Background#

Somewhere on the expo floor at KubeCon Atlanta, someone pulled out their phone and typed a question they'd been meaning to ask for months, "How do I become a CNCF Ambassador?"

That question is relatively easy to answer. But what about the developer trying to choose between Cilium, Calico, and Flannel for their production cluster? Or the first-time attendee scrolling through 300 sessions, desperate to find a talk on the specific tool they are evaluating?

Managing the CNCF ecosystem is complex enough to rival the largest enterprise engineering organizations. With over 200 distinct projects, each maintaining its own documentation, governance, and workflows, there is rarely a "single way" to do things. For a developer, this mirrors the internal reality of a large enterprise with several tools and wikis, and the constant challenge of finding the proper context for the task at hand.

Between certifications, working groups, governance frameworks, contributor pathways, and event schedules, there's quite a bit of information and context to navigate. The CNCF runs programs that touch every part of the cloud native ecosystem. Documentation for all of these focus areas exists, though they can be found across project repos, community wikis, foundation sites, and event platforms. Over a decade of organic growth means there's no single path to getting something done.

How do you help a global community find what they need across an ecosystem this vast?

The Challenge#

Most Dosu customers come to us with GitHub issues piling up, and maintainers stretched thin. However, the CNCF's situation is different. They try to help people navigate an entire ecosystem.

Questions and Answers#

A contributor interested in security work wants to know which projects are actively looking for help and how to connect with the right maintainers. That information is spread across several GitHub repos, websites, and Slack channels. Someone preparing for their first KubeCon is scrolling through hundreds of sessions, trying to figure out if anyone's talking about the tool they're evaluating and whether it conflicts with the workshop they already registered for. For enterprises, this comparison rarely lives in a single repo, forcing developers to context-switch across Slack channels and wiki pages. The result is lost productivity and repetitive questions for platform teams.

These inquiries relate to various aspects like projects, programs, events, and governance. While the information is available, locating it requires prior knowledge of where to search, which is precisely what someone is looking for in the first place.

The Hallway Track#

KubeCon drew around 9,000 people over 4 days, with hundreds of sessions spread across multiple floors and buildings. It's the type of event where you can spend twenty minutes trying to find room C111, miss the talk you came for, and then realize you never figured out where to grab lunch. There's a schedule and floor maps to explore, but when you're standing in a crowded hallway, trying to decide between three sessions that all start in ten minutes, trying to find the correct URL probably isn't how you want to spend your time.

The cloud native ecosystem is vast and ever-expanding. It's nearly impossible to keep up. By leveraging Dosu's tech, we can focus on the content itself. This lets us solve problems with the data rather than trying to drink from the firehose.

— Jorge Castro, CNCF Developer Relations

Enter Dosu#

CNCF and Dosu partnered to launch ask.cncf.io at KubeCon + CloudNativeCon North America 2025 in Atlanta. The idea was that if someone has a question about the cloud native ecosystem, they should be able to ask it and get an answer grounded in CNCF's existing documentation, rather than having to guess which of a dozen sources might have what they need.

This was a different application than Dosu's typical work on individual open source projects, where the focus is on helping maintainers manage GitHub issues and keep documentation up to date.

The launch went live on November 9, 2025, the Sunday before KubeCon officially opened. By the time attendees picked up their badges on Monday morning, ask.cncf.io was ready to help people find exactly what they were looking for.

Dosu already had a working implementation with public spaces. Thanks to their generous open source tier, we were able to quickly prototype with smaller projects before committing. The team is very accessible to all their users, and it didn't take long for us to see the potential for helping our community share knowledge.

— Jorge Castro, CNCF Developer Relations

Community Questions#

The community submitted 765 questions across 481 conversation threads. While some inquiries were lookups of certification requirements, session times, or room locations, others became extensive back-and-forth exchanges. One person even had a complex problem that required a 26-message thread, ultimately reaching a resolution through Dosu's sustained support. Reflecting on these questions revealed the community's immediate needs and some gaps in existing contexts.

"How do I become a CNCF Ambassador?"#

Questions about CNCF programs and participation pathways were among the most popular during KubeCon. The Ambassador question appeared multiple times, along with variations like "What working groups can I join and what do they do?" People wanted to understand how CNCF itself works and how it's structured, rather than a singular focus on projects. "Once a project is graduated with the CNCF, what do they need to do?" one user asked.

Certification questions were just as common. "Do CNCF certs like CKA expire?" came up repeatedly, with people wanting clarity on renewal requirements versus retaking exams. Others were looking ahead: "Can you help me prepare for the CNPE exam?" and "When will the new CKNE certification be available?" One user asked whether LFS101 was free or paid.

These questions offer insight into what people are trying to learn. Becoming a CNCF Ambassador, earning a certification, and understanding how governance works. The volume suggests these pathways matter to more people than might show up in a GitHub issue or Slack thread.

Standardizing Architecture & Discovery#

Enterprise development teams can spend hours researching which tools to use. We saw this exact pattern at KubeCon. Users were asking for architectural advice.

