Hi, I'm Hritwik
I'm a Bangalore based Site Reliability Engineer, with 3+ years of experience in building & maintaining resilient, scalable infrastructure in production environments. I am a dedicated, self-driven geek with a passion for Python, Linux & self-hosting and a strong zeal for open-source development.
In my free time time, you can catch me working on TerraNixLab (my Homelab), playing Badminton, Stargazing, or Solo traveling to different corners of India.
About me
I'm Batman ( jk )
So who am i really?
I am someone who likes to code, be it for my career or for solutions to problems that i create! (why spend 6 minutes doing something by hand when you can spend 6 hours to automate it xD). But seriously, this habit made me significantly better engineer over the past years.
Couldn't find a program to download songs or upgrade the ones in my library? Just code it. (i like to own my content)
Too lazy to walk 10 steps to turn lights/fan on? Control it via Raspberry pi + Relay.
Frustrated about all the privacy invading crap in OEM android? Just build your own fork of Android and tinker with it. (Yep, i use forked AOSP to build my own rom and daily drive it, no more OEM BS).
These are just a handful of instances through which I learned coding. Don't believe me? Just have a look at my GitHub profile. I am a huge free software and OSS supporter, so all my work is open source. (it ain't much, but it's honest work)
You can always have a chat with me on Linux, Competitive coding and how computer systems work.
I have also began self-hosting recently to get into a privacy-focused life and have been hosting many services on my homelab (TerraNixLab) which are direct replacements for many big-tech products.
Some of them include llama.cpp (local LLM's), Nextcloud (Google/Microsoft workspace alt and CalDav/contacts server), Immich (Google photos alt), Forgejo (Github/Gitlab alt), SearX (search), Bookstack (for documentation of my TerraNixLab & Life). And the list is ever growing!
Sunshine + Moonlight are my connection to video game world (and a 2000km journey between me and my Gaming Rig!). My achievements are often short-lived, however, as I'm a connoisseur of the 'You Died' experience.
Apart from that, i love playing badminton, reading psychology books, trekking and a little bit of gaming. I have also been traveling solo for the past year and been loving it so far. Movies, Web-series aren't my cup of tea. (well expect for LOTR and mystery/thriller genre).
Oh, I am also an Astronomy nerd. If you can tell me what a nebula is without Googling, you're instantly my new best friend!
And... that's all folks!
- Location:Bengaluru, IN
- Age:25
- Nationality:Indian
- Interests:Astronomy, Homelab, Travelling
- Study:LNM Institute of Information Technology
- Employment:On a Career break
Education
Bachelors in Computer Science
Work
Career Break
Well, emergencies don't knock on your door; they just barge in and announce, ‘Time for a reset!’ So, I've been rediscovering all the things I forgot I loved – like finally tackling that coding project I'd been putting off, leveling up in my favorite game, and tinkering with my homelab without feeling guilty about neglecting work. Consider it an unexpected system reboot for my well-being.
Platform Engineer
Led the architectural revamp of a monolithic Python backend codebase to a modular design, enhancing scalability, maintainability, and platform flexibility; enabling faster feature releases and quicker response to market demands. This included:
Refactoring the monolithic codebase to modular architecture, reducing code complexity by 20%.
Designing and implementing a fully automated deployment pipeline for new database VMs across AWS & Azure using Argo Workflows and custom backend, reducing VM deployment time by ~80% from 2 days to 4 hours.
Eliminating developer dependency on our team for Database testing, fostering a self-service model and freeing up our team's capacity.
Adding seamless support for new cloud platforms, including successful deployments to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), reducing onboarding time by 25%.
Improving support for integration of new DB's, implemented checksum validation for data integrity, improving data accuracy and reducing error rates by 10%.
Automated cleanup of AWS/Azure zombie resources, saving ~5% infra costs.
Site Reliability Engineer
Leveraged Nix and Terraform to scale existing Hadoop cluster, on GCP and On-prem datacenters, from 20 to 70 nodes; thus reducing deployment time by 80%.
Optimized disk read/write latencies from 20ms to under 1ms for HDFS by fine-tuning various ZFS parameters; thus mitigating frequent latency spikes by 80%.
Led company-wide deployment of Zeppelin & Hue for 300 devs using Nix, TF & SOPS. Used Infrastructure as Code (IaC) methodologies for optimized deployment speed, reliability and secret management.
Scaled Hadoop cluster by 30% in capacity. Implemented resource pipelines to improve capacity planning by generating & aggregating team-specific data.
Implemented Jenkins CI/CD pipelines to automate the deployment of Conda virtual environments on Hadoop cluster, resulting in 30% reduced app deployment time.
Proven on call proficiency in debugging live production issues during 24x7 on-call rotations. Ensured rapid resolution, minimizing downtimes and enhancing system resilience. Proficiently conducted and authored detailed RCA reports.
Site Reliability Engineer Intern
Conducted in-depth analysis of Java garbage collection times by analyzing GC logs from Hadoop cluster nodes. Fine-tuned GC parameters & optimized heap sizes, thus resulting in 10% improvement of application performance and reduced memory consumption.
Skills
Trades which i am Jack of
Personal Pursuits
My Life's Side Quests
PADI Open Water Scuba Diver
Qualified to a depth of 18m, can dive anywhere in the world using my own scuba gear. Who needs Netflix when you have a pufferfish looking perpetually surprised!
Travelling Solo
Just me, my backpack and some wonderful nomads i met on the way. The result? A whole lot of unexpected discoveries and a perspective shift that's, let's just say, significant!
Trek to Summit of Mt. Kedarkantha
Survived -10 °C for 6 days! But hey, the view from the top was pretty spectacular!
Check out some of my work
This blog section is currently experiencing a temporary… creative sabbatical. Think of it as a strategic pause before the word explosion. Coming soon (probably).
The blog section is like a mischievous gremlin. I'm trying to coax it into cooperating, but it mostly just hides. Stay tuned for updates on the gremlin taming process!
The blog section is being held hostage by a severe case of ‘what should I write?’ Send rubber duckies and inspiration!
Get in touch.
Wanna reach out to me? Look nowhere else!
- Location
- Bengaluru, India
- hritwiksinghal
- Github
- HritwikSinghal