Wanted: IT professional/web developer for a 3-6 month paid stint in Tanzania

by Jon Thompson on April 1, 2009

TechnoServeIf you are looking to break into the aid biz this is probably a pretty good way to do it.  TechnoServe is looking for either a volunteer or consultant who is willing to spend 3-6 months in Tanzania helping to build out a system which they already have up and running.  They’ll cover the cost of the flight, accommodation, and a $40/day Per Diem which is pretty standard for a volunteer.  While I cannot vouch for TechnoServe I will say that this sort of experience is exactly what most major aid agencies are looking for.  Here’s the skinny:

Our largest program works with coffee farmers’ cooperatives in Tanzania, Kenya, Rwanda and Ethiopia. We are using IT to help us monitor, manage and evaluate the program. e.g.

– Pentaho B for reporting
– Orbeon XForms for web based data entry
– We may implement offline data gathering solution using smart phones.

We are looking for a Pentaho BI / Web Developer to join us in east Africa for 3-6 months to help us with the next phase of our systems development.

A qualified candidate should have at least the following experience:

-Requirement definition and analysis via use cases, UML, and similar software development modeling techniques
-Decomposing report and dashboard requirements and identifying the optimal configuration and user interface layouts
-Installation, configuration, maintenance, and tuning of Microsoft SQL Server 2005
-Deep understanding of data modeling, and the creation and debugging of Structured Query Language queries
-Developing JSP / Apache Tomcat web applications.
-Understanding of optimizing applications for low-bandwidth environments

The following, more specific experience, would be highly advantageous:

-Installing and configuring the various components of the Pentaho Business Intelligence Suite (Data Integration, Report Designer, CDF Dashboards)
-XForms development
-Application development on Symbian devices (e.g. Nokia E71)

If you are interested please contact Alan Leavy at TechnoServe: pentahorole@tnstanzania.org

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