One person was inquisitive about a "simple, secure, and speedy" PaaS solution for a YouTube clone. These are complex comparisons that usually require interaction with a team lead or a staff engineer. By answering these strictly from existing data sources, Dosu filled the gap, guided people toward solutions without human intervention, or showed them where to speak to the right parties.

Real-Time Event Concierge#

Dosu fielded numerous logistical questions about KubeCon and the CNCF ecosystem. Attendees needed immediate answers, such as when lunch started, where to check bags, how to find a specific room, and who was sponsoring the Wi-Fi.

Dosu became a real-time conference companion. By handling these immediate logistical needs, like helping a user prioritize booths based on threat detection focus or finding the Project Pavilion schedule, this freed attendees to enjoy their conference experience fully.

Security and Compliance#

Supply chain security was a prominent theme during the conference, highlighting a shift from a niche issue to a central concern for practitioners across the ecosystem. Attendees posed specific questions about the security posture of graduated CNCF projects, including which ones are producing Software Bill of Materials (SBOMs), which have established security policies, and how projects are responding to requirements like the Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) from bodies like the Technical Oversight Committee (TOC) and various Technical Advisory Groups (TAGs).

Further showing contributor interest, questions arose about practical engagement with a security focus. For example, one person sought information on which CNCF projects are actively looking for security contributions, a clear entry point for professionals with a security background. Another specifically inquired whether the Prometheus project has a security policy and is generating SBOMs. Resources such as the security self-assessment checklist were also of interest.

"I want to contribute, but where do I start?"#

Some of the most detailed questions came from people seeking to contribute to the CNCF ecosystem. One user introduced themselves fully: "Hello! I've just joined the CNCF Slack. I work with Go, Kubernetes, cloud native security, and eBPF/XDP networking. I'm very motivated to start contributing to CNCF security projects, particularly KubeArmor. Could someone guide me toward the right channels, SIGs, or maintainers to connect with?"

That's someone ready to contribute, with relevant skills, who just needs to know where to show up. Other people asked about bringing their own projects into the foundation, asking how to get a project into incubation and whether having "Kube" in the name would be a blocker. One user wanted a quick check on whether KubeRay would be a good fit for CNCF. Another just wanted to know how to submit to the CNCF blog. Without a knowledge infrastructure solution like Dosu, identifying these pathways for contribution can be difficult.

An International Community#

People from 26 countries asked Dosu questions during KubeCon + CloudNativeCon NA. The United States accounted for 57% of sessions during the conference (which makes sense given the event's location in Atlanta). However, the geographic distribution expanded significantly afterward as users discovered ask.cncf.io through CNCF's online channels.

Questions were asked in multiple languages (beyond English):

What We Learned#

The CNCF now has deeper visibility into key community needs. Individuals eager to become Ambassadors, struggling to find relevant requirements; contributors ready to support security initiatives but unsure where to engage; and attendees seeking a conference companion even before one existed. Dosu helps surface these patterns, enabling proactive addressing of gaps.

For both open source foundations and enterprise organizations, this clarity lays the groundwork for a strong Developer Experience (DevEx). It provides leaders with insight into where documentation is inadequate. This data acts as a roadmap, highlighting if teams are struggling with security compliance, specific tool adoption, or the initial onboarding process. Additionally, teams can address the documentation shortcomings that account for the majority of time spent on research.

Dosu via ask.cncf.io gave us real-time insights into what our community was interested in and also provided just-in-time answers to many questions. That's cool, but the long-term benefits are seeing what gaps in our documentation exist and getting a head start on improving them.

— Jeff Sica, CNCF Head of Projects

Looking Forward#

Dosu helped reveal strong interest in CNCF programs and participation pathways, project discovery and comparison, technical troubleshooting across experience levels, conference navigation, security and compliance guidance, and contribution pathways.

Dosu worked as both an ecosystem navigator helping community members find their way through CNCF's 200+ project portfolio, and a conference companion helping KubeCon attendees navigate schedules, sessions, and logistics in real time.

For open source foundations and large ecosystems facing similar challenges, ask.cncf.io demonstrates a new pattern for how AI can help communities navigate complexity at scale.

How Can Dosu Help?#

Ask.cncf.io is just one example of how Dosu empowers communities to thrive. If you manage a foundation, oversee a complex project ecosystem, or lead an open source organization drowning in more information than any single README can provide, we'd love to connect.

Dosu demonstrates value by expertly navigating CNCF's sprawling landscape of 200+ projects, each with its own fragmented documentation and diverse stakeholders. By turning scattered internal knowledge into a unified, answer-driven resource, Dosu ensures everyone from newcomers to seasoned experts can access the information they need and move forward with confidence.

For open source efforts, Dosu lightens the load on maintainers by streamlining GitHub issue management, keeping documentation up to date, and guiding contributors, all while helping prevent burnout.

Want to see Dosu in action? Book a demo or visit our Discord community to start the conversation.