People of openSUSE: Frederic Crozat

We all hope you had a good start in the new year. I’d say People of openSUSE had. Today we have the chance to interview SUSE’s Freederic Crozat, who’s responsible for systemd in openSUSE.

So, enjoy! ;-)

**Nickname:**	fcrozat
**Homepage: **	//blog.crozat.net/
**Blog:**	//blog.crozat.net/
**Favorite season:**	Winter ( I love to take pictures of landscapes / trees under the snow)
**Motto:**

Please introduce yourself!

My name is Frédéric Crozat, I’m 36 and I live in Paris (France). I’m working for SUSE for a little more than a year, with focus on various topics such as SUSE MeeGo, GNOME 3 live image, LXC (Linux Containers) and more recently, systemd.. Before that, I worked for 10 years at MandrakeSoft/Mandriva, taking care of GNOME. From 2002 to 2011, I was part of GNOME Release Team, making sure GNOME was released on time and with all those nice features.

Tell us about the background to your computer use.

I’ve been interested in computer since I was a kid (first computer was a MSX Canon V20).. First „big program“ (on a PC 8086 with 10MB hard disk IIRC) I wrote was a billing program for my mom (she owns a bookstore), when I was in 7th grade (first in Quick Basic), then I rewrote it in Turbo Pascal when I learned Pascal in 2nd grade and later, I even rewrote it in Object Oriented Pascal (because I bought Borland Pascal 6 or 7, shipped with huge printed user manual, included OO stuff) when I was in collegue. And my mom used this program (on the same computer) until she closed her shop, 7 years ago ;)

Then, I went to a Computer Science Engineering school where I learned a lot about computers science (even if I was already a geek ;), including C, C++, Java and many strange languages.

I also learned Unix there and discovered Linux because our C teacher told us „you’ll get a free C compiler you’ll be able to use at home“ and then, I became hooked (it was in 1996)

When and why did you start using openSUSE/SUSE Linux?

I started to use openSUSE when I joined Novell (now SUSE) in August 2010. I was already monitoring openSUSE (and SUSE) before, when I was working at MandrakeSoft/Mandriva.

When did you join the openSUSE community and what made you do that?

I joined the community when I started to use openSUSE and more precisely, after openSUSE conference in October 2010 (where I met a lot of interesting people)

In what way do you participate in the openSUSE project?

Initially, I helped on GNOME (and a bit on MeeGo, when it was still alive). I took care of GNOME 3 live image (used by GNOME Foundation, and based on openSUSE). More recently, I’ve been handling the switch to systemd for openSUSE 12.1

What especially motivates you to participate in the openSUSE project?

I want openSUSE to be the best Linux distribution in the ecosystem, best in the „easy to use“ sense, but also best in its interaction with upstream projects.

What do you think was your most important contribution to the openSUSE project/community or what is the contribution that you’re most proud of?

Probably, GNOME 3 live image : I started as a way to learn SUSE Studio and then kiwi, and it morphed into a 3 months projects, which helped a lot on GNOME 3.0 launch and Novell/SUSE sponsored 10000 promo DVD based on this work which were handed over to GNOME Foundation.

When do you usually spend time on the openSUSE project?

Usually, during the day, in parallel to my work at SUSE (when it is not openSUSE related)

Three words to describe openSUSE? Or make up a proper slogan!

Green ; Easy ; Powerful

What do you think is missing or underrated in the distribution or the project?

Underrated : OBS . We have a unique technology, simplifing software package (and availability).

What do you think the future holds for the openSUSE project?

Great things :) . OpenSUSE as a project is pretty young, compared to other projects I’ve participated in the past, and I want to be sure we’ll be able to use other project experience to go even further (and avoid possible mistakes other did)

A person asks you why he/she should choose openSUSE instead of other distribution/OS. What would be your arguments to convince him/her to pick up openSUSE?

Because we give people choice and freedom. And we also make sure to have great relations with other communities (either upstream projects or even other distributions)

Which members of the openSUSE community have you met in person?

I can’t list all of them (attending conferences makes the list very long), but in my short list, I’d say Vincent Untz, DimStar, FunkyPenguin, Michael Meeks and many many other people

How many icons are currently on your desktop?

None, since GNOME 3 doesn’t have icons on the desktop anymore ;)

What is the application you can’t live without? And why?

I’d say Firefox, empathy, evolution and git ;)

Which application or feature should be invented as soon as possible?

Easy (ie transparent) backup, and getting my data synchronized and available everywhere ( I know both those ideas are being addressed, but not yet fully and in a „easy for my mom to use“ form)

Which is your preferred text editor? And why?

Vim. I’ve been using both Emacs and vi for a long time and some years ago, I switched to vim exclusively, because it was just so fast to start (I tend to detect a lot of different files not always at the same time) and I thought I would be better to focus on just one editor and better learn to use it at its full potential (I don’t consider myself a vim guru at all)

Which famous person would you want to join the openSUSE community?

None, all the best are there already (kidding ;)

Which computer related skills would you like to have?

Understand assembly language and this kind of low level stuff. I learned it at school, but it was never my „thing“

The Internet crashes for a whole week — how would you feel, what would you do?

This is exactly what I’m experiencing right now (moving between flats). So, I’m using a 3G Internet access at home… More seriously, in the past, when I was travelling for my holidays, I always make sure to „unplug“ myself for one or two weeks and everything went fine.

Which is your favorite movie scene?

None in particular

Star Trek or Star Wars?

Star Trek (but I like both)

What is your favorite food and drink?

Food : truffade (regional dish from countryside, cheese and potatoes : //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truffade

No favorite drink, I like a lot of them ;)

Favorite game or console (in your childhood and nowadays)?

Heavy Rain / ICO. When I was younger, the various „Commander Keen“ from Apogee Software

Which city would you like to visit?

The list is pretty long, but right now, I’d list Amsterdam and New-York.

What is your preferred way to spend your vacation?

Travelling with my wife and use my DSLR to take a glimpse of the landscapes encountered.

Someone gives you $1.000.000 — what would you do with the money?

No idea. Call me when the bank order is done on my account and we’ll talk ;)

If traveling through time was possible — when would we be most likely to meet you?

Nowadays is a nice time, not sure I would move permanently to another time (but maybe I use it to visit various times ;)

There’s a thunderstorm outside — do you turn off your computer?

I used to (because I lived for a long time in rural environment). I don’t anymore.

Have your ever missed an appointment because you forgot about it while sitting at your computer?

One or two times, mostly because I forgot to set the alarm in my calendar for the appointment ;)

Show us a picture of something, you have always wanted to share!

This is what some collegues did in our office in Paris : everybody should do the same : //www.flickr.com/photos/fcrozat/6055381155/in/photostream (and I’m now the guardian of this geeko ;)

You couldn’t live without…

My wife

Which question was the hardest to answer?

Movie scene / what to do with one million $.

What other question would you like to answer? And what would you answer?