothly and on time.
Systems Administrator • Aug, 2009 — Mar, 2014
- Expanded existing game server infrastructure from three locations to over twenty locations globally.
- Planned and implemented a migration from a 20-rack suite to a 5-rack high-capacity colocation setup.
- Worked with several publishers to provide support during the development process and after launch, including adding support for the game to Clanforge, the control panel used at the time by Multiplay.
- Provided on-site support for publisher events promoting upcoming games to both journalists and at consumer expos (e.g., EGX, Rezzed, Insomnia).
First/Second line support • May, 2008 — Aug, 2009
I was a first-line support technician responsible for B2C, B2B and ADAL customers providing support via Phone, Live Chat and Tickets to setup services to customer requirements.
Software
Kubernetes, Ubuntu, Ansible, Terraform, Docker, Vagrant, Graylog, Jira, Confluence, Windows, Jenkins
Monitoring
Grafana, Prometheus, Alertmanager, InfluxDB, Telegraf
Databases
MongoDB, MySQL, InfluxDB, Redis, Elasticsearch, and Postgres
Cloud Platforms
Google Compute Platform (GCP), VMware, AWS, and Azure
CI/CD
Gitlab CI, Github Actions, Flux, GoCD
Programming Languages
Shell scripting, Python, YAML, HCL (HashiCorp Configuration Language)