FC21访谈
Nicolas Valcárcel
Age: 24 Location: Lima - Perú IRC Nick: nxvl
How long have you used Linux and what was your first distro?
4 or 5 years from now on, i started with RedHat, I tried it for a few months, then I started testing a lot of distros (Gentoo, Fedora, Conectiva, Mandrake) and finally found Debian, which I used for almost a year until Ubuntu shows up, then I switched and never left the distro.
How long have you been using Ubuntu?
Since Warty Warthog.
When did you get involved with the MOTU team and how?
Almost a year ago. I always wanted to contribute back to the FOSS Community doing some developments, and since I was an Ubuntu user, one day i came into the web page, the saw the “Get involved” link, clicked on it, and that was the point of no return. I started doing some merges on the early hardy release cycle, then get involved on the server team, where I've been doing most of my work lately.
What helped you learn packaging and how Ubuntu teams work?
I started reading the packaging guide, recipes was also a good help, but the key of my learn process was the MOTU community, i find a lot of lovely and helpful people that were always there to answer my questions, my lovely sponsors, who, with a lot of patience checked my patches and point me to my errors and/or best practices on how to solve things, there is where i really learned about the ubuntu work.
What’s your favorite part of working with the MOTU?
That it's a huggy community!! All the people involved are helpful, lovely and don’t hesitate in showing their love. They also can point you at your errors in a really polite way, but they will also told you when you did good work, and I find that awesome.
Any advice for people wanting to help out MOTU?
Jump in now! “I will do it tomorrow” is a lie, if you want to start help, start now, why to wait until tomorrow? You will find a lot of helpful people who can guide you on your process. I swear it would be an awesome experience.
Are you involved with any local Linux/Ubuntu groups?
Yes! I’m part of the Peruvian LoCo Council where i try to get more people involved on the Ubuntu development giving some talks in local conferences while I can.
What are you going to focus on in Intrepid?
I’ve been working on Server Usability, being that easier ways to manage your servers, since there is a big barrer for Windows sysadmins to switch to Linux, but as it is a hard work (and actually a lot) and i don’t have the free time i wanted to have it won’t be ready for intrepid, but we already have some of it pieces getting into shape!
What do you do in your other spare time?
Spare time? What’s that? I actually work at PriceWaterhouseCoopers as an intern (I used to be senior consultant in the past on a full time job), I’m also finishing the university and have a wonderful girlfriend who take almost all of my free time :P. I also love to hang out with my friends, having some beers and stuff, and on summers I love to go to the beach and surf when I can, but there is not a lot of other spare time for me now
