Ubuntu Wiki

Contact Information

About Me

Short Summary

My real name is Chris Robinson and I live north of Brisbane in Caboolture Shire, within a stones throw of the beach. My first experience with *NIX type operating systems was in the late 80's with SCO Unix. At this time these systems were not really suited to home user systems: X Windows was in it's infancy and computers had very specific requirements such as SCSI HDD controllers. Around 1991 I was using a hot new OS from IBM called OS/2 2.0. Windows NT was just a Microsoft promise and would remain on the "real soon now" list for many years. My first Ubuntu experience was 8.10 Intrepid Ibex when a work colleague suggested it. Since OS/2 had long since lost any real IBM support or development and I was only a reluctant Windows XP user in the first place it wasn't too difficult to make the decision to switch.

History

After my senior year in High School I did a Cert IV Photography. I very soon become disenchanted with the photographic industry however and switched to IT where I remained for about 12 years. Most of my roles were in support areas but I also got experience in management and sales, later programming and running my own business.

Around this time I became a member of the Army Reserve. While I never seriously entertained the idea of a full time army career my experiences as an enlisted member of the ADF were rewarding and valuable. I resigned from the ADF after 6 years, having attained the lofty rank of Bombardier (sarcasm ) Mostly what Bombardiers do however, is train the Gunners, and most of what the army does is train, so I've done more than a few intensive "train the trainer" courses.

When I decided that I had had enough of IT I found that I was deeply interested in metal fabrication and set about teaching myself to weld. It was at this time that my online name for usenet became fabricator4, as it denoted the metals fabrication I was involved in at the time. I started my own fabrication business and at the same time went back to college doing engineering subjects and gained welding certifications.

When the GFC hit I took a redundancy from the company I was working for at the time and started my own photography business which is still operating. I needed a more secure source of income however, so after some contracting to a local business in the areas of IT support and electronics repair I again got involved in sales, this time in the area of manufacturing sales and support where I am still working.

I seem to be in the odd position of working in three fields at once: Photography, IT, and fabrication/engineering. I've been married since 2001 and drive my wife nuts.

Contributions

I'm involved with ubuntuforums.org, providing help and support where I can, mostly in the areas of new user problems. I've also become involved in Launchpad, providing answers to questions. I've reported several bugs on Launchpad and have found this very rewarding.

Ubuntu Advocacy

I'm a vocal advocate for Ubuntu and am responsible for several friends and acquaintances adopting it. I generally recommend the last LTS version as it's easier to support. I joined the Ubuntu-AU LoCo in the hope that it will give me more opportunities to show people that Ubuntu is a viable free alternative that is secure and has a strong community. I also like to show people how older equipment can be made useful again using Linux and one of the Ubuntu releases.

Hobbies

When time allows, my other interests are Music (guitar and saxophone), microscopy, and reading (mostly sci-fi).

Testimonials

If you know me and have something nice to say, please leave a comment here.