Cloud Native Computing Foundation KCD Africa, 1 Jun 2021

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From YouTube: Embracing open source as a catalyst for growth

Description

Uchechukwu Obasi is a software engineer with Grafana Labs and a CNCF Ambassador

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Awesome awesome uh thanks a lot uh pacman for the awesome presentation, so yeah um I I guess it's my turn to present so I'll start by introducing myself. So my.

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A social engineer at a company called grafana labs so far.

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The company behind the popular open source project called, and I also happens to be the co-organizer of the kubernetes community based on africa event, and today I would be talking about my journey and how open source changed. My life for good, so yeah I'll be sharing my screen in a.

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Bit cool, can you all see my screen.

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Yeah, can you all see.

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Yeah so so, like I said, the title of my topic today is embracing open source as catalyst for groups and.

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This is the very sharing personal story um on how open source changed my life in a very positive way, so.

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I will be sharing a lot of details about how I moved from being like a very obvious developer to actually working in a world-class company basically, and how open source was part of you know my vote as an engineer so yeah. um Basically, this is like particular of content.

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Diving into how.

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I found open source I'll also be talking of the open source festival which happened. You know last year, 2020. I was talking about how I was able to get into the lfx mentorship program and how I was able to join the final.

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How I was able to also join the cncf ambassadors program.

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Then I would be sharing some key, simple ways and, lastly, the final words so yeah. uh So before I dive into sharing what life used to be for me um prior to learning about open source, I would want to actually tell you a story of you know something that happened recently.

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So uh I think that was like two weeks ago or three weeks ago, a very cool saturday morning I was basically on my couch and I was reflecting back on how I started. Basically, you know how yeah I came from. I was able to like move from zero to hundred, and you know it struck me how open source was. You know a big part of what you know.

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People take me from being a video call notice to fellow parts being you know very like very good uh to feel about, and then you know it just came to my mind that open source actually changed my life for good and then.

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I went on twitter.

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And I tweeted about it and, to my greatest surprise,.

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You know you had you know, subtractions I mean you could see like 175.

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Likes just one tweets.

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And five comments- and I think the most interesting part was this particular comment. So someone.

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Commented on the trade and.

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Actually, mentioned.

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That open source community changed his or her life too, and.

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Actually struck me, you know, actually I thought it was just me, but you know, after seeing this comment, I actually knew.

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It's not just me. Actually, there are a lot of people that open source has actually had some impact in their lives in one way or the other, and.

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uh That brings me uh to how it all began. Basically, so basically, you know before the dawn uh before I knew what open source was, and I was basically 30.

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In 20 in college, I was in computer science, computer science in school, and I wanted at.

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The time I wanted.

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To just be a freelance web developer, you know just wanted to start up my own web agency and just hire people and just build.

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You know websites.

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For people- and that was basically what I you know, dreamt to be at the time and.

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Time I had zero understanding of what and, of course I had no opportunity for careers so.

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The position I found myself up until um yeah uh so basically up until I think uh january january, to february 2020..

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So at the time I had moved to my fourth year in college- and you know I was- I was asking myself a lot of questions you know. So how do.

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I move from here.

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You know, actually is this enough, for me is being a freelancer enough for me. Is that where I want to go and.

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You know at the time.

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I had several opportunities, so what it meant was, you know even.

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Someone that I complete websites from was was very, very difficult. It was very difficult so.

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Of course, I was young.

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I was dumb, I was broke at the time, so I mean forgive the little uh type because I I had report. If you could see.

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Routine on february 10th, so I was.

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Super fascinated.

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Like I, I wrote this with anger. You know I actually needed.

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I needed something more and yeah, I first the same february 20. I think I worked on twitter and then I saw uh open source community africa and then.

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I noticed today we are planning an event: it's called the open source festival and I had never heard of open source before, but you know taking a look at these speakers.

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You know what they planned and everything I was super pumped. I wanted to attend the event and you know just a little bit of background contest. I live in the eastern part of nigeria.

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I'm currently in.

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Nigeria and in go to lagos it's a very long journey and at the time like I said, I was broke, um but I wanted to be there.

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To actually you know.

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To learn more about so I just and you know, with the help of uh the open source community africa, you know they gave some some sponsorships for travels and accommodation. At some point, then I was able to attend the event in lagos, nigeria, so.

