In this OpenStack Days Nordic Keynote spotlight series we talk to our three keynote speakers that are presenting at OpenStack Days Nordic. This is the people that administer, contribute, develop and create awareness and shares their knowledge of OpenStack. Part of their work is to keep OpenStack seamlessly humming and they help push our boundaries forward within the cloud computing arena.
Director of Engineering
OpenStack Foundation
I’m originally a Mechanical Systems engineer. But I worked with open source software for the last 20 years, and have been involved in governing open communities for the past 15 years. I’m more of an open source specialist than a classic coder.
Tell us a little about yourself? Where do you live and work? What do you do surrounding OpenStack?
I work from home, living in a small village in the center of France. I do a lot of travel though, so I like being able to alternate between socially-intensive travel weeks and work-focused home weeks. I do not maintain an ideal work/life balance… But when I can I play table tennis (I’m the captain of a local team), ride horses or snowboards. I also try to spend more and more time on my digital photography hobby.
What’s your favorite area/ project to work on in OpenStack? What’s your specialty?
In OpenStack I’ve been mostly involved in general project coordination, governance and release management. Trying to keep the OpenStack community healthy and productive. With the explosive growth of OpenStack, that is not exactly a smooth ride. But then if it was smooth, it would not be as fun.
What is your expectations on the first OpenStack Days Nordic event?
I like OpenStack Days because they let me meet with OpenStack enthusiasts and reach out to new communities. I find that extremely refreshing and motivating. I have been in Tel Aviv, Berlin, and Budapest so far and it has always been a great experience. I hear you have a fantastic community up there, so I’m really looking forward to paying you a visit!
What do you think the audience will take away from your key note session?
My goal is to talk about what OpenStack is. It might sound obvious but it’s not. OpenStack is a lot of different things, and our always-evolving community has spent a lot of time over the past 6 years defining and refining what it actually is about. So I expect the audience to understand better our history so far, the OpenStack project mission, what we stand for, and where it will likely go in the future.