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Google's Summer of Code Over

yootje writes "The Summer of Code ('Google's program designed to introduce students to the world of open source software development.') is now over. The result: 410 participants helping 38 projects suchs as Apache, KDE and FreeBSD. 'Among the project awards are both complex and simple innovations spanning the width and breadth of everything that the open source world has to offer. There are projects dealing with security, networking, VoIP, Java, mono, IP-PBX, online picture galleries, instant messaging and content management. There is even a game that Google's summer internship helped to pay for.'" Update: 09/11 17:15 GMT by Z : Added the story link at submittor's request.

171 comments

  1. awesome! by xintegerx · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is awesome! There is nothing like the highest worth technology company paying students to work their ass off in the summer to make and improve products and open source software in the name of Google.

    1. Re:awesome! by PunkOfLinux · · Score: 1

      hooray... Well, it's a good idea... maybe they should have kept it GOING... for... a long time...

    2. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      This is nothing more than a shot across Microsoft's bow. They are warning them that they are ready to make a big play in open source and also have managed to basically, buy the hearts and minds of nearly every single FOSS developer for merely $2million - an absolute bargain.

      Google still isn't that open source friendly. Sure, they use Linux for servers but that's simply because there is little competition in the market for 100,000 PC 'clusters' with zero license fees.

      Where is Google Desktop Search for Linux? Where is an official Google Talk client for Linux (yes, I know about Jabber, but it doesn't integrate with your gmail contact list)? Where is the Gmail notifier for Linux?

      Until that changes, I don't really think that you can consider Google anything more than an open source user, not a contributor.

      Finally, Google knows that open source is a huge catalyst. For the $5,000/student they paid it would of probably cost Microsoft $50,000+ to do the same work. That basically means that for every million dollars Google puts in, they cost Microsoft $10million. It's a bit like the CIA funding the mujahadeen to fight the soviets, it probably cost them $1 to inflict $10,000 worth of damage onto the soviet economy (eg a $10,000 stinger missile launcher taking down a $10,000,000 helicopter).

    3. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Google giving $4500 to each student is pretty darn good. When I was in school, it would have paid an awful lot of bills. Also, the projects are all sorts of open source projects...Asterisk, apache, whatever. What are you complaining about?

    4. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "What are you complaining about?"

      Parent wasn't complaining about anything. You hit the wrong reply link bud.

    5. Re:awesome! by emurphy42 · · Score: 1

      Googling (of course) the last one turns up 3-4 third-party notifiers in the first set of results.

      I'm not personally concerned with gmail contact list integration, but if I was, I'd want to see it in gaim.

    6. Re:awesome! by davidesh · · Score: 1, Informative

      sorry but MS still is the highest worth tech company @ 284.42 Billion Market Cap...
      google = 84.56 Billion

    7. Re:awesome! by cide1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Not to be picky, but $4500 for a summer of work isn't pretty darn good. Most companies factor a summer as 12 weeks * 40 hrs/week = 480 hours. This is $9.37 / hour pretax. If the students were going to do the projects anyways, out of the goodness of their hearts, than this was a nice gesture, but it is not the same as an internship where the pay is normally twice that of google, and an internship which will have mentoring and allow a student to learn a companies culture.

      --
      -- the computer doesn't want any beer, no matter how much you think it does. NEVER, EVER feed your computer beer.
    8. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not to be picky, but $4500 for a summer of work isn't pretty darn good.

      bitch bitch bitch bitch

    9. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Dunno about the Linux version, but on Windows the Gmail Notifier is integrated into Google Talk - the old version is uninstalled (optional though, but it would be useless to have them both on at the same time for the same account).

    10. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 5, Interesting
      "Google still isn't that open source friendly. Sure, they use Linux for servers but that's simply because there is little competition in the market for 100,000 PC 'clusters' with zero license fees."

      No. The reason Google uses Linux is simply because they always have. Even since before they called it "Google" it's run off of Linux servers because they couldn't afford anything else.

      "Where is Google Desktop Search for Linux? Where is an official Google Talk client for Linux (yes, I know about Jabber, but it doesn't integrate with your gmail contact list)? Where is the Gmail notifier for Linux?"

