It’s sad I don’t get more time to post here these days. Being a manager is a pretty busy job, although I have no complaints! It’s enjoyable, and fortunately I have one of the best teams imaginable to work with, the Fedora Engineering team.

Since we’re coming to the close of another calendar year, I wanted to take a moment to remind people about what the holidays mean to availability. I’m going to crib from an earlier post of mine:

My good friend John Poelstra is fond of saying, “It’s OK to disappoint people, but it’s not OK to surprise them.” That wisdom is a big reason why I like to set expectations over the holidays.

Working at Red Hat is a fast paced and demanding job. Working full time in Fedora is itself demanding on top of that. These demands can make downtime at the holiday important for our team. At Red Hat, there’s a general company shutdown between Christmas and the New Year. This lets the whole organization relax and step away from the keyboard without guilt or fear.

Of course, vital functions are always staffed. Red Hat’s customers will always find us there to support them. Similarly, our Fedora infrastructure team will monitor over the holidays to ensure our services are working nominally, and jump in to fix them if not.

Some people like to spend time over the holidays hacking on projects. Others prefer to spend the time with family and friends. I’ve encouraged our team to use the Fedora vacation calendar to mark their expected “down time.” I encourage other community members to use the calendar, too, especially if they carry some expectations or regular responsibilities around the project.

So all this to say, don’t be surprised if it’s harder to reach some people over the holidays. I’m personally taking several weeks around this holiday shutdown as time off, to relax with my family and recharge for what’s sure to be another busy year. Whatever your plans, I hope the holiday season is full of joy and peace for you and yours.