CoreDeveloperApplication

I, Łukasz 'sil2100' Zemczak, apply for core-dev.

Name

Łukasz Zemczak

Launchpad Page

https://launchpad.net/~sil2100

Wiki Page

<link to your Wiki page>

Who I am

My name is Łukasz Zemczak, going by the nickname of sil2100. I am employed by Canonical as a Software Engineer, part of the Ubuntu Foundations team (previously part of Product Strategy Integration and the Ubuntu Desktop teams). I help maintaining the Ubuntu daily-release infrastructure, work with Ubuntu upstream developers on Debian packaging and help in development of some Ubuntu related projects. I work as the main Ubuntu Touch release manager, managing the system-image infrastructure. In the past I was also heavily involved in the development of the Haiku operating system, as well as application development for the BeOS original.

My Ubuntu story

I have had contact with the GNU/Linux platform in my high-school years, while using Red Hat and Slackware distributions when experimenting with my local home network. My first real Ubuntu experience was around 2006, when I tried Ubuntu and then Xubuntu 6.06/6.10 - making Xubuntu my main operating system for the next year. The funny thing with my Ubuntu user-experience was that I never really used Debian before Ubuntu, so I learned all Debian-concepts indirectly. I have been contributing format-support to the once-used XArchiver archive manager.

My involvement

Currently I am a MOTU and the release manager for Ubuntu Touch. I have been partaking in patch piloting sessions once a month, although most of the time I'm busy with touch development. I am the current LandingTeam lead and one of the maintainers of the CI Train, additionally doing daily trainguard duty. We are publishing many many packages every day, signing-off their packaging changes (for universe packages) and cooperating with core-devs for main packages. I have worked a lot on the ubuntu-rtm derived distribution. I had a short +1 Maintenance shift at one point of time, but due to touch landing-team duties I didn't help out as much as I would want.

Examples of my work / Things I'm proud of

As per what was mentioned above and additional overview:

Packages that I prepared:

  • python-evdev
  • zmqpp
  • appmenu-qt5

Non-Ubuntu-upstream packages I released:

  • capnproto
  • lucene++

Packages that I am/was involved with:

  • appmenu-qt5
  • ubuntu-keyboard
  • ubuntu-system-settings
  • autopilot
  • unity/compiz

Infrastructure:

Previous +1 Maintenance:

  • Working on the libav11 transition, rebuilding packages, pulling in fixes, most work undocumented

Recent +1 Maintenance:

Ubuntu Sponsorship Miner: link (does not include ubuntu-rtm uploads)

Areas of work

Let us know what you worked on, with which development teams / developers with whom you cooperated and how it worked out.

I had many experiences with dealing with the Ubuntu archives. Most of my work was done on the ubuntu-rtm/14.09 distribution and series where I handled the upower 0.99 transition. In ubuntu/utopic I helped a little with the libav11 transition. I added multiple-distribution functionality to the CI Train functionality, enabling landings for both ubuntu and ubuntu-rtm packages. I formalized a lot of the landing team processes, working on all related CI Train and touch release documentation. I also helped out with unblocking some package transitions in -proposed during the final stages of the vivid cycle. For this purpose I cooperated a lot with the ubuntu-release team.

Currently I'm also responsible for managing Ubuntu Touch images and builds. I'm helping out in managing the channel configurations, adding new devices, preparing images for releases, performing promotions etc. I picked up the responsibility of touch seed management as well. I try to do some fixes in the system-image server as well, although not as much as I would like to. All these responsibilities require me to be a gate between the release team and the Canonical product team.

The main programming language of my choice is C (sometimes C++). Throughout the last year I was also working a lot with Python code and the Launchpad API.

Things I could do better

I would like to work more closely with Debian, as till now I only have selective occasions to upstream my work there.

Plans for the future

General

My main plans generally revolve around Ubuntu Touch, making sure that we are able to release stable images for each of our milestones. I will continue to work with archive admins and managers in decision-making and implementing the final solution for rapid touch development (the derived distribution vs overlay PPA). I want to further improve the touch development processes and get rid of many CI Train's short-comings, working with upstream developers, core-devs, archive admins and other stakeholders to get a process setup that would satisfy everyone.

What I like least in Ubuntu

Please describe what you like least in Ubuntu and what thoughts do you have about fixing it.

The current divergence of Touch from Desktop. Currently it seems that there are two fronts where each works in their own container, while we should be aiming for convergence. Even though it is not possible to align all schedules to be the same (due to touch being typically customer-driven), there multiple places where a common process can be used. Both desktop and touch should use the same mechanisms and have the same quality standards.

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

As a sponsor, just copy the template below, fill it out and add it to this section.

KenVanDine

General feedback

I've reviewed packaging changes and sponsored quite a few packages for Lukasz. Early on I found some minor issues, which Lukasz was very accepting of feedback and quickly resolved. He has excellent attention to detail, and has now become my goto guy for dealing with annoything things like CPP symbols files. I also find Lukasz quite disciplined and thorough when reviewing packages from others. He's not afraid to give feedback and reject poor packages.

didrocks

General feedback

I've been working with Lukasz and reviewing his work for some years. During this time, I saw him growing from a packaging newbie to a very skilled and talented expert in that field. Of course, there were some minor issues, but he's always happy to receive feedback and get that fixed. His enthousiasm and willingness to do things makes working with him always a pleasure and I'm sure he would always ask in case of doubts than throwing something and see the consequences later on.

Dmitry Shachnev (mitya57)

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I have worked together with Łukasz on several things, like various Qt
transitions and development of appmenu-qt5 and sni-qt.

While most of the work is done via citrain (and it was Łukasz who taught
me how to use it), he also had some packages uploaded using the classic
way (via landing PPA or directly to distribution).

He also was quick at finding the reason for build failures, fixing them
and sending the patches upstream. From what I can see he was doing some
work in Debian as well.

To sum up, I fully support giving him the deserved core-dev rights.
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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

LukaszZemczak/CoreDeveloperApplication (last edited 2015-11-18 14:53:38 by sil2100)