On 02/18/15 13:59, Alan Robertson wrote:
Hi all,
I'm putting together a talk encouraging system administrators to
contribute to open source projects, expand their idea of what
constitutes a contribution, and enable them to know that what they know
and what they can do has value to open source projects.
Good morning Alan!
It's taken me a while to find a personal answer for this. Hope you find
it useful.
Open Source software is less about bytes and chips than openness to each
unique individual. Because the source is open to you, personally, the
limits of the original coder do not restrict what contributions you,
personally, can make. Sometimes those contributions may not even be
directly into the code but to the community at large.
My success stems from my weakness. I don't remember well. I stutter. I'm
a slow learner. I fall asleep in class. I was poor.
Because I don't remember well I take lots of notes. Lots. I've taken
"Essential System Administration" on vacations and highlight parts and
scribble notes.
Later I make time and organize my notes into some semblance of
documentation. Why? Because I stutter. It takes a lot of energy for me
to speak clearly. Since I'm an introvert that energy expenditure is
seldom recovered. I write documentation and hand it to people to use so
I don't have to keep answering the same questions again and again.
Because I learn slowly my learning is consuming. I'll read a book, try
stuff out, ask questions on IRC or mailing lists, and then make a small
amount of progress. Because the learning is consuming I don't have a
huge range of skills but am pretty good within my bounds.
"Books rule, classes drool." I slept through most of grad school but
passed based on self study. I have a lot of books and that has led me to
providing feedback on books. One book review landed me a gig
ghost-writing a technical section of a Linux book. Another couple have
landed me mentions in the credits. For those of you not aware of the
O'Reilly User Group program, I suggest you look into it.
Hate being poor? Me too! I started Linux with a book that included a
Slackware CD. A friend donated a single speed Mitsumi CD reader and my
386 took most of the night to compile the kernel. O'Reilly books were as
awesome then as they are now, but outside my budget. Because I did
reviews I was able to get one or two that I needed. I reviewed them,
studied them, and grew my skills.
Open Source has made my life much better. I try to help others take
advantage of it.
Leam
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