I, Chase Douglas, apply for core developer membership.

Who I am

I am a member of the Ubuntu multitouch team, employed by Canonical. My current activities include development of the multitouch gesture stack both as an upstream and as a downstream packager for Ubuntu, and development in the Linux kernel and X.org window system for multitouch. I am helping develop the XInput multitouch extension which will allow for full multitouch support through X.

I previously was a member of the Ubuntu Kernel Team. In that role, my activities included bug fixes for the Ubuntu kernels, a few upstream kernel fixes and improvements, and support for firmware in Ubuntu.

I also wrote and maintain the rinputd package as the upstream source and debian package maintainer.

My Ubuntu story

I ran Gentoo for quite a while, and it helped me learn all about GNU/Linux. After a while, I started to use it on my MythTV server as well as my desktops, but I found that I was spending too much time administering it. I moved my server to Ubuntu first, then moved my laptops to Ubuntu, and I've found it to be perfect for what I need. Once I arrived on the Ubuntu Kernel Team, I found myself to be enthralled by the challenge of making the Ubuntu releases work as well as possible. It enthuses me greatly to know that I contribute to helping people enjoy using their computers.

My involvement

I currently work on anything multitouch related. The biggest item so far has been developing the XInput multitouch extension to allow for full multitouch through the X.org window system. As part of this role, I have coordinated with the Ubuntu-X team to package and publish the XInput 2.1 work. I also help develop and maintain the multitouch gesture stack in Ubuntu.

During the Natty cycle I worked with Oxullo Intersecans to bring a multitouch-capable version of libavg to Ubuntu. I taught him how to package libavg and individual multitouch games. I then showed him how to get them uploaded to Ubuntu.

Previous to the multitouch work, my main areas of work on Ubuntu had been on the kernel directly. Outside of the core kernel source code, I fixed a few bugs up the stack into X and gnome, and I have worked on making power management better through the pm-utils package.

I have participated in directing the Ubuntu project in regards to input handling and display manager systems. I plan to continue leading Ubuntu in these realms.

I have prepared numerous uploads for various packages throughout the Ubuntu distribution. I have also created new packages for new upstream projects. I was taught the Ubuntu development process by Didier Roche. I have published a package in Debian and sync'd packages to Ubuntu. I am proficient in SRU handling, having performed multiple SRUs for various packages.

Examples of my work / Things I'm proud of

• Pre-release XInput 2.1 multitouch support in Ubuntu Natty
• Helped architect and develop the multitouch gesture stack
• Reverse engineered and developed driver for the Apple Magic Trackpad
• Found and fixed many kernel bugs
• An ability to traverse the entire stack from kernel to plumbing layer to applications to find and resolve bugs
• Resolving particularly daunting bugs, examples:
  • A pthread malloc mutex bug in uClibc on MIPS
  • A kernel scheduler bug keeping the loadavg artificially low

Areas of work

Primarily anything relating to multitouch and other input. Secondarily, I focus on fixing bugs that I notice.

Things I could do better

I am still refining my packaging skills. I believe I am a competent packager, but I will need help reviewing special packages, such as for Python projects.

Plans for the future

General

I plan on continuing to support multitouch in Ubuntu. This will include work upstream on X.org and potentially Wayland, and work to get the changes into Ubuntu.

I also plan to help sponsor packages for Ubuntu related to multitouch. New upstream multitouch projects are requesting packaging frequently, and I want to help them land in Ubuntu.

What I like least in Ubuntu

That I still can't use my Magic Mouse fully!

Comments

If you'd like to comment, but are not the applicant or a sponsor, do it here. Don't forget to sign with @SIG@.

Endorsements

Bryce Harrington

General feedback

I've sponsored bunches of uploads of multitouch/xorg packages from Chase, and am happy to recommend his application for CoreDev upload rights. I trust his packaging work to be good and then he'd make a great addition to the CoreDev team.

Chase has a depth of understanding throughout the Input stack from kernel, through X, to applications that fills a huge need in Ubuntu. He also has a breadth of experience from low level kernel development, to hacking on X, to userspace library and application development, and to packaging. He seems to be a swiss army knife of skills when it comes to solving Input problems!

He's reached the point where people go, "What, Chase isn't CoreDev already?" which seems to be a signal that the person is ready.

Specific Experiences of working together

Most of the uploads I've sponsored for Chase have been items in the X stack including xserver, -evdev, and other touch-related items. He has been remarkably proactive at following up with me to see if any issues arose, and if/when bugs did turn up he has been very quick to turn around fixes. When he has been uncertain about an aspect of packaging, such as determining correct version number formatting for SRU'd things, he asks questions first to make sure it is correct.

Areas of Improvement

One of the duties of CoreDev is sponsoring other developers' work, and I think Chase would be a very good sponsor so would encourage him to get experience doing sponsorship via Patch Pilot once he has CoreDev.

