INTERNSHIP DETAILS

Backend Engineering Intern - OCaml

CompanyAhrefs
LocationPalo Alto
Work ModeOn Site
PostedMay 27, 2026
Internship Information
Core Responsibilities
The intern will dive into the Dune codebase to identify and implement modifications that improve build observability. They will also collaborate with the team and contribute to the upstream `ocaml/dune` project.
Internship Type
full time
Company Size
201
Visa Sponsorship
No
Language
English
Working Hours
40 hours
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About The Company
Ahrefs is the marketing platform built to keep your brand discoverable across search, AI, and the web. We support modern discovery end to end – from SEO to AEO – showing you how people search, what AI surfaces, and where your brand actually appears, so you can act on real demand, not assumptions. With Brand Radar, Ahrefs powers one of the largest AI visibility databases available today. The scale: • 239M+ total monthly prompts indexed • 162M+ AI Overviews prompts • 29M AI Mode prompts • 13M+ ChatGPT prompts • 13M+ Copilot prompts • Coverage across ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini – plus Reddit, TikTok, and YouTube For over 15 years, we’ve been building one of the largest marketing data platforms in the world and turning that data into tools marketers rely on every day. With Ahrefs, you can research demand, analyze competitors, find content opportunities, track backlinks, monitor performance, and measure visibility across search and AI – all in one place. Ahrefs is trusted by teams worldwide, from fast-moving startups to 44% of the Fortune 500.
About the Role

About the Role

To ensure someone can be effectively supported throughout the intern we cn only look to hire an intern in either Singapore or in Europe.

You'll work remotely within our Middle-end / Tooling team, focusing on improving the observability of Dune, the OCaml build system. This isn't about cosmetic changes; it's about digging into Dune's core to expose how it builds things, making complex OCaml projects more understandable.

Responsibilities

  • Dive into the Dune codebase, identify areas where the build rules are translated into actions.
  • Implement modifications directly in Dune's source code to expose fine-grained information about builds.
  • Develop and contribute pull requests to the upstream `ocaml/dune` project, working with the maintainers.
  • Experiment with your changes and new tooling on real, large-scale industrial OCaml codebases to validate their usefulness.
  • Collaborate asynchronously with the team.

Requirements

Must have:

  • Solid OCaml programming skills. You need to be comfortable reading, understanding, and writing idiomatic OCaml.
  • Experience with basic Git and GitHub workflows (branching, committing, pull requests, code reviews).
  • Good written and verbal English communication skills for collaborating with a remote, async team and upstream maintainers.

Nice to have:

• Prior experience using more than one build system (e.g., Cargo, Make, Bazel, SCons, Nix, etc.).

What Success Looks Like

You've made significant contributions to Dune, resulting in working prototypes or even merged changes for a
tool that clarifies what happened during a build and why. This could involve exposing new internal Dune data
structures or developing a basic analysis tool on top, verified on an industrial codebase.

Ahrefs does not engage with agencies or third party recruitment solutions for the roles we hire for. If at any point we need help, we'll let you know! 

Key Skills
OCamlGitGitHubCommunicationBuild Systems
Categories
TechnologyEngineeringSoftware