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These are, like you know, images of you.

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Know the memories and the experiences we had. I mean.

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I I'm part of the oscar emo chapter and basically these are my friends and we went together and the interesting part, the the amount of content I was able to absorb the amount of knowledge I was able to gain at the event like I let.

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A lot of open source, I learned a lot.

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About like open source licenses, I learned a lot about you.

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uh Communities within.

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The open source and how I could leverage your problems just to grow my career.

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So this was an awesome event. I mean.

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Huge props to the organizers of this event. It was really awesome and after this event um I went back home and you know I was thinking. I taught myself no so after this. What next I mean now I know what open source is. How do I move from here and then I I told myself, you know enough is enough, um let's just let's.

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Serious you know, let's.

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Get things done basically and from these slides you can see an image of what happens to be my goals. For for the year, for I took some time I wrote down, I told myself, I was going to master the skills. I was going to code every single.

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To contribute to open source, because I had already learned what open source was and.

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Some books and some coding tests I have to do as well, so I was super pumped. I was highly motivated to push and become the best version of myself and yeah. That's actually, you know drove me into coding every single day so and my friends, we actually started this thing called. You know I think, on on ending days of code. Basically so like we are quoting every single day and we do we need to decap to how long we would be coding. Basically. So, along the line, I learned about the lfx membership program.

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You know, as probably, as you have seen on previous slides. I my plan was to continue to g-suck and I applied to gsoc, of course, but then I didn't get into gsu along.

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The line I learned about the lfx mentorship.

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Program and it was actually um through.

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I belonged to on on one saturday, so at the time.

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This on this whatsapp group, you know a few weeks: a young, vibrant, um open.

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Enthusiast and eventually.

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That was where I got the link to the lfx mentorship program. Of course I applied, and you know if, prior to the application, I went to do like a list of projects that I passed specie and one project caught my attention, and that was the thanos project. So.

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Basically, you know.

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I've always been doing fronted web engineering.

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Long time and so projects project topics related to that and then looking for me, I found this uh issue on thanos, which was you know professionally building.

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You know for the thanos documentation, site and.

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Then I was, I was super excited.

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Because uh I I saw a project I felt I could contribute to, and you know I immediately um commented on the threads. uh You know right from there. I started picking up interest on that project and I started like doing research immediately and trust me um at the time.

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You know I had zero expectations that I would be selected. I was.

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Just genuinely interested, of course, I was being hopeful to.

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Get selected, of course, or or generally interested, and I wanted to just contribute to this project, and you know. Basically I think you know you don't have to start big. Basically, you just have to start small and show love and interest.

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uh Oh sorry, okay, so yeah! um So of course, uh eventually I got accepted into the program, and you know I spent like a couple of months three to four months. You know contributing to the tennis projects and.

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You know when I joined while I was contributing. I noticed you know there was some other.

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That were also contributing to tunnels as well, and I wanted to like work with them, because I I thought I was walking in the side of just me. Trying to you know like work on this project, and I felt you know. Maybe I could reach out to this uh other.

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And probably just sync up and just work together and collaborate together and then I reached out to them and then he.

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Right from the first day, so we waited um so I was able to create this initiative called the thanos. I.

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And my friends.

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Of course, so we created this uh initiative called the tunnels mexico's friday hangout. So basically you know he meet every friday. Would you try to reflect on what we are able to achieve for that week? You know what our plans are for the next week and of course, uh we also you know have chats about. You know our careers.

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How we could you know basically improve ourselves and from time to time you know we invited like open source maintainers.

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The space, so we invited maintainers from the communities.

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The cortex project, from thanos, of course, and from kubernetes and so on so.

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It was fun, was.

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Really fun was was, I think it was the highlights of my um I stay as mit attends and yeah. uh Eventually I completed my project. Of course it was it took months and it took a lot of perseverance a lot of hard work, because I've not done something like that before I mean, like I've, always been a front-end developer, but then building it completely. Automated too, that could you know, do some form of professional uh for the channel certification site, but something I had zero clue about, but.

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I was you know, I.

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I believed in myself I knew if I could put in the time and hard work and experience. I could get things done.

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And, of course, I did.

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um And you know when my project was finally merged to the thanos corps or to the town of repo, I literally dropped on twitter and I tweeted you know um how.

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And to my great surprise, it also got a lot of attractions as well. I mean.

