Things I've Learned as a Linux Kernel Maintainer

I spent seven years serving as the maintainer of the XFS filesystem and iomap filesystem library in the Linux kernel. Whilst on that journey, I learned a lot about steering technical direction of those two projects, but also the limitations of managing a community without authority. I intend this talk to be most helpful for people who are current FOSS maintainers or are mid to senior level developers contemplating taking on such roles. These are the six skills that I found most helpful and grew the most in those seven years: * Concocting a strategy from which to build a development roadmap * Defining roles for people to take on * Negotiating staffing and budgets with managers * Coaching people who are trying to get their efforts across the finish line * Dealing with external shocks in as principled a manner as possible * Steering your way out of burnout, aka Replacing Yourself For each of these areas, I'll share how that skill fits into the Linux community (they didn't always fit well!) and what happened when I tried to make things happen in those areas. I will target spending about 4-5 minutes talking about each of those points and leave 20-25 minutes at the end for an audience discussion.