Interview with Ubudog

By ubuntu-news-team | Published: 2011-08-24

Our next interviewee is Ubudog, a name that should be familiar to those who frequent the Ubuntu Forums. He is particularly active in the support areas helping all he can. Ubudog is also heavily involved with the development of UbuMonkey, which describes itself as “A lightweight, fast web browser for the modern Linux desktop.”

1. Tell as much as you’re willing about your “real life” like name, age, gender, location, family, religion, profession, education, hobbies, etc.

My name is Michael, and I am a freelance software developer.

2. When and how did you become interested in computers? in Linux? in Ubuntu?

I first became interested in Linux back in 2007.  I was using Windows Vista then, and I was looking for an alternative.  I found out about Ubuntu, a user friendly Linux OS.  I tried it, and I’ve been using it ever since.

3. When did you become involved in the forums (or the Ubuntu community)? What’s your role there?

I became involved in the Ubuntu community back in 2009.  I joined the Ubuntu Forums.  At first, I had to always ask questions about the CLI, etc, but now I love to help out new users solve the same problems I once had.

4. Are you an Ubuntu member? If so, how do you contribute? If not, do you plan on becoming one?

I became an Ubuntu member in June 2011.  I contribute the most to the Ubuntu Forums, and I am normally online in my spare time.

5. What distros do you regularly use? What software? What’s your favorite application? Your least favorite?

I regularly use Ubuntu, but I like to try out the latest Linux distros.  :-)   My favorite application has to be Firefox.  With all the add-ons available, support community, etc, it’s one of my favorite tools.

6. What’s your fondest memory from the forums, or from Ubuntu overall? What’s your worst?

My fondest memory of the UF has to be the community cafe.  I’ve had many laughs there, it’s a great place to meet other members of the community and have lighthearted discussions.

7. What luck have you had introducing new computer users to Ubuntu?

I’ve had much luck converting people to Ubuntu.  In my case, people like most being able to try Ubuntu out before installing it.  (LiveCD)  People are really amazed to see how much faster/simpler Ubuntu is.

8. What would you like to see happen with Linux in the future? with Ubuntu?

I hope to see Linux grow and be adapted by more users.  I hope to see Ubuntu’s community expand and to see users from all aspects of life.

9. If there was one thing you could tell all new Ubuntu users, what would it be?

The one thing I would tell new Ubuntu users is:  Don’t be afraid to ask.  There is a huge, friendly community out there and someone has an answer.  There is no such thing as a stupid question.

Originally Posted here on 2011-09-24

Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter Issue 229

By pleia2 | Published: 2011-08-22

Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter. This is issue #229 for the week August 15 -21, 2011, and the full version is available here.

In this issue we cover:

The issue of The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter is brought to you by:

  • Elizabeth Krumbach
  • Jessica Ledbetter
  • Miia Ranta
  • Neil Oosthuizen
  • Daniel Bo
  • holstein
  • Amber Graner
  • And many others

If you have a story idea for the Weekly Newsletter, join the Ubuntu News Team mailing list and submit it. Ideas can also be added to the wiki!

Except where otherwise noted, content in this issue is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License BY SA Creative Commons License

Ubuntu 11 .10 Release Parties

By akgraner | Published: 2011-08-22

It’s this time of year again where we get together in our local communities to celebrate the release of the newest release of Ubuntu. On October 13th 2011 we will celebrate the release of Oneiric Ocelot. With that in mind, lets get all the loco communities out celebrating, having fun and sharing with one another and having a party for 11.10.

We have added the event to the LoCo Directory, so please do add your team event on here so we can show everyone how welcoming our communities are. Have some fun, have a party.

Pick a date, chose a venue, add your event to the LD, and then let your team know what is going to happen. Take photos of the event, blog the event so we can all see how you celebrate Ubuntu in your own way.

Originally posted here by Laura Czajkowski on August 22, 2011.

New 2011-2012 Ubuntu Women Leadership Team Announced

By akgraner | Published: 2011-08-22

Thank you so much to all those who voted and many thanks to Elizabeth Krumbach (pleia2), Jessica Ledbetter (jledbetter), Cheri Francis (Cheri703) and Valorie Zimmerman (valorie) for their willingness to run for these positions. Many thanks to Melissa Draper and Leigh Honeywell for serving on former leadership team.

Below is the New 2011-2012 Ubuntu Women Leadership Team:

  • Elizabeth Krumbach (pleia2)
  • Jessica Ledbetter (jledbetter)
  • Cheri Francis (Cheri703)

If you voted in the poll you can see the results by clicking on the link sent to you with your voting key. Many thanks again to all those who participated and congratulations to the new leadership team.