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Can see here, you can see 253 likes, it was huge, it is huge and yeah um after.

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Shed this uh I checked this tweet. I basically I knew the next step for me was to get a job, because basically I was calling on my kind. I was in college next step for me was to join the company and because I had contributed to open source to tunnels. I wanted.

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Within the space I wanted to work with the company that is open source. I wanted to work on an open source project and you know.

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Basically, I wanted.

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To you know remain within the space and then.

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You know I learned about.

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About a company called grafana labs and basically my encounter with graphene labs was through the observability con events that loves, I think, around. Every.

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Learned about the observability called I registered and I, of course the events really opened my eyes into you know what observability was and the opportunities within the observability space and that actually you give like interest. You know into me diving, deep into the company, I get to learn about the company and you can see to know how I could be part of the company and the interesting part was it actually took uh ticked. You know ticked off most of the things I was looking for in.

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Company so I mean like you know: they are a completely open source company. They are completely remote. First, they had great engineering, and you know their products was a really great product. They had a great community.

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And you know I I was excited because I I never knew a company like this existed. So eventually I moved to the jobs page, and you know I I sense my application, of course, at some point before sending that application. I was scared because I felt I wasn't good enough. I felt you know I I mean like I mean. Basically this is nigeria.

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How how can I get employed in a global company like this, but so with the help of my friends at me, and it pushed me to just apply and I did and of course uh I I got into graphing.

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As a software engineer, I currently work, you know basically seeing.

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Micros and yeah, uh you know sooner soon after I joined grandfather labs, um I was still.

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Very much active.

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With the same space- and you know along the lines I learned about the cncf ambassadors program, so I I was quite excited about it as well. You know I felt I could be part of this.

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And then I applied as well. I applied.

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To the css program- and you know at the time I didn't really know how huge it was- I didn't know the caliber of people that you know that are being accepted as uh as ambassadors. So after I sent in my application, I went to the cncf site and then I saw a list of the ambassadors.

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You know I I mean I lost hope. Basically, because I I mean I was seeing like engineers at microsoft and google chief cloud architects. You know people that have lots and lots of experiences. I was like you know. There is no way I was going to get him. Basically, there is no way well. You know to my greatest surprise, I got a mail that I was accepted into the ambassadors program. I.

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Super excited because at the time I think you know we had not had a cncf ambassador from west africa, so what it meant was. I was like the first in east africa, which was huge for me.

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Basically, it basically promises an opportunity for me to make a lot more impact, because I've always been.

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Driven right from day one so so yeah I of course I went on tv as well, and I treated you know how excited I was about getting into the ambassadors program and yeah, um basically I'll be ending the story here, um but I would want to end with some few key takeaways. So basically, this is my journey. This is my story and I know it's different for different people, but then I I actually took out time to reflect on my journey and actually you know document what I think like helped me.

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You know get to the level where I am here and.

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Feel if you should follow the same, so number one is share openly so because.

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It's open source, it's.

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Highly important to cultivate start open culture yourself, make it part of your personality. I mean for what you could see. I I mean like right from the beginning of the slides, I always been tweeting. You know I've always been sharing. um Basically, what has been going.

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And trust me, people are watching people actually looking people are actually monitoring you and yeah. Just uh open share open. You know basically embrace open source. You know as your personality basically and the second one is take responsibility, so tech research taking responsibility is quite an important skill, both as a software engineer and also as an open source enthusiasts or anyone interested in open source, because, basically in open source, you know um it is expected. You take full responsibility of wherever you are. You are planning to work on or whatever you are assigned to do.

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So I think it's a very, very important skill set to embrace.

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Then the next is, you know if.

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You can apply to open source mentorship programs, so there.

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A lot of a couple of open source mentorship programs like lfx mentorship program, which is open for both students and I think.

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Experienced engineers as well.

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You are quite new to the open source. I think you can participate within the lfx mentorship program. I.

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That's still the case, but I during my own time that was how it was structured. You know there is giselle for students in university. There is outreach for basically underrepresented folks within the community. uh There are a lot more. There is google summer of talks, I mean. If you are interested in technical writing and technical, you can actually contribute to open source by participating in the google summer thoughts program.

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And a lot more.

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And then the another point is to collaborate with others. I mean from what I mentioned. You know, while I was contributing to the tennis project, I was.

