DongCalmada

DongCalmada

Dong Calmada, complete name: Dong B. Calmada

  • Address: Marikina City, Philippines
  • Work: Help Desk/Technical Support Staff at University of the Philippines Manila; FOSS consultant
  • Ubuntuphile Since January 2005

Accomplishments for Ubuntu Linux

  • Joining this LoCo wiki site

  • Using Ubuntu Linux since January 2005
  • Installing Ubuntu Linux in one field office computer

My Linux Background

I only got involved personally with Linux in 1999, using Red Hat 5.2 in my 386 machine. I enjoyed using it for learning a bit of C and the basics of vim. At the same time though, I had to use Windows since it was the dominant OS in my work at that time. Until I finally gave up Windows in 2003 in favor of Linux (Red Hat 9 flavor)--a brave GNU world, indeed.

The beauty of Linux, of FOSS, is that you can try out as many flavors/distros as you like. I tried a bit of Slackware, Debian and Suse. But I used Red Hat, Fedora, and Mandrake for the longer time.

I served as Database Administrator at a non-profit research outfit that is now using PostgreSQL? as database backend and PHP-based fronted applications for data entry and retrieval operations. Now, I am serving as National Coordinator (Chief Operations Officer in corporate parlance) of a peasant-based NGO. I have "used" my role to influence the ICTs of my organization, which also makes me the de facto CIO. We are now in the process of fully migrating to open source. We started with completely FOSSifying our server (documents, printer, internet connection, and yes, mp3s). Then one by one, our staff are trying out Linux.

At the same time, I am newly-elected Vice-President for External Affairs of the Philippine Linux Users Group (PLUG), which has been in FOSS advocacy since 1994. As a person in that role, I am in charge of leading PLUG's policy advocacy work at the levels of government, schools, corporate world, civil society organizations, and local communities.

I have also been involved in a newly organized independent technical group whose mandate is conducting free FOSS orientation and training activities designed for the non-profit sector. The specific module I have taken on is OS migration.

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DongCalmada (last edited 2011-04-13 05:28:26 by 202)