Training Scholarship Winner Andrew Dahl is an Aspiring Kernel Guru

Linux Foundation Training scholarship winner Andrew Dahl is relatively new to the Linux community but he’s already jumped in to help on the XFS file system, fixing bugs and reviewing a small number of patches.  As a file system engineer at SGI, he works on NFS, XFS and SGI’s CXFS (Clustered XFS.) But in his spare time he likes to dabble in Qt application development and fix kernel bugs he finds on his current hardware.

Lines of code from his small bug fix for the XFS_IOC_ZERO_RANGE IOCTL, for example, were used during the refactoring and removal of a larger set of wrapper functions in XFS.  He’s also currently looking into enhancing the touchscreen drivers for the Chromebook Pixel.

Dahl is one of five Linux developers and IT professionals to win a training scholarship from the Linux Foundation. Nearly 700 submissions were received in categories that included SysAdmin Super Star, Whiz Kid, Women in Linux, Kernel Guru and Developer Do-Gooder.

As the winner in the Kernel Guru category, Dahl plans to use the additional training in Linux kernel internals to improve his work at SGI and to further his career as a Linux kernel developer.

We followed up with all of the winners after the scholarships were announced at LinuxCon and CloudOpen in New Orleans to find out a little more about who they are and their goals as Linux professionals. Here are Dahl’s answers. Watch Linux.com in coming weeks for profiles featuring winners Sarah Kiden, Abdelghani Ouchabane, Nam Pho and Nandaja Varma.

For a full list of Linux training courses available, visit http://training.linuxfoundation.org.

Where are you from?

I’m a Minnesota native. I was born in the twin cities metro area, but I grew up in Sauk Centre, MN.  Currently, I’m living in Woodbury, MN.  And yes, I definitely have a Minnesotan accent!

Where did you go to college?

Minnesota State University Moorhead

Tell us something few people know about you.

In my first two years of driving, I owned a total of eight vehicles.  —  I’ve managed to only buy two in the latter seven years of driving, but I’m still very much a gear head in my spare time.

What is it about Linux kernel development that gets you excited?

I think what gets me most excited is the footprint my contributions to the Linux Kernel have.  The code I contribute will run on millions of computers around the world.  And the fact that my contributions are open and free makes me feel like I’m making a real difference in the world, as opposed to just one company, which is just the icing on the cake.