1. Full legal name: Martin Joseph Brej
* City, Country, Timezone: Monterey, California, USA (Pacific Time)
* Profession: Software Consulting Manager
* Company: International Business Machines Corporation
* My goals in the Fedora Project: I enjoy using Fedora as a platform for my home personal computing needs and would very much like to help others become open source users as well--to help take the technology mainstream. I am not a coder, but do consider myself to be a power-user with strong familiarity with software development processes. I am a liberal arts major with a passion for explaining technology to others.
* What do you want to write about? I am open to writing for any area within Fedora that most needs the help. My personal experience is that many programs are not documented or have documentation that is "rough and ready". I could help cover areas no one else currently is or supplement areas which are currently documented but in need of some polishing.
* What other documentation do you want to see published? I have often looked at the documentation to get the answer to a configuration setting or to solve a problem on my own and found that it did not answer my question.
* Do you want to edit for grammar/writing and/or technical accuracy? I am happy to edit for grammar/"read-ability" and technical accuracy if that is where I can best contribute immediately. I am not a professional writer, so that may be a good way for me to break in as a documentation contributor for Fedora.
* Anything else special? I am an enthusiastic guy--what I may lack in experience, I know I will make up for in dedication and enthusiasm. Between work and family life, I do not have a ton of free time, but will commit realistically to deliverables and deadlines and deliver high quality work. My goal will be to write the doc that I wish were there when I needed to use it.
* Historical qualifications
* What other projects or writing have you worked on in the past? I have been on numerous software implementation projects as a programmer, designer, architect and project manager over my 17 years in the industry. I have written many presentations for customers and some training materials and documentation for the systems delivered. I have never been a documentation professional, however.
* What level and type of computer skills do you have? I would label myself a "power-user". I like to diddle around and see how things work and learn the advanced configuration options, etc. It have been many years since I have been at the code level. I have played around recently with learning Java and scripting on the side, but have no serious programming skills to speak of anymore.
* What other skills do you have that might be applicable? User interface design, other so-called soft skills (people skills), programming, etc. I am a very organized worker--part of my project management background, so over time, that may be an area that I can contribute as well.
* What makes you an excellent match for the project? I spend most of my free time using Fedora and am passionate about building great software that is useful to others (and ideally, easy to use!) I think I express myself clearly and would like to contribute to Fedora instead of just consuming other people's excellent work without giving anything back.
* GPG KEYID and fingerprint * pub 1024D/14A0CF3B 2005-12-02 [expires: 2006-12-02] * Key fingerprint = 202E 9B0A 2D20 C9B6 D703 1504 51D1 E1E8 14A0 CF3B * uid Martin Joseph Brej (Marty) mjbrej@sbcglobal.net * sub 1024g/273B7E4A 2005-12-02 [expires: 2006-12-02]
--------------------------------------- Martin Joseph Brej 326 Monroe Street Monterey, CA 93940-2218
831-375-2735 h 831-521-3925 m mjbrej@sbcglobal.net e martinbrej (Yahoo!) im
Ask me about getting a personal digital certificate.
On Sat, 2005-12-17 at 14:10 -0800, Martin Joseph Brej wrote:
1. Full legal name: Martin Joseph Brej * City, Country, Timezone: Monterey, California, USA (Pacific Time) * Profession: Software Consulting Manager * Company: International Business Machines Corporation * My goals in the Fedora Project: I enjoy using Fedora as a platform for my home personal computing needs and would very much like to help others become open source users as well--to help take the technology mainstream. I am not a coder, but do consider myself to be a power-user with strong familiarity with software development processes. I am a liberal arts major with a passion for explaining technology to others. * What do you want to write about? I am open to writing for any area within Fedora that most needs the help. My personal experience is that many programs are not documented or have documentation that is "rough and ready". I could help cover areas no one else currently is or supplement areas which are currently documented but in need of some polishing.
Welcome to the project !
There are several documents where an additional writer would be extremely helpful:
- Release Notes: we have vacancies for writers to cover some of the sections. This doesn't require much of time commitment, and is a fairly easy way to get started. The page is here:
http://www.fedoraproject.org/wiki/DocsProject/ReleaseNotes/Beats
- Documents in progress: There are half-a-dozen documents in early phases, and an additional writer would be welcome for any of them:
http://www.fedoraproject.org/wiki/Docs/Drafts
You could also pick up one of these, or propose your own subject:
http://www.fedoraproject.org/wiki/DocsProject/DocIdeas
Probably the best thing to do is to have a look through, and pick an area that interests you personally. To get started, you can then either e-mail, or join the IRC channel (#fedora-docs on Freenode).
On Sat, 2005-12-17 at 14:10 -0800, Martin Joseph Brej wrote:
1. Full legal name: Martin Joseph Brej * City, Country, Timezone: Monterey, California, USA (Pacific Time)
Let's get together at a LUG sometime soon and discuss Fedora Ambassador ideas, as well as general geeking. SMAUG (Santa Cruz Microsoft Alternatives Users Group) meets every Monday night at 8 pm at Tiny's in Capitola, and I'm sure the Gentoosians there would love to ridicule our efforts. ;-D
<snip lots of good stuff>
Grand! Welcome, looks like you'll fit in quite nicely.
I think we may need to review the self-intro, as it is quite writer focused. We have needs beyond writing/editing, although that is obviously the bulk of who should be on the project.
For example, I'm going to send out a request for scriptwriting and video editing to this list, as we work on a Fedora Tour. Very different set of skills than your run-of-the-mill tech writing background. :)
* What other skills do you have that might be applicable? User interface design, other so-called soft skills (people skills), programming, etc. I am a very organized worker--part of my project management background, so over time, that may be an area that I can contribute as well.
One area that I think Fedora, and most FLOSS projects, need is good project management. We don't have to launch a formal effort necessarily, but any ideas you have in this regard for the Fedora Documentation Project are much appreciated. I've worked in PS organizations with real PMs, and what an amazing difference a well run project is. I aspire to doing that within FDP. We can then export our ideas, processes, templates, etc. to other projects.
cheers - Karsten
-
Karsten Wade -
Martin Joseph Brej -
Stuart Ellis