Linux Foundation Announces Linux Training Scholarship Winners

Nearly 700 submissions received in five categories; winners represent the future of Linux

NEW ORLEANS – LINUXCON & CLOUDOPEN – September 17, 2013 – The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization dedicated to accelerating the growth of Linux, today announced the winners of its annual Linux training scholarship program.

The Linux Foundation’s Linux training program provides funds to developers and IT professionals who show incredible promise for building careers in Linux and shaping the future of the operating system but who otherwise do not have the ability to attend Linux Foundation training courses. Each scholarship covers the registration fees for a Linux training course from and a 30-minute mentoring session with a Linux Foundation training instructor.

New this year was the introduction of five categories to help solicit submissions from a diverse group of applicants. Nearly 700 submissions were received, and the average age of applicant was 25-years old. The most popular categories were SysAdmin Super Star, Whiz Kid and Developer Do-Gooder.[1]

The winners and their respective categories are:

Andrew Dahl, United States, Linux Kernel Guru. A native of Minnesota, Dahl has already submitted bug fixes to the Linux kernel, including a small bug fix for the XFS_IOC_ZERO_RANGE IOCTL from which lines of code were used during the refactoring and removal of a larger set of wrapper functions in XFS. He will use the Linux training scholarship in his day job as a File System Engineer to work on NFS and XFS in the community.

“I think what gets me most excited (about Linux) is the footprint my contributions to the Linux kernel can have,” said Dahl. “The code I contribute will run on millions of computers around the world.”

Sarah Kiden, Uganda, Women in Linux. Kiden has been a Linux user since 2010. She learned Linux on the job when she was assigned a new role with the Systems team of her department and was asked to maintain systems running on Linux. Kiden will use the Linux training scholarship to improve her performance at work and be a role model for other women in her local community and the global Linux and open source communities.

“I’m sure many more women will be encouraged to participate in Linux forums and use open soft software if they meet someone else who has been successful in the field,” said Kiden 

Abdelghani Ouchabane, Germany, SysAdmin Superstar. Ouchabane has extensive experience in Linux system administration and development and is a Linux Foundation member. He has more than 10 years of experience working on Linux systems at the Center for the Advanced Technology in Algeria, the Technical University of Berlin and today at eZono AG. Ouchabane says the Linux training scholarship will take his skills to an even more advanced level.

“I believe that Linux training (from The Linux Foundation) will let me learn from the right experts, so I will get the latest techniques and knowledge in Linux,” said Ouchabane.

Nam Pho, United States, Developer Do-Gooder. Inspired by the accomplishments of the human genome project, Pho pursued a science track in genomics in college, and Linux was a consistent presence. Today Pho works as a research and computing scientist on the Linux High Performance Computing (HPC) team at a medical research university where he uses and develops open source code for the Linux HPC environment. In recent years, budget for training opportunities in his workplace has been cut. Pho seeks the Linux training scholarship so that he may have an impact on the quality and stability of new and innovative scientific tools for Linux.

“I’ve been using Linux for a long time, and I’m both inspired and amazed at how much it has grown and matured over the years,” said Pho.

Nandaja Varma, India, Whiz Kid. A regular contributor to the Debian community, Varma’s primary area of interest is application development for Linux system administration. She says she will use her Linux training scholarship to build her career as a Linux systems administrator and to conduct mini-workshops to increase interest in Linux, especially among girls and women.

“I believe girls can be better programmers. Inspiring at least one human being is my dream,” said Varma.

The 2013 Linux Jobs Report shows demand for Linux pros exceeding other areas of technology for the second year in a row. Ninety-three percent of employers said they would hire Linux pros in the next six months, while 90 percent said finding Linux talent is difficult. When they do find it, they pay higher salaries and offer better perks to the Linux pros.

“The number of submissions we received from around the world represents the growth of Linux and diversity of people using and contributing to Linux, especially among young professionals,” said Mike Woster, chief operating officer at The Linux Foundation. “We congratulate this year’s winners and look forward to seeing them in our Linux training courses and contributing to Linux in the years to come.”

About Linux Training at The Linux Foundation

The Linux Foundation Training Program includes a comprehensive set of Linux courses that are distribution-flexible, direct from the source, technically advanced and customizable. Built in concert with its Technical Advisory Board of Linux experts and the leading maintainers from the Linux community, The Linux Foundation’s training curriculum is constantly updated and synced with advances in Linux and includes new features as they are released. The Program combines broad, foundational knowledge with the networking opportunities that attendees need to thrive in their careers today. The organization has helped hundreds of companies move to Linux or gain advanced knowledge of the technology to give their development or operations teams a competitive advantage. For more information, please visit http://training.linuxfoundation.org

About The Linux Foundation

The Linux Foundation is a nonprofit consortium dedicated to fostering the growth of Linux and collaborative software development. Founded in 2000, the organization sponsors the work of Linux creator Linus Torvalds and promotes, protects and advances the Linux operating system and collaborative software development by marshaling the resources of its members and the open source community. The Linux Foundation provides a neutral forum for collaboration and education by hosting Collaborative Projects, Linux conferences, including LinuxCon, and generating original research and content that advances the understanding of Linux and collaborative software development. More information can be found at www.linuxfoundation.org 

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