Greetings! I am announcing my candidacy for the OpenStack Technical Committee. As a long-time developer, I have been part of projects that have succeeded and others that have not; in either event, I always learned something to apply to the next endeavor. I would like to use that experience to help guide OpenStack forward as part of the TC. For those who may not know me, my name is Ed Leafe (edleafe on IRC), and I have been involved in OpenStack since the very beginning as part of the original Nova team. I am currently employed by IBM to work 100% of my time on upstream OpenStack, so I would have the freedom to devote as much time as needed to my TC duties. I have been participating in the TC meetings for over a year, and am familiar with the issues that come before it. I believe that I could contribute a lot more as a member of the TC, and that's why I'm asking for your vote. Here are some of the issues that I would like to focus on: * Improving the user experience Part of my current job is mentoring fellow IBMers who are new to OpenStack in what it is, how to use it, etc. Have you ever tried to explain how to set up and configure OpenStack to anyone? Then you know just how difficult it is. That's one of the reasons I have been involved in groups such as the API working group, the Nova API team, and the Configuration Option cleanup efforts, as they represent places where OpenStack needs improvement. The recent efforts to open dialogs between ops and devs is a great start, and I'd certainly like to build on that. As a TC member, I would promote efforts to make all of OpenStack more manageable to deploy and maintain, since the coolest software in the world is useless if people can't get it running. * Adding clarity to the Big Tent Opening up the OpenStack world to projects without having to go through the incubation and co-gating requirements was a huge step forward, but the feedback I've heard about the resulting mix is that it is confusing. A few months ago the TC added the 'starter-kit' tag to the baseline projects you would need to install to get OpenStack running; this was a good first step, but I think we need is a way to separate the "guts" of OpenStack from the parts that are built on top of that core. Is a project part of OpenStack itself? Or is it something that works on top of OpenStack (or any other cloud)? I'd like to see projects clearly separated into those that provide 'cloud' services, and those that work with those cloud pieces to make them easier to deploy/manage/report. Why is this distinction important? Because I feel that OpenStack should only have a single project for any particular service, and if someone has an idea for making it better, they need to work with the existing project, not compete. But in the world of projects built on top of OpenStack services, I say let's invite competition! There doesn't have to be a single "winner", as these will more likely tend to be solving particular use cases. Forcing these to be in a single project usually results in bloated, inefficient code. * Promoting consistency across OpenStack projects There is some inconsistency within a single project like Nova, but when you work with multiple projects, the inconsistencies are glaring. And while the TC is not a strong-arm enforcer of standards, it does have considerable influence on how projects evolve, and I would like to see the TC push harder at establishing standards, as the API Working Group is doing, and then encouraging adoption of those standards across projects. The sanity of our operators is at stake! In closing, I'd like to say that anyone who cares enough about OpenStack to want to be a part of the TC will certainly be worth your vote. I hope that I've presented enough to earn your vote.