Griffin Downs
Software Engineer at Ocean Synaptics
Trondheim, Trøndelag, Norway
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolGriffin Downs is a C++ infrastructure engineer with eight years of experience building developer tooling, compiler pipelines, and low-latency runtime systems across Microsoft, robotics startups, and industrial simulation teams. He specializes in C++ toolchains (vcpkg, CMake, MSVC), static analysis, ABI-sensitive upgrades, and zero-runtime-overhead frameworks including WebAssembly and advanced template metaprogramming. Griffin has modernized build systems and CI/CD workflows and contributed to high-profile open-source projects such as Microsoft’s vcpkg and the VS Code C/C++ extension, improving both back-end package handling and front-end developer UX. He recently created cto-assets-rtis, a deterministic C++/WASM simulation engine that resolves simulation logic entirely at compile time, demonstrating a novel approach to shifting runtime complexity into the compiler. Based in Trondheim and US-citizen, he is remote-flexible and actively seeking roles in compiler infrastructure, devtools, WASM-native runtimes, or C++23+ systems programming.
8 years of coding experience
8 years of employment as a software developer
Bachelor’s Degree Computer Science, Bachelor’s Degree Computer Science at DigiPen Institute of Technology
Stackoverflow
1reputation
0reached
0answers
0questions
Github Skills (22)
dependency-management10
filesystem10
c-language10
lib10
package-management10
typescript10
build-system10
cmake10
vscode-extension10
typescript-types10
file-handling10
vcpkg10
typescripts10
cprogramming-language10
microsoft9
Programming languages (7)
Github contributions (5)
microsoft/vcpkg
Feb 2019 - Sep 2020
C++ Library Manager for Windows, Linux, and MacOS
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:8 releases, 110 commits, 245 PRs in 1 year 6 months
Contributions summary:Griffin's commits primarily focused on modifying CMake build configurations within the vcpkg repository. They updated the Find modules for several third-party libraries like Brotli, Flatbuffers, and others. These changes involved adjusting search paths, library names, and build type-specific configurations to improve integration with the vcpkg package management system. Their contributions aimed at enhancing the build process and dependencies for various C++ libraries.
c-plus-plussetuptoolspackage-managermacoscplusplus
microsoft/vscode-cpptools
Jan 2018 - Aug 2019
Official repository for the Microsoft C/C++ extension for VS Code.
Role in this project:Full-stack Developer
Full-stack DeveloperContributions:41 commits, 23 PRs, 103 pushes in 1 year 6 months
Contributions summary:Griffin primarily contributed to the C/C++ extension for VS Code, demonstrating front-end and back-end development skills. They added functionality for highlighting inactive regions by modifying the client-side code, introducing new features and refactoring existing components. They also made some changes to the configuration files and package management, which demonstrates a more full-stack approach to the project's development.
cppvscode-extensionvscodevs-codemicrosoft
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