# Darragh Burke

![Darragh Burke](/resources/cognition/portraits/darragh-burke.webp)

Member of Technical Staff at Cognition building agent interfaces for Devin; ex-Figma eng lead on Figma Make and Code Layers  
Cognition  
New York, New York, United States

## At Cognition

- Role: Member of Technical Staff (Engineering)
- Joined: Jun 2026
- How they joined: Directly
- Before Cognition: Software Engineer, Figma
- Overlapped before Cognition with other Cognition people at: Microsoft (https://www.autumn.ai/resources/cognition/worked-together)

## Identity
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darragh-burke-875509163
- X: @DarraghBurke_
- GitHub: https://github.com/darraghjburke
- Website: https://darraghburke.com/
- Domain: cognition.ai

## Notes
- Co-authored the Devin blog post 'How Devin rebuilt its renderer' (Aug 25, 2026) with Jorge Zreik, covering virtualized rendering for sessions with hundreds of thousands of events; said on X: "@ZreikJorge and I used Devin to rebuild it's own chat renderer over the last couple of weeks we wrote about why chat rendering is a hard problem, and what we learned about collaborating with agents to build great frontends" (https://devin.ai/blog/rebuilding-devins-chat-renderer)
- Joined Cognition in June 2026 as Member of Technical Staff (New York) to build Devin; announced on X: "Joined @cognition last month to build Devin! Cloud agents are a huge change to the way software gets built. They're incredibly powerful already, but they need to be simpler to use and more fun to work with. We're making it so :) If you're a Devin user, I'd love your feedback!" (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2079267258434539663)
- On the renderer rebuild, posted: "We're spending all our time chatting with agents and managing our sessions in a sidebar. We need these interfaces to get out of our way so we can get things done. So we rebuilt the chat and sidebar in the @DevinAI app to be faster, cleaner and more functional" (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2092646973958467874)
- At Figma (Mar 2024-Jun 2026, Product Engineering for AI) he was eng lead on Code Layers and Figma Make, and primary engineer for AI Rename Layers and Text Tools (Translate, Rewrite, Shorten); work spanned client-side TypeScript/C++ and server-side coding-agent optimization and evals infrastructure - direct precursor to agent work at Cognition. (https://www.linkedin.com/in/darragh-burke-875509163)
- X bio frames his Cognition remit as "building agent interfaces @cognition". (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_)
- Promoted Devin stacked PRs: "megalithic PRs are hard to review and difficult to revert if something goes wrong. With agents writing thousands of lines of code in minutes, PRs can easily grow out of hand. stacked PRs fix this completely. They're the biggest thing I was missing in Devin; now they just work!" (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2082875416818200971)
- Left Figma in June 2026 after ~2 years: "last week was my last @figma. i had a blast building AI for design over the last few years! grateful to have shipped stuff i'm proud of and to have worked with incredibly kind & talented folks" (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2068882844932534739)
- Open source: GitHub account darraghjburke (bio 'Babylon.js Tools Engineer | UCSB CS '21'); his personal site repo darraghjburke/site (Astro) lists devin-ai-integration[bot] as a contributor, meaning he uses Devin on his own projects. (https://github.com/darraghjburke/site)
- Presented Code Layers on stage at Figma Config 2025. (https://youtu.be/qaZC3XSAeR8?t=1633)
- Wrote 'Building Figma's Code Layers' on the Figma blog and 'Context and control in Figma Make' (Make Kits and attachments). (https://www.figma.com/blog/building-figmas-code-layers/)
- At Tinder (Jun 2022-Mar 2024, Software Engineer III, web) worked on the Obsidian design system: drove Dark Mode on Tinder Web, built design-token/icon codegen for Web/Android/iOS, CI/CD with Buildkite and Artifactory across 5 app repos, and a Figma design-system linter plugin; wrote 'Building Obsidian, Tinder's Design System' on the Tinder Tech Blog. (https://medium.com/tinder/building-obsidian-tinders-design-system-e127770d8e3f)
- At Microsoft (May 2021-Jun 2022) was on the Babylon.js team: owner of the Babylon GUI Editor (gui.babylonjs.com), built the Island Painter multiplayer 3D demo, and implemented browser APIs like XmlHttpRequest in native code for Babylon Native. (https://www.linkedin.com/in/darragh-burke-875509163)
- Personal site lists principles including "Slow down and think harder" and "The systems we interact with should be beautiful, intuitive, and joyful". (https://darraghburke.com/)
- Education: BS Computer Science, UC Santa Barbara (2017-2021); earlier studied Creative Writing at Orange County School of the Arts (OCSA). (https://darraghburke.com/)
- Microsoft internships: 2020 built a Babylon.js texture inspector/editor (TypeScript, Canvas, WebGL, 60fps); 2019 in Azure Networking on the sWAN backbone, on a team building a cross-platform router agent in Go. (https://www.linkedin.com/in/darragh-burke-875509163)
- Retweets of Cognition launches (Devin Outposts, macOS cloud agents, Devin Cloud Mac by Jon Kelley) show his public posting centers on the Devin product. (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2101372207360286730)
- On AI and software engineering: "software engineering has been flipped on it's head in the last year" (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2052530407728357565)
- Earlier: 2018 intern on a 6-person startup team at Learn with Maven (Irvine; Node/React Native), Varsity Tutors tutor, and 2015-2016 research assistant at UC Irvine on an exergaming research project. (https://www.linkedin.com/in/darragh-burke-875509163)
- Posted a 'tinder reunion at #Config2024' photo. (https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/1806429018977394719)

