I, Mattia Rizzolo, apply for core-dev.

I am applying because:

• I'd like to eliminate delays in getting my work sponsored.
• I'd like to reduce the burden on my sponsors.
• I feel I'm competent enough to not need somebody to review my work most of the time.

Who I am

An Italian guy, currently 27. I work as a freelancer sysadmin for Debian-based systems, plus I'm heavily involved in the Reproducible Builds project as a grantee.

My Ubuntu story

I started having something to do with Ubuntu way back in 2009, mostly giving user support in the Ubuntu Italy forum. I started messing around with packages in 2013, DM in 2014, DD in 2015, MOTU in 2016.

Startin 2014-2015 I slowly drifter my main (technical) contributions toward Debian rather than Ubuntu, but I never stopped uploading stuff from time to time, mostly merging/syncing things that I'm involved with in Debian.

My involvement

Examples of my work / Things I'm proud of

Prior to being a DD, I meticulously collected all of my uploads in this wiki page.

Anyhow, since I started contributing, it seems I did quite a bunch of uploads to main.

udd=> select count(*) from ubuntu_upload_history where changed_by_name='Mattia Rizzolo' and component='main' ;
 count 
-------
    64
(1 row)

See also

• https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=mattia

• https://launchpad.net/~mapreri/+related-packages

• https://udd.debian.org/cgi-bin/ubuntu-sponsorships.cgi?render=html&sponsoree=Mattia+Rizzolo&sponsoree_search=name

I also did plenty of SRUs, a couple of recent ones I quickly found:

• https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/smart-notifier/0.28-6~ubuntu20.04.1

• https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pure-ftpd/1.0.46-1ubuntu18.04.1

But I've been doing SRUs every so often since the start, just saying that I'm aware of the procedure.

Also, even though I don't think I ever actively took charge of library transactions in Ubuntu, I consider myself very knowledgeable of the process, and I've been involved in quite many of them over my years in Debian.

Areas of work

Besides the new Backporters team I never worked in any specific area in Ubuntu.
Many of the things I do are mostly aimed at reducing or making the delta of the packages I'm involved with more managable.

Things I could do better

Right now, I consider myself "just fine", however, I'm always open to suggestions on what I could do better!!

Plans for the future

None specifically. Right now I'm interested in the backporters team; I plan to work toward making Ubuntu Backports a first-class citizen for our users.

General

What I like least in Ubuntu

Amusingly enough, looking at my MOTU Application, I find myself sharing the same opinion I had 7 years ago:

I think the are a lot of devs that not forward adequately (as in: not even try) patches to debian and/or upstream. Really, this bothers me a lot.

Today I'd probably add to it:

• I think the SRU team accepts way too many breaking/annoying changes

  • As an example, what for me was the absolute worst was this python-certbot SRU where clearly defined behaviour was changed in a way that IMHO was not warranted

  • Just looking accidentally, I found this netplan.io SRU: I'm sure here there was some talking in private, and also some previous agreement, but that's totally obscure; what I see, instead, is that a very core package (something that if done wrong could bring a system offline) that had what looks like a major upstream update (with two screenful of changelog) and the only comment in that regard that the SRU team made was "This is a big SRU", nothing more. Also, this was handled in only one working week, whereas I personally was involved in what were obviously easier SRUs that stretched for months where communication with the SRU team (via official channels, i.e. the bug report) was just not happening.

• during development some things are done way too hastily (current example being the OpenSSL 3 change: half the world is not ready, but it is being discussed very seriously on how to do the transition in Ubuntu NOW) - this happened in the meantime since I wrote the page, of course.

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.

Gianfranco Costamagna

General feedback

I worked with Mattia for ~10 years, sponsoring packages for him in main and universe, as well as merges and bugfixes. I asked him many, many, many times to apply for CoreDev, his knowledge is higher than mine, I'm just a blind sponsor for him, he doesn't need anything changed because he knows his stuff already too much.

Ubuntu will benefit from him being a coredev, without needing of additional sponsor for his high quality work.

I don't think there is anything to say about areas of improvement, neither in the working together section, because he helped me in transitions, seeds, syncs, merges, and lots of other areas.

GianfrancoCostamagna

Dan Streetman

General feedback

I haven't sponsored anything for mapreri but I have worked with him on ubuntu-dev-tools and the backports team for several years now. He is clearly ready for coredev and should have applied long ago; I have absolutely no concerns whatsoever about him and I feel it's pretty obvious he knows what he's doing technically as well as knowing the process (both for Debian and Ubuntu) as well or better than anyone else.

-- ddstreet 2021-12-15 14:37:42

Paride Legovini

General feedback

I know Mattia mostly from his Debian work, to which I'm familiar from an interesting perspective: he was one of my mentors and sponsors while I was learning about maintaining packages. Not only Mattia knows packaging far and wide (he maintains devscripts, pbuilder and diffoscope!), he also aware of the processes to take care of the package once it's in the archive, involving the archive administration and the release team. From the technical point of view he meets and exceeds the skill level required to become Core Dev.

I also trust Mattia to have Core Dev rights. He has contributions record spanning several years and a daily active presence on multiple channels (IRC, mailing lists, bug trackers). His continued involvement and engagement with Ubuntu combined with his skill set will make of him an active, responsible and dependable Core Developer.

Specific Experiences of working together

I didn't sponsor any package from Mattia, however we had occasions to discuss packaging in general, ubuntu-dev-tools bugs (he's a proactive maintainer!), and the new Ubuntu backports process.

Areas of Improvement

I think Mattia could work towards joining one of the Ubuntu "core teams" of his interest. His work in salvaging and rebooting the Ubuntu -backports pocket shows he's ready to go beyond individual contributions.

-- paride 2022-01-04 21:15:42

Simon Quigley

Mattia has been an important part of my Ubuntu and Debian Developer journey. His ability to critically review and provide feedback is stellar, and he takes great care to ensure that his uploads (and sponsorships) are sound. I have known and worked with Mattia for many years (I have lost count) and we have sponsored uploads for each other.

Mattia reviewed my packages before I became a MOTU, and it greatly surprised me to see that he has not applied for Core Developer already. I would not be as strong as a developer today if it were not for his gracious mentorship. While I have not closely reviewed his recent technical contributions, Mattia has proved himself countless times and I am confident he has much integrity as an Ubuntu Developer already.

I, Simon Quigley, strongly believe that Mattia Rizzolo is ready to be granted official Ubuntu Core Developer status, now, and can be trusted to act responsibly with those permissions.

-- tsimonq2 2022-07-13 21:09:18

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.''
## Full list of sponsored packages can be generated here:
##  https://udd.debian.org/cgi-bin/ubuntu-sponsorships.cgi
=== Areas of Improvement ===

@``SIG@

CategoryCoreDevApplication