CoreDev

I, Chris Peterson, apply for core-dev

Name

Chris Peterson

Launchpad Page

https://launchpad.net/~cpete

Wiki Page

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/cpete

IRC

cpete

Email

chris.peterson@canonical.com

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'd like to be more involved in the community (sponsoring, patch pilot, etc.)
  • My work may require touching various packages, including those in main, for which there is no distinct package-set goal and MOTU/PPU won't cover packages in main.
  • It will facilitate my general distro related work (+1 maintenance, proposed-migrations, etc.)

Who I am

Hi, my name is Chris Peterson and I am a software engineer on Canonical's Foundations team.

Prior to joining Canonical, I received my Master's in Computer Science from the University of California, Davis, where I researched semantic parsing in the areas Natural Language Processing and Computational Linguistics. Before that, I received my Bachelor's in Computer Science & Engineering from the University of Nevada, Reno, where I performed research in a Social Robotics laboratory.

I live in California, United States, and when I'm not writing software I enjoy building keyboards, playing the bass guitar, or playing video games.

My Ubuntu story

Back in my first year of college when I started to learn programming and what Linux was all about, I started with Ubuntu (Trusty). For a short time I bounced around different distributions, though mostly Ubuntu based, and eventually came back to Ubuntu after working in a robotics lab which relied on it for its software (ROS). Since then it's been my daily driver for everything I do. I am passionate about open source and working on Ubuntu everyday brings me great joy.

My involvement

Examples of my work / Things I'm proud of

Areas of work

As part of Canonical's Foundations Team I spend a majority of my time working on installer related things, primarily Subiquity. While this often includes work in projects which are also not conventionally packaged, such as Curtin or Probert, it also includes work in archive packages such as livecd-rootfs, Casper, or ubuntu-meta. I expect core dev privileges will most facilitate my work by removing the need for sponsorship to make changes to these packages. However, given my experience is still limited with some of these core archive packages, I certainly still expect to ask for review and thoroughly test changes before committing something I'm not 100% certain about.

I also spend time working on Apport, fixing bugs and working to improve bug reporting in the installers. In particular, over the last two release cycles I have been collaborating within Foundations and across Desktop and Server to improve the Apport bug reporting process in general among the various installer related tools.

As part of my more general packaging related responsibilities on the Foundations team, I also participate in regular +1 maintenance and proposed-migration work.

Things I could do better

  • Get more familiar with the automation/tooling that's available to better standardize my workflow.
  • Increase my participation on IRC
  • Improve my knowledge of Debian and their processes/tooling.

Plans for the future

General

  • Continue to make contributions to Subiquity, making it more robust and improving the overall installation experience.
  • I would also like to leverage my upload privileges to help sponsor work within my team, engage in patch piloting, and conduct more effective +1 shifts.

What I like least in Ubuntu

  • Ubuntu development process documentation is very disjoint, which makes things difficult for newcomers. Best practices are not always clear and may also depend on who you ask. Continued work on centralized documentation, like the ubuntu-packaging-guide, is sorely needed.

  • The Launchpad UI. Finding what you are looking for can be difficult if you don't know exactly where it is. Dedicated sections in the developer documentation would greatly help with this.

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.

Łukasz 'sil2100' Zemczak

General feedback

Chris, even though still relatively new in the Ubuntu ecosystem, demonstrated multiple times his passion, determination and growing experience with regards to distro-work. Chris actively participated in multiple archive activities, such as helping with transitions, +1 maintenance, proposed-migration etc. Chris also is never afraid to ask for clarification or help when in doubt, which is essential when starting off as a core developer. Furthermore, Chris seeks mentorship actively, being trained by more experienced core-developers on a weekly basis. I gladly endorse Chris on his road to an official Ubuntu Core Developer. I think he's ready.

Specific Experiences of working together

I have officially sponsored only one package for Chris so far, but as his manager and co-mentor, I have insight into all the great work that Chris is performing. In my mind he demonstrated particular excellence during the infamous xzutils vulnerability and time_t crunches: when we announced an all-hands-on-deck, Chris answered. And even though he didn't yet feel 100% comfortable back then with distro-related topics, his help was invaluable. At the same time, as a main developer of subiquity, Chris by default has a lot of contact with Ubuntu per-se, making him a great candidate.

