We’re thrilled to welcome Julie Gunderson as an advisor to AppMap. Julie serves as a DevOps Advocate at PagerDuty and as the founding member and co-organizer of DevOpsDays Boise, she’s passionate about helping individuals, teams and organizations understand how to leverage DevOps.
We recently had the chance to chat with Julie about why she decided to become an advisor to AppMap and the importance of open source communities. Read on to learn more about Julie and what she’s most excited about for AppMap.
What made you decide to become an advisor to AppMap?
Initially, Elizabeth’s passion, strong leadership and fascinating background in epidemiology drew me in. Before my time in tech, I was on an epidemiology career path myself, but life ended up having other plans for me. Still, there are so many parallels in how we think about science and technology, and I really respect technical people who take a scientific approach to their work.
In addition to my interest in Elizabeth’s leadership and background, I recognized that AppMap was a company totally focused on its community right from the get-go. That showed me they were on the right path and focused on the right things.
I built my career from the open source community supporting and teaching me. Working with AppMap is my chance to give back to the community that’s given me so much and I’m honored to have the opportunity.
Why is community so important for open source companies like AppMap?
Open source communities give people who are passionate about working on tough problems a chance to collaborate and make products their own. And these communities transcend boundaries. There are no geographical limits, so they bring in some much-needed diversity – both to the community itself and the product being built, which is a win-win for everyone.
There’s so much more to open source communities than the technical, coding aspect. Yes, these communities are improving technology for us all and ultimately driving how products look and function. But open source communities are also about writing documentation, networking and making lifelong friends. They also impact a company’s brand and reputation. Enterprise-level customers in particular watch how communities behave and notice how companies treat their communities. A company that truly values its community recognizes this and is always working to give back.
What role does leadership play in open source communities?
It’s pretty simple: When people in an open source community don’t like or feel respected by a company’s leadership, they stop contributing. I continue to be impressed by both Elizabeth and Kevin’s ability to listen, and take people’s advice and contributions to heart. They understand how to respectfully leverage people in their community to build something great, and they do this by really listening and being open-minded leaders.
What are you most excited about for AppMap?
I remember back in 2009, when the DevOps movement was starting to gain traction, and it fundamentally changed how we all work. AppMap is doing the same thing today. Along with its community, AppMap is going to revolutionize how developers and businesses work.
I love hearing from developers at conferences how AppMap is changing how they work. And I’m excited for even more people to discover how AppMap can allow them to build more security into their code and achieve a more preventative state by being able to understand where code dependencies are. AppMap really is making developers’ lives better and their tech is going to be a game-changer for all of us.
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