Tribaal

About Me

I'm an Ubuntu user since about 2005 (Breezy), after playing with Debian for years, and GNU/Linux for even longer.

I currently hold a software engineer position with Canonical, in the Ubuntu Foundations team, after working in the Landscape team for several years.

My position in the Landscape team allowed me to help develop the server, cloud and openstack side of the whole Canonical offering. The focus of my work was making the code for both the client and the server as transparent and reliable as possible, with extra emphasis on readability and testing. The client is part of the default Ubuntu CD, and so a special attention is always necessary.

In the foundations team, I focus on delivering cloud images to both cloud-images.ubuntu.com and some of our cloud partners requiring special considerations (special kernels, fine tuning of installed software, etc...). It also allows me to work closely with some of the core components of an Ubuntu system - grub, gcc, the various toolchains (Python, Ruby, etc...) and the build process for both Ubuntu images and the packages themselves.

Very active, I like to travel a lot, and so recently came back to my native Switzerland after living in Tanzania for some time.

Apart from being an Ubuntu fanboy, I did and still do some Django on my spare time, and I have contributed and/or started several Django related projects, such as django-shop and django-cms (both of which I was a core developer of).

I developed quite some knowledge related to self-sufficient transmission systems as well, out of necessity and interest (solar power, mesh networks, directional point-to-point transmissions...)

Note: While I was a Canonical employee this is page and membership are own initiative, and is neither required nor sanctioned by my former employer. I feel that I belong as a member of the community in my own right Smile :)

Contact Information

Contributions

A few contributions along the years:

Packages, code

Documentation

LoCos

  • Member of the Swiss LoCo since... a long time?

  • Member of the Tanzania LoCo since May 2014 (more or less). Administrator since August 2014.

As part of Canonical

  • Developer in the Foundations team. We maintain "core" packages and the build system delivering Ubuntu cloud images to the various public and private clouds across the world.
  • Former developer in the Landscape team, both client and server. The landscape client is installed on *a lot* of computers worldwide, and is a critical piece of infrastructure for hundreds of Ubuntu installations and Canonical customers.

  • Added some proxy logic to LXC container templates for Ubuntu, making spinning up of LXC containers on slow networks much more bearable.

  • Contributed some code to LXD around SQL normalisation and ON DELETE behavior (as well as a bunch of tests).

  • Some contributions to the Ceph storage cluster, in particular Python bindings (not directly an Ubuntu contribution, but related to Ubuntu's Openstack reference architecture).

  • Found a relatively serious security problem with MAAS.

Charms, Juju

Various

Future Goals

  • Revive and dynamize LoCos around the world.

  • Contribute to and improve the Ubuntu OpenStack reference architecture.

  • Develop a longer series of blog post about debian and snap packaging, as well as how to contribute to the ubuntu community in the more general sense.

  • Dive deeper in the (Debian) packaging side of Ubuntu, to hopefully help make the distribution better form the bottom up.
  • Dive deeper in the snap packaging side of Ubuntu to hopefully make the Ubuntu core initiative better.

Testimonials

Note: If you have anything nice to say about this person, please do add it below along with @ SIG @ (no spaces). The @ SIG @ command will sign your name and date/time it after you "Save Changes".

Chris is an awesome colleague and developer. He pays a lot of attention to quality and if something is wrong he is eager to fix it. He feels very responsible for the code he writes and projects he maintains, so he can really be called a Maintainer. He really enjoys Ubuntu and pushes it forward anywhere he has a chance. -- ahasenack 2014-08-04 15:31:26

My interactions with Chris have been brief, however they are quality conversations. He's submit some work against Charm Helpers in an effort to clean up documentation, and add robust new features to the charming ecosystem. +1 on his review from Me -- lazypower 2014-08-04 07:08:26

I have been working with Chris in the Swiss Ubuntu Team and we have organised several events together. It was always a great pleasure to work with him, as he is very efficient while being the calm rock in the stormy sea. He really is a great addition to any team. -- myriam 2014-08-09 20:38:32

Chris is a valuable member of the Swiss Ubuntu team. He is always willing to help people with any problems that they might be experiencing. We organised several events in Switzerland, he contribute since the beginning of the Swiss Ubuntu team. He's also devoted to contributing to the Ubuntu community. He has my support for Ubuntu membership. -- waver 2014-08-17 21:50:42

I have done a few uploads for Chris (ie https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubumirror/0.5), the exchanges with him always were to the point, his work excellent and leaving an Ubuntu sticker on Mt Kilimanjaro on its own worthy of getting Ubuntu membership! Keep up the good work! -- dholbach 2014-08-19 07:51:24

I recently had the chance to meet Chris in person, after some on-line interactions. We just had to talk a little for me to notice that he really enjoys this community and will help us make it even more awesome. It's great that he wants to step up and help the teams around the world to give new life to LoCos. He has my full trust and support. -- elopio 2017-10-24 02:09:41

Tribaal (last edited 2022-02-15 16:22:34 by tribaal)