Tanguy Ortolo

For this new year I got a quite specific “present”: a Debian Developer account. Of course this is not an end by itself but rather a beginning, or perhaps a continuation of my modest effort to contribute to the greater good of our users and free software. As an introduction, I would like to quickly explain how I came to this point, and I also have some people to thank.

Debianist journey

1997-2003

First family computer, a PC running Microsoft Windows 98. I became a power-user, and I progressively replaced all the pieces of that computer, except it operating system (though I reinstalled it several times).

2003

First contact with GNU/Linux: at my preparatory school, we use XEmacs and Kile under Mandrake Linux 9.2 to do some works in Caml Light and LaTeX. I start enjoying free software at home, with Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird and Libre^WOpenOffice.org.

2005, preparatory school

I try Knoppix at home and eventually install Mandriva Linux 10.2 for my own use. Since then I have never used Microsoft Windows for personal work any more.

2005, engineer school¹

I integrate Centrale Paris and I join the team of VIA Centrale Réseaux, which I believe is a known den of debianists. So I start using Debian on my personal laptop.

2006

Debian power-user. I start reporting bugs.

2007

First small contributions: some of my bug reports now include patches. I also start maintaining a French training document about Debian: formation Debian GNU/Linux.

2008

First packaging work with the help of adn, a modification and split of frozen-bubble to have a server-only package (contribution finally refused, actually).

2010

First package: I adopt dokuwiki with the help of adn. I become a Debian Maintainer, with the intent of applying as a Debian Member later.

2012

I am now a Debian Developer, responsible for a handful of packages and able to do NMUs and to sponsor new contributors.

As you may guess, I have always been a tinkerer, about computers but also about bikes (the ones that work with manpower, not the ones that make noise and smoke ;-)). And I also always wanted to publish my works somehow, because I hate to think that someone could have to do again some reusable work I had to do before instead of taking advantage of it. Well, it happened that free software was a way to achieve both goals: to hack² and to make my work available for anyone.

Thanks

I would like to thank all those who helped me to discover and contribute to free software, especially: adn, who helped me with my first steps to directly contribute to Debian, dererk and all the Debian Developers that patiently reread and sponsored my packages, and my Application Manager gwolf, who gave quite a lot of time asking me questions, reading my replies, and replying to some questions that arose during the process.

Outside of the Debian Project I have to thank Alexis de Lattre, who wrote the original “Formation Linux” that I am now maintaining under the name of “Formation Debian GNU/Linux”, a document which helped me to discover GNU/Linux and Debian specifically.

More generally, I would like to thank all the Free Software community that made that possible: Debian Developers, hackers and users from everywhere. We have built and we are still building quite an impressive pile of very useful work, and we can be proud of it.

Notes

1. Here in the northern hemisphere our school years begin in the middle of the civil year, which makes it tricky to tell them apart…
2. This is almost a synonym for tinkering, in the context of free software, is it not?