> That sounds like an interesting and varied role.
It is, and it doesn't get as much formal recognition in the research world. Some folks are trying to change this [0], but unfortunately for the moment research software engineers often end up more of a happy accident than a deliberate decision on the part of labs. Part of this is due to weirdness in how funding is allocated for research positions at universities- instead of research programmers being funded through operating expenses like a secretary, administrator or many (but not all) librarians, most lab positions are dependent upon soft money (i.e., grants) that could potentially evaporate unexpectedly. I had a friend at ${BAY_AREA_UNIVERSITY} who almost had this happen to him recently, but fortunately his PI got another grant so he didn't need to get furloughed/laid off. When I was living in Ithaca, I noticed a similar trend of non-faculty taking sabbaticals due to funding issues and then returning 6 months to a year or so later in a different department [1]. That sort of instability in employment is part of what scared me into moving to a major metropolitan area- I still work for a university, but I know I have options (although I'm currently not funded by soft money- last job was though).
I love my job. Most of the projects are medium sized ones with 100-200 hours of programming involved, so I get to see a good variety. Splitting my time between C, Java Script, MATLAB, Python, Swift, PHP and R means that I am probably not an expert in any of them, but I we have a solid team of general purpose programmers who can handle almost anything the labs send our way.
My only complaint would be that the pay is a little on the low side. Otherwise the work and the work environment are both excellent.
It is, and it doesn't get as much formal recognition in the research world. Some folks are trying to change this [0], but unfortunately for the moment research software engineers often end up more of a happy accident than a deliberate decision on the part of labs. Part of this is due to weirdness in how funding is allocated for research positions at universities- instead of research programmers being funded through operating expenses like a secretary, administrator or many (but not all) librarians, most lab positions are dependent upon soft money (i.e., grants) that could potentially evaporate unexpectedly. I had a friend at ${BAY_AREA_UNIVERSITY} who almost had this happen to him recently, but fortunately his PI got another grant so he didn't need to get furloughed/laid off. When I was living in Ithaca, I noticed a similar trend of non-faculty taking sabbaticals due to funding issues and then returning 6 months to a year or so later in a different department [1]. That sort of instability in employment is part of what scared me into moving to a major metropolitan area- I still work for a university, but I know I have options (although I'm currently not funded by soft money- last job was though).
[0] https://rse.ac.uk/who/
[1] Possibly more of a perception than a reality.