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To reach out to others and trust me trust me, it was the best decision I have made till date. I mean we still talk today. We meet once every month to discuss and share.

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Become best of friends you know basically, so it's very important to learn how to collaborate with others, and that brings me to the next point which is joining the community.

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I mean I can't even I can't over emphasize like how community has really been a huge part of my growth as a software engineer- and I I think you know if you if you are really really interested in going far and you are really interested in becoming the best version of yourself, I would highly advise you join the community and there are a lot of community.

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You know within.

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We have like the cncf.

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Community for for most of us interested in climate change, you know you have like the oscar. If you're interested in open source, you can enjoy the oscar, the open source community in africa and.

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Open source communities within the continent so feel free to join in one of them and, of course, be kind. So open source is people. You know to work with people on a day-to-day basis and because you want people, it's very advisable to be kind to people, because you'd.

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Treat someone how you would want to be treated so yeah, um please be kind and reach out. You know, reach out to people who reach out to mentors reach out to maintainers. Don't be scared. um Everyone.

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You know just like you um feel free to reach out to anyone basically on twitter, on the projects, communication platforms anywhere.

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As much as possible to reach out to people and the last, but not the least, is paying it forward, um I am a huge fan of the community and basically you know I feel you know. Community has really done a lot for me and I feel the need to pay for it and that's why I happen to be the coordinator of gcp africa events. You know, and you know that's why I do the things I do today and yeah um find.

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I have for anyone that is really interested in embracing open source. I was really interested in doing this on my career um I found out, what's uh in the.

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Words of helen.

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Hayes, I would say the expert in anything was once a beginner and in the words of jobs, keep pushing without settle and in the wants of peace, and web code is hard but don't give up. I hope we all you know, embrace open source as part of our culture and I hope to see you all.

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Basically, the world's teach world classes and.

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Awesome session uh with jay, it was uh uh great listening to you and also watching lots of the glowing comments that uh have been coming on yeah. I think uh iho shared the link to mentor needed in the chat. If anyone is interested in cncf mentoring programs, the url is mentoring, dot, cncf, dot, io and also we have a comment from youtube.

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Let me just pronounce good man. Let me not spoil the rest of me. He says great session of it and I think there has been quite a lot of glowing comments uh on on twitter. Also now a quick question: um how have you dealt with impostor syndrome? I know it's. uh It's a major thing that most people struggle with, especially when you come from an environment where you probably struggle or feel as if you are not capable within a particular group, and you now get to an international company. How do you manage impostor syndrome.

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Yeah yeah, that's, I think, that's a very wonderful question. Actually I wrote about it on my personal blog about there. So maybe.

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Could also share the link, probably after this session, um so when I joined grafana labs, of course, I I felt like a new poster. In fact, I still do um to be honest. I still do, but I think what has helped me was me taking time to reflect on other achievements, how far I've come so.

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Basically, what I try to.

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Do is I try to actually reflect back and see. Okay, I've actually done this. I've actually done that actually done this in the past. So because I've been able to do this in the past, it's also analytics that I can actually pass this holder. So that is one and then second part is you know.

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I try to you know, have conversations you know with people with the company, so I know for sure, like I work here very similar, I know for sure that most of the seniors must have gone through that particular stage, and I try to have some conversations with them and you know tell them that hey. This is how I feel you know. This is what I'm feeling basically and it's so reassuring, to actually learn that they also feel the same way and they also have felt at some points in their career. So.

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I think basically.

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Speaking of uh and reaching out, you know also, it helps in scenarios like that and.

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Then, of course, uh believing in.

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It's hard it's hard to believe in oneself, but I think you just have to because if you don't so we want you so yeah. I think that's like my few tips on how I was able to fight this year. Awesome.

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Yeah, I don't know question one thing I think most people struggle with is taking feedback feedback because most times we are from different cultures and we speak differently. There are some people who are direct when they share their opinion directly.

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You can feel offended sometimes, but they don't know it as an offense or something wrong because that's how they share. That is how they communicate. How what's your experience with feedback? And how do you manage when someone is direct to you or not necessarily confrontational, but the feedback looks direct.

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Very very good question, so I.

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I've I've had a couple of experiences about, you know receiving feedback, and I think for me personally. It's basically me knowing that I know nothing. So the fact that I know that I know nothing means that. I know for sure that there are a lot of experts. There are a lot of people that lose way more than I do, and what I try to do is I try to.

