Joshua Downer
Principal Software Architect at House of Design Robotics
Stoneham, Massachusetts, United States
Summary
👤
Senior🎓
Top SchoolJoshua Downer is a Principal Software Architect with 12+ years building robust, Linux-first systems across robotics, simulation, and distributed infrastructure. He blends deep academic training (PhD in Mathematics) with hands-on engineering in C++, Python, and Qt to design concurrent, asynchronous, and safety-critical systems for companies ranging from Veo and Rethink to robotics startups. Joshua has led R&D teams, architected integration and simulation frameworks, and produced tooling and test suites that bring repeatability to complex workcells and embedded products. An active open-source contributor, he has maintained and refactored components of the widely used SleekXMPP library, signaling a focus on code hygiene and long-term maintainability. Based in Stoneham, MA, he seeks remote roles where algorithmic thinking and systems-level design converge with practical delivery. Unusually for an architect, he pairs formal math research experience with low-level device and CI/DevOps work, enabling both prototype science and production reliability.
12 years of coding experience
17 years of employment as a software developer
Ph.D., Mathematics, Ph.D., Mathematics at University of OtagoB.E., Engineering Science, B.E., Engineering Science at The University of Auckland
Stackoverflow
727reputation
86kreached
24answers
7questions
Github Skills (10)
xmpp10
lib10
python10
code-cleanup9
maintenance9
graph6
python-multithreading6
cython6
inheritance6
ubuntu6
Programming languages (6)
Github contributions (5)
fritzy/SleekXMPP
May 2015 - Jul 2015
Python 2.6+/3.1+ XMPP Library
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:6 commits, 4 PRs, 1 comment in 2 months
Contributions summary:Joshua primarily focused on improvements and maintenance within the `sleekxmpp` library, a Python XMPP library. Their contributions involve fixing import statements, removing unused modules, and addressing minor spelling errors. They also refactored the xep-0323 plugin code, removing dead code and adjusting logic in the sensordata module. Their work demonstrates a focus on code cleanup and maintaining the functionality of the XMPP library.
pythonxmppxmpp-librarypython-2python-2-6
jdowner/score
Sep 2013 - Sep 2014
Contributions:99 commits in 1 year
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