Running for openSUSE Board

Hi! I am running as openSUSE Board member and I would like to let you know more about me, my view of what openSUSE is and why I want to be in the Board.

About myself

I’m Ana María Martínez, 24 years old, from Madrid, Spain and living in Nuremberg, Germany. I studied Computer Science Engineering and Mathematics in Madrid. During my last year at university, I started in open source development contributing to a local open government project. At the end of my university studies (2016), I participated in Google Summer of Code (GSoC) as a student for openSUSE. I fell in love with the open source development and the openSUSE community. Because of that, after GSoC, I moved to Nuremberg to work as a Software Engineer at SUSE in the Open Build Service frontend team.

I’m currently writing a lot of Ruby code. As I can not avoid taking a look to every code that crosses my path, apart from my work at SUSE, I contribute to several open source projects inside and outside openSUSE. In some cases becoming active contributor, or even maintainer, for some of them. Some people say I am addicted to GitHub! In openSUSE, I maintain projects like Open Build Service (build.opensuse.org), OSEM (events.opensuse.org), Trollolo, mentoring (101.opensuse.org) and software-o-o (software.opensuse.org). Outside openSUSE, I have recently contributed to Jekyll, the Ruby core, Rubocop, Rantly, etc.

What I like the most of openSUSE and working in open source is that it is fun, I learn a lot and I have the chance to work with a lot of talented people interested in the same things as me all around the world. I think it is really important that everybody who is interested can join openSUSE development and community. Because of that I help newcomers to open source, for example by participating as a mentor and organization admin in GSoC for openSUSE.

I have also happily spoken at openSUSE events (openSUSE conference, openSUSE.Asia Summit) about topics like mentoring and Open Build Service and I try to contribute to make those events as fun as possible.

You will find me in Github, IRC and some other places as @Ana06. You can contact me in Twitter as well (@anamma_06).

Goals and values

I have heard from previous Board members that the board needs to become more approachable and improve communication. I also think this is important and that there is still room for improvement in this regard. In addition, I find really important that the board works as transparent as possible, so that every openSUSE member is aware of the things that are done and the decisions that are made and how they are made. In openSUSE we like to say that those who does, decide. And I also think that those who does, should be as informed as possible. I consider really important as well that openSUSE contributors are valued and have fun, and we should promote this fun spirit from the board. Last but not least, I think we have to improve as a community on encouraging new people to join us, keeping always fun and advertising openSUSE as much and spread as possible.

Why should you vote for me?

I think it is important that there are openSUSE developers in the board and openSUSE developer is a term that defines myself quite well. Most of the candidates to the board will probably mention here that they are using openSUSE since more than a decade. This is not something I can say. I am using openSUSE distribution and contributing to openSUSE since less than 2 years. Without forgetting that there are people in openSUSE that know much more than me, that I need to hear and learn from, I think that my point of view can be really valuable for the board. I bring new ideas and energy and a great desire to learn and improve things. And of course the reason why you should vote me is because you share my ideas and concept of what openSUSE is and the things that need to be improved.