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um I try to have uh usually held beliefs. Basically, so I know for sure. Okay, this is my belief. This is what I think it is, but then it's completed without so I am a huge believer in experiences, so the facts that I know that I've had a couple of experiences means that you know this more than I do, and in scenarios.

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I I know for sure all I get to do is just to listen and to just take.

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Whatever you're.

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Actually, trying to you know tell me basically.

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So so yeah, I think.

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Basically, what has done what.

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I am still starting out. This journey has actually been absorbed, feedback.

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I try to also make sure that the person giving the feedback has like has suffered a domain knowledge on. What's he or she is giving in the first place, because if you have zero knowledge about this and then you're giving your feedback, you know on.

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You click you have a reach about, then it makes no sense. Basically because you have several knowledge, so I.

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As much as make sure that the person has a lot of experiences.

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That could actually make me select, I'm so careful so yeah um having with the help.

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I think it does.

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Awesome yeah. One last question I want to ask: is um there's this thing. uh That happens quite a lot lately. There are lots of announcements on twitter. People are doing a lot of great things, which is really exciting for our community.

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Apart from people companies raising funds a lot more people are getting international opportunities. That is what we want, and that is what, as a community, we want to happen because there is a lot of false leadership on the continent, but that access to opportunity is not there but there's one other thing.

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I also term announcement-driven development, where people push themselves not to grow or to build a career, but just to put something out there on social media and at the end of the day, instead of focusing on building their career building themselves, they end up just looking and struggling for the next thing that they want to post on social media. What do you think about this? Have you experienced it or what advice do you have on managing social media? Managing uh such pressure from social media yeah.

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Yeah, that's that's a very.

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Good question so so for me personally, you know I've always had like big dreams, and you know, even when, like I contributed to channels and joining graffana labs and the company ambassador, I knew.

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There was more support.

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I could achieve, and you know because you know.

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Of source I've been able to work closely with like exceptional.

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Like principal.

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Software engineers.

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Software architects, I've been able to work with really experienced people, and you know one thing I notice at all times.

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Is yes, it's good.

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Share my story, but then it's also important to be a mind via destination like yeah man. What your destination is. Basically, so the fact that I know that I have, I still have a very long way to go. I tend not to focus on my achievements now. You know and.

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Right from day, one I've always.

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I've always been someone that is value driven. So, yes, the noise is quite important, but then I focus on the end results. Basically.

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So yeah, basically, I think my advice for anyone having such challenges is. First things.

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I I think you should you know ambitious. You know, have very good ambition. If you have a big enough goal, then you know that the change you achieve now, it's not in compared to where you want in the future, and then I think the second one is um is basically focus.

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The end result so.

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This thing you want to share on social media. What's the end result, are you sharing it just to you know, make people know that you've arrived or are you sharing it just to motivate people? Are you.

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Sharing it just to.

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Like inspire people, basically so have good intentions be valued.

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Like have a very good end result that you want to.

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At the end of the day, and then you know last but not least, I would say you know, be authentic.

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It will be original, it's not like sharing.

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Again, it's awesome. It's also because.

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People from there, but try to be authentic. You know try to share value valid information.

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Because everyone else is sharing, and they just want to lie about your so try to attend and try to you know actually be value.

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That's that's basically what I think I can say about this.

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Awesome and for the community don't get me wrong, it's not wrong to celebrate your wins. We should all celebrate our wins and be confident in some of the things we achieve, and sometimes when you put yourself out there. That is when people can know. This is what you are good at. This is what you've achieved and how they can work with you, but it's also important to know what the goal is and stick to the goal.

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Yeah make your announcement share with the world, but put let your id or the goal and uh not uh get carried away with social media, social media. I always say social media is the place where people put forward their facade.

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What you are seeing might not necessarily be what is true, but while we are trying to celebrate our wings, it's also very important for us to put our eyes on the goal and make sure we achieve our core objective.

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Awesome yeah. So I I I don't see any other questions in the chat uh yeah. Let me see yeah once again. Thank you very much for joining us here and uh awesome so which I will be moving to the enterprise stage, he's our uh track manager for the enterprise stage. He had to come here to still to share with us his experience, while, while he's moving to the capacity, I will touch this with our next speaker.