Areas of Improvement

Chris sometimes can be overly ambitious, taking on his back too much for comfort. So I would like him to be a bit more mindful of his limits.

Daniel Bungert

General feedback

Chris is a colleague on Subiquity, and my mentee as part of the Foundations team.

From Day 1 I stressed the importance of a mix of distro work as part of the Foundations experience. Someone new to working on the installer might find that surprising, but the fact is that sometimes the best place to fix an install issue is the archive, so core-dev is a useful skill. Plus, multiple core installer-related components are, and will remain, following the archive process, such as livecd-rootfs and casper.

Chris has taken that feedback seriously, incorporating a mix of various distro tasks into the narrow slice of time in the week for things not directly on the Subiquity or related codebases.

I appreciate that Chris is involving himself in Apport as of late, both something we're trying to improve within Subiquity and also land bug reporting improvements in related components.

I trust Chris to seek out code reviews and ask questions.

Please approve Chris for core-dev.

Specific Experiences of working together

I am pleased with the growth Chris has shown in core-dev type tasks. Recently he took on the challenge of landing seed changes in a SRU along with paired livecd-rootfs changes so that we could fix an issue where openssh-server was installed when it shouldn't. (LP: #1974483)

Numerous Subiquity examples could be listed here, I'm choosing one that I'm particularly happy with. As part of work on autoinstall user experience improvements, Chris saw the opportunity to make it easier to validate autoinstall outside of the installer environment - https://github.com/canonical/subiquity/pull/1901 - this was work that Chris identified and drove.

Areas of Improvement

I have no particular concerns to list here - if I did, I would be working on them with Chris during our 1:1s.

-- dbungert 2024-09-05 19:00:08

Dave Jones

General feedback

While relatively new to the team, Chris has dived in and tackled everything thrown at him, even when novel and unfamiliar (the time_t work springs to mind, in particular). He's always happy to ask for information, but demonstrates good instincts when needed (picking the minimal change necessary without prompting).

Specific Experiences of working together

I've only sponsored one upload for Chris, specifically jruby in LP: #2023589. However, as someone else involved in building images for Ubuntu, I've watched some of his contributions to livecd-rootfs, the meta-package and the Ubuntu seeds. He's handled these complex areas well -- likely rather better than I did when first faced with them! Finally, he's covered quite a broad range of responsibilities in the short time he's been with the team, including +1 shifts, SRUs, MIRs; all the essentials I'm used to seeing in core devs!

Areas of Improvement

None spring to mind.

-- waveform 2024-09-05 21:09:17

Vladimir Petko

General feedback

I have sponsored two packages for Chris: needrestart merge and bonnie++ framepointer fix. Both merge proposals were of good quality and needrestart only requiring some minor changelog nits.

Chris effectively works on complex areas of Ubuntu packaging and addressed MIR, SRUs and +1s.

A number of the packages I have sponsored do not justify a fully qualified endorsement, but I think it would be helpful to unblock Chris in their work, given they work productively as a project member.

Graham Inggs

General feedback

I've only sponsored three uploads for Chris. A fix for Python ipyparallel, a fix for NumPy astroml and a rather complicated merge util-linux. The quality has been good, and any queries promptly resolved. I trust Chris.

Specific Experiences of working together

While reviewing the util-linux merge in LP: #2072813 merge, we discovered a breaking change (taking over the login package from src:shadow), which after a good discussion we decided to avoid. Chris quickly re-based his merge on the Debian upload prior to this change and I sponsored.

Areas of Improvement

None in particular.

Michael Hudson-Doyle

General feedback

Chris has been a solid and reliable member of the Foundations team since day 1 (honestly, it seems surprising that he has only been around for a year!). Although he has mostly focused on installer topics, he has also got stuck in with the general distro tasks and I fully support this application.

Specific Experiences of working together

I have sponsored a few packages for Chris (yt, diffoscope, livecd-rootfs, skimage, protontricks, ...) but to be honest I don't have any great recollection of any of these -- a sign that they were so correct I could just upload them without thinking much, I guess!

I have also worked with Chris on issues around image building and seeds and so on and he has developed a pretty good understanding of how our images are made.

Areas of Improvement

There are always more corners of Ubuntu development to learn but I am not aware of any particular gaps at this point.

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 ===

CategoryCoreDevApplication

cpete/CoreDev (last edited 2024-09-30 18:21:27 by cpete)