Gap Tracker

Fintech Backend Platform Co. · Backend Software Engineer — Java & Python

Gap	Severity	Why It Matters	Study Task	Proof Task	Safe Interview Framing	Status
Java / Spring production backend depth	High risk	Role title explicitly includes Java and likely expects production backend depth.	Learn Spring Boot controller/service/repository structure, dependency injection, DTOs, validation, and exception handling.	Build a tiny Java/Spring REST API or prepare a truthful ramp explanation.	My strongest recent backend work is Python/FastAPI; I am transparent that Java/Spring is a ramp area.	Open
AWS production ownership	High risk	JD likely values deployed cloud services, monitoring, reliability, and operational ownership.	Review ECS/EKS, Lambda, RDS, CloudWatch, IAM basics, and deployment patterns.	Add a deployment architecture diagram for a FastAPI app on AWS.	I understand backend reliability and traceability patterns, but I have not owned large-scale production AWS systems.	Open
CI/CD production ownership	Medium risk	Backend teams expect automated tests and deployment gates.	Review GitHub Actions, test/lint gates, build artifacts, deployment stages, rollback thinking.	Add GitHub Actions to one portfolio repo.	I have used tests and local verification; production CI/CD ownership is an area I am actively strengthening.	Open
Observability stack depth	Medium risk	Fintech backend systems need logs, metrics, traces, alerts, and production debugging.	Learn logs vs metrics vs traces, CloudWatch/Datadog basics, alert thresholds, dashboards.	Add structured logging and a simple metrics/readiness endpoint to TraceOps or an API repo.	My engineering background is strong in traceability and debugging; I am extending that into backend observability tooling.	Open