## Experience
- Member of Technical Staff at Cognition - New York, New York, United States (Jun 2026 - Present)
- Software Engineer at Figma - New York, New York, United States (Mar 2024 - Jun 2026): Product Engineering for AI
• Eng lead on Code Layers & Figma Make, Figma’s new AI design-to-code tools
• Primary engineer for AI Rename Layers and Text Tools (Translate, Rewrite, Shorten)
• Full stack engineering work; significant emphasis on clientside TypeScript and C++, and server-side coding agent optimization and evals infrastructure.
- Software Engineer III at Tinder (Jun 2022 - Mar 2024): Web Engineer at Tinder working on design systems and tooling.
• Drove implementation of Dark Mode on Tinder Web, coordinating across product, design and engineering to implement theming across dozens of screens
• Worked on design system pipeline, built code generation tools to transform design tokens and iconography assets for Web, Android and iOS
• Contributed to CI/CD system for design-system using tools like Buildkite and Artifactory to automate design system updates across 5 app repos
• Built bespoke tools to improve design->engineering handoff, including a design system linter plugin for Figma, a design system flow chart visualizer, and a design->code translation tool
React, TypeScript, Node.js
- Software Engineer at Microsoft - United States (May 2021 - Jun 2022): Engineer on the Babylon.js team (babylonjs.com)
• Owner of the Babylon GUI Editor (gui.babylonjs.com), a browser-based UI builder for Babylon.js
• Built aka.ms/islandpainter to showcase multiplayer networking in a 3D game
• Implemented browser APIs such as XmlHttpRequest in native code (C++, Java, Objective-C) for Babylon Native
Technologies: React, TypeScript, WebGL, Canvas, C++
- Software Engineer Intern at Microsoft - Redmond, Washington, United States (Jun 2020 - Sep 2020): • Built a texture inspector and editor tool for Babylon.js, a browser-based 3D graphics engine
• Leveraged TypeScript, Canvas, and WebGL to enable editing high resolution textures at 60fps
• Led design of product from ground up, working collaboratively with PMs and technical artists
- Software Engineer Intern at Microsoft - Sunnyvale, California (Jun 2019 - Sep 2019): Organization: Azure Networking
 • Worked on Azure's backbone network, sWAN with 100+ data centers across 52 regions
 • Member of a team developing a cross-platform router agent in Go
 • Developed integration tests that ran in a virtualized router environment as part of a CI/CD pipeline
- Software Engineering Intern at Learn with Maven - Irvine, California (Jun 2018 - Oct 2018): • Worked as an intern in a 6-person team to develop a web and mobile app for a small startup
• Developed full-stack using NodeJS for the backend API and React Native and Redux for the mobile frontend
• Built a user account system using MongoDB and frontend login/signup functionality
- Tutor at Varsity Tutors - United States (Jun 2018 - Oct 2018): Worked as an independent contractor for Varsity Tutors, helping highschool students with
test preparation on a freelance basis. This involved spending approximately 4 hours
with each student per week reviewing practice tests and studying time management
strategies
- Research Assistant at UC Irvine - Irvine (Jun 2015 - Jan 2016): • Created software for an exergaming research project at UCI focused on physical therapy for disabled children
• Developed a hardware-software bridge in Java between an excercise bike and the video game Minecraft

## Education
- UC Santa Barbara - Bachelor of Science - BS, Computer Science - (Jan 2017 - Jan 2021)

## Sources
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/darragh-burke-875509163
- https://darraghburke.com/
- https://github.com/darraghjburke
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_
- https://devin.ai/blog/rebuilding-devins-chat-renderer
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2079267258434539663
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2113678259590463670
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2092646973958467874
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2082875416818200971
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2068882844932534739
- https://github.com/darraghjburke/site
- https://youtu.be/qaZC3XSAeR8?t=1633
- https://www.figma.com/blog/building-figmas-code-layers/
- https://medium.com/tinder/building-obsidian-tinders-design-system-e127770d8e3f
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2101372207360286730
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/2052530407728357565
- https://x.com/DarraghBurke_/status/1806429018977394719


Researched with Autumn (https://www.autumn.ai) from public sources. Updated 2026-11-04. Profile: https://www.autumn.ai/resources/cognition/people/darragh-burke · Everyone at Cognition: https://www.autumn.ai/resources/cognition/people