RossGammon

Revision 15 as of 2016-04-18 16:51:38

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I am an Engineer by day, and in my spare time I maintain packages for Debian and act as the Test Team Lead for Ubuntu Studio.

I was born in Australia, and now live in Copenhagen, Denmark. In my younger days I spent a lot of time learning to program. This was mainly in BASIC, but I also learnt some Assembler (Z80) and Pascal programming through my studies. Then my work got in the way, and I spent many years as a software user only (Windows of course).

Then in 2011 I installed Linux, discovered the joy of software freedom, and rediscovered the fun of making computers do what you want. Then in 2013 I decided to start contributing something back. I started by taking over the maintenance of the Gramps package in Debian. Nowadays, as well as Gramps, I also maintain the goocanvas, abcmidi, and dominate packages. I am a member of the Debian GIS Team, the Debian Multimedia Team, and the Debian Javascript Team where I also help to maintain several packages. I am also enjoying brushing up on some Python, PHP and C programming skills.

In Ubuntu, I am a member of the Ubuntu Studio Team. With the Ubuntu Studio Team, I have recently taken on the role of Testing Team Leader. As well as helping out with the next release (16.04), we hope to create a suite of Manual Test Cases that we can use to test the important Ubuntu Studio applications before the release. I am also a member of the Ubuntu Studio Bugs Team, and the Ubuntu Bug Squad. After we get the suite of Manual Test Cases in order, my intention is to build on the Bug Triage documentation for Ubuntu and create some Bug Triaging guides specific to Ubuntu Studio (particularly with respect to audio and MIDI), and begin to plan some Bug Hugging days on Ubuntu Studio packages in need of some love. I am also planning to hack together a few tools to help manage typical tasks in the Ubuntu Studio Development Team. I also try to help out by syncing and merging software from Debian where I am one of the maintainers. I have also done Backports for some of these packages. For Ubuntu Studio, I hope to be a bit more systematic about this aspect in the future.

Contributions

A summary of some of my Open Source learning and contributions can be found on my blog.

Future

I want to ...

  • Help to build up a portfolio of Manual Test Cases for Ubuntu Studio packages and begin Application Testing before the 16.04 release
  • Help with testing ISO's for the Beta and Final releases of Ubuntu Studio 16.04 and marking them ready for release
  • Work on enabling unit tests where available in Ubuntu Studio packages and pushing the packaging changes back up to Debian
  • Work on writing autopkgtest tests for Ubuntu Studio packages and pushing these back to Debian
  • Write up some Bug Triaging guides specific to Ubuntu Studio
  • Hack some tools to help monitor and manage the packages of interest to Ubuntu Studio
  • Assist with development work on making Ubuntu Studio desktop agnostic
  • Become an Ubuntu Member
  • Obtain upload rights so that I can assist with merges, syncs, SRUs, and backports of Ubuntu Studio packages and other packages I maintain within Debian
  • Help to build up the Ubuntu Studio Team with more developers so that we can be faster at fixing problems with Ubuntu Studio related packages

Testimonials

Note: If you have anything nice to say about this person, please do add it below. Please do not forget to add your launchpad link and account username as a signature of your testimonial.

Being new among the Ubuntu Community, I cannot quite yet tell what are good requirements or qualities for a member. However i know how to recognize a dedicated, generous and sharp person. Ross has been of an incalculable value to Ubuntu Studio, working hard and regularly on some of our most important packages. The fact that he seems to enjoy testing software aimed at multimedia is in itself a testimony of Ross's creative fiber. His emails to the Ubuntustudio-devel mailing-list are in my humble opinion templates and examples of well put, well structured information loops and proof that Ross is a socially skilled team-worker; always straight to the point and positively pragmatic. Simply put, it is a pleasure to work and discuss with Ross.

Set Hallström

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