Jakob Waibel

Systems software engineer at IBM Quantum

I’m a systems software engineer at IBM Quantum, where I work on low-level infrastructure for quantum computing systems. My day-to-day involves Rust, Python, and Go, running on Linux inside Kubernetes and container-based environments.

Before that, I completed an MSc at the University of Stuttgart. My master’s thesis tackled qubit mapping - specifically, integrating bounded exhaustive search over sequences of up to k SWAPs into the SABRE routing algorithm - sitting at the intersection of theoretical computer science, combinatorial optimisation, and quantum computing. My bachelor’s thesis explored the cloud software side of quantum computing at IBM, though it’s covered by an NDA.

Alongside my studies I worked as a tutor in theoretical computer science, mathematics, and software engineering.

Projects #

lurk - a simple, pretty alternative to strace written in Rust. Traces system calls of a process or command with colourised output and JSON support. Available on crates.io as lurk-cli and packaged in Arch Linux.

microscope - the implementation of K-SWAP SABRE developed for my master’s thesis. A Rust/Python extension (built with maturin) that extends the SABRE qubit-mapping algorithm with bounded exhaustive SWAP-sequence search.

sile-fystem - a generic FUSE filesystem implementation in Go built on top of the afero API. Any backend that satisfies the afero interface can be mounted as a FUSE filesystem.

rusant - an open-source video conferencing platform written in Rust using GTK4, libadwaita, and GStreamer. Uses Saltpanelo as its networking layer via FFI bindings.

Outside of work I spend my time running, cycling, and hiking. I play board games regularly and have been deep into Magic: The Gathering for a while. I’m also an avid reader — you can find my reading list and recommendations there.