Ubuntu 11.10 Development update

By dholbach | Published: 2011-08-18

Ubuntu Development Update

Last week we hit Feature Freeze. This is the big date that all developer dread the most. Now features and new upstream versions have to have landed, everything else will be a matter the release team has to decide upon. We are rushing towards release with UI Freeze and Beta Freeze coming up next week. Exciting times!

For this report I got an update from the Ubuntu Server team, written by Dave Walker.

What’s cooking in Ubuntu server land?

The Ubuntu Server Team has already had quite a busy cycle.  Last cycle, openstack components were initially introduced. This cycle has seen them receive much more attention, and packaging of extra components that  didn’t exist last cycle.

In addition, using Ubuntu Server to orchestrate deployments is something that has evolved this cycle. One of the most interesting parts is the use of cobbler for deployment.

Ensemble, which is now part of the server team has entered the archive this cycle. Originally, ensemble worked purely against the ec2 API to assist with cloud deployments. This cycle, support for provisioning bare-metal hardware using cobblers API has been achieved.

There are always areas where interested people can contribute to the server flavour. The development tasks that people can take on varies from bitesize trivial tasks, to larger undertaking depending on available time commitment and experience. The type of desired task also tends to vary depending on the stage of the development cycle.

The Ubuntu server team tracks these bugs for release. Please note, that anything unassigned or assigned to ‘Ubuntu Server Team’ is generally up for grabs.

Another crucial part of being part of the Ubuntu Server Team, is triaging incoming bugs. We generally follow this process. We also welcome testing of the development cd image, and server archive components. This is vital to help catch critical issues before release.

Ensemble is always interested in having formula contributions, which is another interesting way that people with experience in deploying workloads are welcomed to contribute.

All contributions to Ubuntu Server are appreciated, if you want to get more  involved please join #ubuntu-server on freenode IRC and say hello, or more formally follow: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/Membership

Thanks a lot Dave for the update! I’d like to add that if you’re interested in the Cloud and what’s happening there, make sure you visit http://cloud.ubuntu.com/! Also if you got excited about Ensemble and what it can do for you, have a look at existing formulas and requested formulas. Just join #ubuntu-ensemble if you need some help or want to meet the people behind this fantastic project.

If you’re interested in any other aspect of Ubuntu Oneiric, I’d refer you to the oneiric-changes mailing list and the big picture specification status overview instead. So what’s happening with the Ubuntu Desktop?

Events

We have one of the coolest events of the whole cycle coming up: Ubuntu Global Jam. Local Community teams around the world come together to have a good time on work on Ubuntu directly: translations, bugs, packaging, documentation, testing, documentation – everything goes! Check out the list of participating events to find out where to go, or set up an event yourself! There’s still some time until 2nd-4th September!

If you want to get involved in packaging and bug fixing, there’s still a lot of bugs that need to get fixed:

  • There’s packages that fail to build.
  • Also is the Ubuntu Mozilla team looking for help, so if you’re excited about Mozilla and what’s happening there, join IRC, talk to the guys on #ubuntu-mozillateam on irc.freenode.net.
  • And then there’s Security bugs you can take a look at, the team is a friendly bunch and they’re incredibly helpful in getting your patch reviewed.
  • Also is the Server team interested in your help: merges from Debian is one possibility, fixing important bugs another.

New contributors

I was on holidays for a two weeks, so here’s almost three weeks worth of new contributors! Here’s the list of new Ubuntu heroes: Ben Howard,  Tim Niemueller, Stefan Tauner, Gary Poster, Guybrush88. Five new people in the Ubuntu world, welcome everyone! 🙂

Get Involved

  1. Read the Introduction to Ubuntu Development. It’s a short article which will help you understand how Ubuntu is put together, how the infrastructure is used and how we interact with other projects.
  2. Follow the instructions in the Getting Set Up article. A few simple commands, a registration at Launchpad and you should have all the tools you need, and you’re ready to go.
  3. Check out our instructions for how to fix a bug in Ubuntu, they come with small examples that make it easier to visualise what exactly you need to do.

Find something to work on

Pick a bitesize bug. These are the bugs we think should be easy to fix. Another option is to help out in one of our initiatives.

In addition to that there are loads more opportunities over at Harvest.

Getting in touch

There are many different ways to contact Ubuntu developers and get your questions answered.

  • Be interactive and reach us most immediately: talk to us in #ubuntu-motu on irc.freenode.net.
  • Follow mailing lists and get involved in the discussions: ubuntu-devel-announce (announce only, low traffic), ubuntu-devel (high-level discussions), ubuntu-devel-discuss (fairly general developer discussions).
  • Stay up to date and follow the ubuntudev account on Facebook, Identi.ca or Twitter.