Allison Randal appointed Technical Architect of Ubuntu

Allison Randal
Source: Piers Cawley of www.bofh.org.uk Allison Randal has been appointed Technical Architect of Ubuntu at Canonical by Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth. Randal is known for her work as an architect of the Parrot virtual machine and chairman of the Parrot Foundation and is a board member of the Perl and Python Foundations.

She announced her new position in a blog posting, explaining that she was not usurping Shuttleworth's position as SABDFL, (Self-Appointed Benevolent Dictator For Life), but becoming the person who helps translate Shuttleworth's vision into a practical plan saying "I’m here to help turn his vision into reality".

Randal describes her position as SABTAFL ("SABDFL Appointed Benevolent Technical Architect For a-Long-time-but-not-necessarily-Life"). She had previously considered applying to Canonical over the years, but "the specific roles I looked at were never quite right for me". With Parrot development having reached a relatively mature version 2.0 and now moving into a new phase of code refinement, Randal had been considering a new challenge. At May's Ubuntu Developer Summit, she found that challenge in the form of an opening for the post of Technical Architect at Canonical and was encouraged to apply for it.

(djwm)