Chris Halse Rogers

General feedback

I've been reviewing Chase's X-related packages since the start of the gesture work in Maverick. He works well with the Ubuntu-X processes and is an excellent collaborator. He's extremely responsive to bugs, and has a deep knowledge of the X input stack - all the way from the applications down to the kernel - which he applies to rapidly provide solutions to the bugs we forward him. Chase will be a valuable contribution to the CoreDev team.

Specific Experiences of working together

The uploads I've advocated for Chase have been in the X/gesture stack from Maverick onwards have been good. When changes have needed to be made Chase has been quick to fix the problems, and does not make the same mistake twice. I've not had to correct anything in the packaging Chase has done during the Natty cycle.

Duncan McGreggor

General feedback

As part of my role in the Product Strategy group, I manage the Multi-touch team efforts. As luck would have it, this means I get to work with Chase. He is a phenomenal engineer -- once of the best I've worked with. What continually surprises me about him, though, is that in addition to his 3-engineers-in-1 work ethic, there is a 4th member to that party: an outstanding QA Engineer. I have never worked with a developer who has such a passion for quality coupled with an exceptional ability to deliver it. Not only does he constantly perform regression testing in his own work on a daily basis as part of his development style, but he watches for any possible issues in code peer reviews, ensuring that everything committed to trunk is held up to his high standards.

In my opinion, this, in addition to his fantastic packaging skills, makes him an excellent candidate as a member of the CoreDev team.

Kamal Mostafa

General feedback

Chase is a pleasure to work with. His guidance during my early days with the kernel team (and since) has been invaluable. I can always count on Chase for expert advice, well-considered answers, and a friendly conversation. He is an outstanding software engineer and a significant contributor to Ubuntu.

Chase would be a boon to the CoreDev team, just as he is to any team lucky enough to have him!

Specific Experiences of working together

Chase helped me come to grips with some of the kernel build methods when I started. Later, he educated me (and the rest of the kernel team) about the use of 'ftrace', a facility that I've used regularly since then.

Tim Gardner

Chase has prepared a number of kernel packages as well as linux-firmware and linux-firmware-nonfree. I have complete faith and trust in his abilities. In my opinion he is quite capable of fulfilling the role of core-dev.

Stephen Webb

General feedback

Chase is a very competent software developer with experience at various levels (kernel, x.org, applications) and a willingness to embrace new techniques and technologies. He does not hesitate to lasso the appropriate resources when he runs up against a problem. He is both hard working and detail oriented.

Specific Experiences of working together

I work with Chase on the gestures project. He has been responsible for developing, maintaining, reviewing, and packaging a good portion of that project, as well as patches to other related projects like the x.org server.

OXullo Intersecans

General feedback

I'm more than grateful for the time Chase spent for my adventures in Ubuntu packaging. He followed my noobie steps with an exceptional patience, providing me with a complete workflow that turned to be highly efficient also for my present development tasks. His knowledge is robust, his need for precision a rare quality, and finally he's kind and serious: traits that made the time we've been messaging a pleasure, in spite of the complexity (I talk for myself!) of the tasks.

Specific Experiences of working together

I had to publish a group of multitouch games based on libavg (a multimedia C++ library with python bindings). Chase followed closely the projects' publishing to launchpad, provided me with a complete, clean and proper packaging workflow, reviewed the packages, sponsored them. In addition, he helped libavg upstream team to workaround an issue with a mesa bug and offered more than an hint to solve the tons of copyright issues that were affecting our packages.

Didier Roche

General feedback

In addition to be a great upstream developer, Chase is a very talented packager and do not hesitate of asking on areas he's not 100% sure on how things work together. I never had to ask for something twice to him as well as he never repeats the same mistakes. I'm very confident he will do an awesome core developer. He's also very conscious about distribution requirements and the ubuntu worflow as well as the release process. In addition to all those qualities, he's really easy to work with and opened to discussion

Specific Experiences of working together

I worked on a lot of multitouch (how suprising!) packages with him, for approximately a year since the first introduction of the gesture stack in ubuntu. Teaching him the merge-upstream workflow and what the library packaging requires in particulary. All went smoothly on those domains. I had as well to ack some MIR he prepared for this particular stack and dependencies and the quality of those were high and well prepared. Recently, he adapted his work to the Qt/QML stack and the packaging work was as usual very well performed.

TEMPLATE

== <SPONSORS NAME> ==
=== General feedback ===
## Please fill us in on your shared experience. (How many packages did you sponsor? How would you judge the quality? How would you describe the improvements? Do you trust the applicant?)

=== Specific Experiences of working together ===
''Please add good examples of your work together, but also cases that could have handled better.''
=== Areas of Improvement ===

CategoryCoreDevApplication