Self-introduction: Neal Gompa (Fedora, CentOS, openSUSE)

[Neal Gompa]

Hello all,

My name is Neal Gompa. I'm a Linux enthusiast and Linux distro
contributor spanning across many Linux distribution communities. I
found this Google Group after finding the 2021 VFX Studio Platform
Survey Report and looking over it. As someone who has loved VFX and
CGI since childhood and a strong Linux advocate, I have a soft spot
for this industry and I'd love to help out with figuring out the Linux
platform for VFX/CGI studios and help them get a feel for the
landscape.

So, a bit more about me. I’ve been using Linux for two decades now,
and I’ve been contributing to open source for almost as long. From a
“distro leadership” perspective, I participate in leadership roles in
multiple Linux distributions:

* Fedora Engineering Steering Committee (FESCo[1]) member since May 2020
* Mageia.Org Council[2] member since April 2018
* Mageia.Org Board[3] member since March 2021
* openSUSE Project Board[4] member since January 2021

I also informally participate in leadership roles in various
distributions. In the CentOS Project[5], I am a de facto leader in the
CentOS Hyperscale SIG[6] and the chief developer of the CentOS Stream
Hyperscale Workstation Spin[7]. Within the Fedora Project[8], I also
run the KDE Special Interest Group (SIG)[9]; the Workstation Working
Group (WG)[10]; the Cloud SIG[11]; and lead the Fedora Btrfs project.
In the openSUSE Project[12], I assist with the planning process for
future openSUSE Leap releases[13] and act as a community bridge to
SUSE Linux Enterprise engineering.

I previously did work in Yocto, OpenMandriva Lx, and ROSA Linux
distributions to help modernize their software management systems, and
established bridges with upstream projects so they could work with the
larger community around RPM-based distributions. I have assisted in
the creation of custom Linux distributions in the past as well.

In the past couple of years, I've done a fair bit of work around
modernizing the Linux desktop experience in Fedora Linux. User-facing
changes I've implemented or assisted with implementing: Btrfs by
default in Fedora Linux 33 on the desktop[14], Wayland by default for
KDE Plasma in Fedora Linux 34[15], PipeWire for audio in Fedora Linux
34[16], Btrfs in Fedora Linux 35 for the cloud[17], WirePlumber for
PipeWire in Fedora Linux 35[18], replaced SDL 1.2 with a shim using
SDL2 in Fedora Linux 35[19], and improved power management on Fedora
Linux 35[20]. Through my work in the CentOS Hyperscale SIG, I have
brought many of these features to CentOS Stream 9[21], which will
enhance the experience for anyone using RHEL 9 and derivatives.

I would like to lend my experience, expertise, and community
connections to help this community solidify their future on Linux. I
would also like to invite anyone interested to come meet me in the
ASWF Slack in #vfx_reference_platform or on Matrix in
#kde:fedoraproject.org[22], #workstation:fedoraproject.org[23], or
#centos-hyperscale:fedoraproject.org[24].

If you want to know a little bit more about me personally, I gave a
pretty good interview about myself on the Destination Linux podcast
last year[25]. I hope the wall of text doesn't intimidate you, I'm
generally a friendly guy and happy to talk about all kinds of tech and
Linux stuff! :)

Thank you for your time and best regards,
Neal

[1]: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fesco/
[2]: https://wiki.mageia.org/en/Org_Council
[3]: https://wiki.mageia.org/en/Org_Board
[4]: https://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Board
[5]: https://www.centos.org/about/#the-centos-project
[6]: https://sigs.centos.org/hyperscale/
[7]: https://sigs.centos.org/hyperscale/spins/workstation/
[8]: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/project/
[9]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/KDE
[10]: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/workstation-working-group/
[11]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Cloud_SIG
[12]: https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Project
[13]: https://en.opensuse.org/Feature_Planning_15.4
[14]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/BtrfsByDefault
[15]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/WaylandByDefaultForPlasma
[16]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/DefaultPipeWire
[17]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/FedoraCloudBtrfsByDefault
[18]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/WirePlumber
[19]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/SDL12onSDL2
[20]: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/Power_Profiles_Daemon
[21]: https://blog.centos.org/2022/01/centos-hyperscale-sig-quarterly-report-for-2021q4/
[22]: https://matrix.to/#/#kde:fedoraproject.org
[23]: https://matrix.to/#/#workstation:fedoraproject.org
[24]: https://matrix.to/#/#centos-hyperscale:fedoraproject.org
[25]: https://destinationlinux.org/episode-198/


--
真実はいつも一つ！/ Always, there's only one truth!

[Nick Cannon]

Welcome Neal!

Thank you for the excellent intro, it's great to have you here on the list. No doubt your experience as a distro leader and package maintainer gives you a valuable perspective that is very relevant to many of our discussions here.

We'll be spinning up more discussions in the coming weeks but please feel free to start a new thread if you have any particular questions about the report, or suggestions for how we could address some of the challenges it raises.

Nick

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