[Kde-women]Who am I?

[Lauri Watts]

Hi :)

I think the last thing I wrote on here was my last introduction.  I reall=
y=20
wish I had more time to help create a more active community, but it's sti=
ll=20
nice to see traffic on the list :)

Here's what I am not: I'm not a programmer, I'm not a Linux User, I'm not=
 a=20
physicist, and I don't smoke a pipe (well, I may have once, but I didn't=20
inhale, I swear)

I'm 29, I'm from New Zealand, and live now in Sweden, I have three childr=
en=20
ranging from 11 to 3, and I'm a graphic designer by day.  My employment=20
history in IT is mostly in hardware - I used to be one of those nice peop=
le=20
you call up from IBM to come and fix your monitor.  Or your printer, or y=
our=20
ATM machine out on the street.. if it can be intimidated into working wit=
h a=20
screwdriver or a solder kit, or for recalcitrant cases, both, I can proba=
bly=20
fix it.    =20

I have absolutely no skill at programming, I once wrote a shell script th=
at=20
nearly does what I want, most of the time.  I'm not much interested in be=
ing=20
an admin although I can manage it if I have to.  My Unix background cover=
s=20
various incarnations of several commercial UNIXes, from AIX to Solaris wi=
th a=20
smallish helping of HP-UX, but only as an end-user.  Linux and I just=20
entirely don't get along, I've several times tried and it's *just too har=
d*=20
heh.  I use FreeBSD instead, have done for 6 or 7 years now at home.

What do I do for KDE?  Well, I'm KDE's Documentation Coordinator, which s=
ounds=20
impressive but mostly consists of a nearly unmanageable email load,=20
handholding new writers as they take the steps from tentative approach to=
=20
being productive, sometimes translating extended tantrums from the=20
translators into polite requests to the development teams, and desperatel=
y=20
trying to get some documentation written in the small down time I have.  =
This=20
position has enabled me to develop advanced skills in Nagging, which shou=
ld=20
be made a sport, because I would earn medals, and it's also earned me the=
=20
nickname "the Documinatrix" in certain quarters, which I must admit, I th=
ink=20
is pretty cute.

My other task for KDE is more peripheral, I'm one of the FreeBSD packager=
s,=20
which can be interesting at times.

My goals for KDE? I want KDE to have documentation as excellent as the Fr=
eeBSD=20
handbook, which is good enough the online version is regularly printed=20
directly as a dead-tree book by O'Reilly.  KDE is not there yet, and some=
=20
days I feel like we're slipping further back, but that's the goal. =20

My other goal is to make sure KDE stays a cross platform/cross OS desktop=
=2E  It=20
should be sold as an enormous advantage to corporate environments with a =
lot=20
of legacy Unix hardware and operating systems, that they could put a=20
homogenous desktop environment on them all, which has to be good for inte=
rnal=20
IT to support.

And finally, I need to learn to not write epic novels when I'm starting o=
ut to=20
write an email!

Regards,
--=20
Lauri Watts