A subsurface modelling SDK for a Shell and Baker Hughes joint venture
Developer in the Software Extensibility team that maintained the SDK and public API that other teams and third parties used to build the next generation of subsurface modelling software.
- Client
- Shell & Baker Hughes (joint venture)
- Period
- 2015 – 2018
- Sector
- Oil and gas
- Role
- Software Engineer, Application design, Scrum Master
The joint venture between Shell and Baker Hughes built the next generation of subsurface modelling software used to develop oil and gas fields. I worked in the Software Extensibility Scrum team, eight developers and two testers responsible for the SDK and its API.
Our job was to give other project teams and third parties a clean, documented way to build the components that made up the final product. That meant improving a ten-year-old codebase step by step while new functionality was added, keeping the design aligned with the architecture guidelines that prepared the product for the cloud.
Next to lead development work I was the team’s Scrum Master for several months, keeping the process running so the team could work without interruption.
Key challenges
- A codebase developed over more than ten years, carrying significant technical debt.
- An API consumed by other product teams and by third parties, so every change had to stay compatible and documented.
- Preparing a fat-client application for future deployment in the cloud.
Architecture highlights
- A clean, well-documented SDK and API as the extension point for internal teams and third parties.
- Incremental refactoring aligned with new architecture guidelines while new functionality kept shipping.
Stack
- C#
- C++
- .NET 4.6
- WinForms
- WPF
- TypeScript
- TFS
