I, Alessandro Astone, apply for Ubuntu Desktop Developer.

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.

Who I am

I am a Software Engineer specialized in operating systems, and more specifically the Linux userspace.

I started getting involved in open-source software around 2018 with LineageOS, the #1 community-made custom Android distribution. There I contributed to the build-system and common system frameworks, and ended up becoming the maintainer of the Recovery OS, as well as a few device ports.

Around the same time I started using Fedora Linux on my home workstation, with the KDE desktop. As the little bugs annoy the software tinkerer, eventually they'll want to try and fix them, and so I did. I eventually became a member of the KDE-SIG where I help maintain the large KDE desktop stack in Fedora: this is where I gained a large experience with packaging software with what we now call the "traditional" package managers.

I've always enjoyed contributing my fixes upstream, and thus after sustained contributions I became an upstream KDE Developer.

I'm also the primary maintainer of the Waydroid project, which is a container-based approach to run Android applications side-by-side GNU/Linux applications in your GNU/Linux desktop: this is where I gained experience working with the Wayland windowing system.

I always end up getting involved in too many things; but I find it really fun!

My Ubuntu story

My first sustained interactions with Ubuntu must have been around 2018, where I was using an Ubuntu VM from a Windows host in order to compile the Android operating system. Ever since, I've been using Ubuntu in VMs or containers for some of my software tinkering.

After graduating from university I joined Canonical's Desktop Team in June 2024, which is when I started contributing to Ubuntu. It's been interesting to explore the Ubuntu culture and processes, as someone coming from other different communities. I've grown to truly appreciate the attention to detail that comes into every package upload.

My involvement

Examples of my work / Things I'm proud of

• I've handled merges from Debian.
• I've handled new upstream releases.
• I've handled FTBFS issues with the archive rebuilds.
• I've packaged one new package from scratch.
• I've backported fixes from upstream.
• I've made new patches and always contributed those back upstream.
• I've handled autopkgtests and autopkgtest failures.
• I've handled many SRUs.
• I've handled a few MIR requests.
• I've handled one library transition in both Debian and Ubuntu.

Include your existing sponsored uploads for the packages for which you are seeking upload rights. You can link directly to an upload by following this pattern.

Areas of work

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

Things I could do better

Plans for the future

General

What I like least in Ubuntu

Launchpad as a user-facing tool for testing proposed updates. Please describe what you like least in Ubuntu and what thoughts do you have about fixing it.

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.

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 ===