      The reason we don't have any of these is because they're in touch with the OS community. Where's Google Desktop Search for Linux? I don't care, and from what I've seen and heard in the Linux community, no one else using Linux does either. We keep track of our files, and if we really need it, we've got Beagle and KFind. Same for these other programs. EVERY distro already comes with either Kopete or GAIM, both of which can handle AIM/ICQ, Jabber, MSN, and other chat protocols. And as for the GMail notifier. . . all it is, is an aggregator that retrieves an RSS feed from Google. If you really want your "GMail Notifier" you can set up Firefox, Konqueror, or Kontact - or any other program that can handle RSS feeds - for the same function. Since you'll likely be using these programs anyway, why would you want another program?

      "Until that changes, I don't really think that you can consider Google anything more than an open source user, not a contributor."

      You can't be serious. Even with the 400+ programmers they just brought into the open-source community, many of whom may have otherwise never even TOUCHED open-source software?

      Google does plenty for the Linux community. It may not seem like much to you, but it really is - they open-source LOTS of code, and they're even using Qt (the basis for KDE) for Google Earth (even on the Windows verson! And I hear they're going to make Linux and Mac versions!) Not only are they spreading code, but they're spreading word about the beauties of open-source. That's a lot more than MS ever did - and back in the mid-90's, Hotmail ran completely off of open-source software (yes, they bought it off someone else, but still, it ran open-source software for a while when it was in MS's possession).

      If you're trying to point out the fact that Google is using open-source to their advantage, so what? We'd be writing code with or without Google. I'm glad they support us, it's more than most people do. Plus, whether they profit or not from open-source, they ARE giving back to the OS community by open-sourcing their own code and, with "Summer of Code", bringing new people into the open-source programming community. And they're helping Mozilla out, too, by making GMail fully compatible with Firefox and Mozilla (instead of making it work only on IE, like many sites do) and hosting Firefox's start-up page.

      Like I said, these may all seem like small things to you, but that's what the open-source community is like. Everyone contributes in their own way - whether it's contributing code, spreading the word about open-source, or contributing ideas - and, while each individual contribution may not be much, all of these contributions together work make a HUGE difference.

    11. Re:awesome! by Vann_v2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      He's right. There were two big problems for me with Google's summer of code. The first was that they announced it well after most major summer internship deadlines. Even if I had wanted to do it I was already committed to doing an REU. The second was the pay. $4500 for the entire summer? Give me a break. Most REUs pay better than that per-hour and include room and board.

      Personally, I did an REU for the first 8 weeks of summer, which paid two thirds the amount Google was paying. The remainder of the summer I work full time and by the end I'll have made significantly more than Google's $4500, plus I'll have learned a lot of research-level mathematics. Most of the Summer of Code projects seemed to be plain BORING. Never mind that $4500 for someone in rural Iowa will go a lot farther than $4500 for someone living in San Francisco -- cost of living doesn't figure into Summer of Code anywhere, while it does for typical summer research or internship opportunities.

      I'm glad Google did this because it will help out a lot of projects, but the only way Summer of Code is compelling to a college student is if they've already exhausted other avenues.

    12. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1
      "Not to be picky, but $4500 for a summer of work isn't pretty darn good. Most companies factor a summer as 12 weeks * 40 hrs/week = 480 hours. This is $9.37 / hour pretax. If the students were going to do the projects anyways, out of the goodness of their hearts, than this was a nice gesture, but it is not the same as an internship where the pay is normally twice that of google, and an internship which will have mentoring and allow a student to learn a companies culture."

      Since when do companies pay $18+? No, I highly doubt that many companies pay THAT much. If you ask me, $9.37/hr is REAL good (it's $9.37/hr more than I made :) ). And, if they wanna become programmers, it gave them good experience and pretty good pay.

      Google's "Summer of Code" wasn't really meant to "hire" these programmers, it was just meant to teach them about programming and the open-source community, and that programming open-source software can have real benefits (Torvalds may not be as rich as Bill Gates, but from what I hear, he isn't doing too bad, either - especially for not actually making any money from individual users).

    13. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting
      they're even using Qt (the basis for KDE) for Google Earth (even on the Windows verson! And I hear they're going to make Linux and Mac versions!)

      Yes, that makes them a user of open source, as the grandparent was saying. If they contributed changes back to TrollTech, they would be contributing.

      back in the mid-90's, Hotmail ran completely off of open-source software (yes, they bought it off someone else, but still, it ran open-source software for a while when it was in MS's possession).

      Which was a continuous embarrassment to them. They tried several times to switch to Windows before they finally got it right. They would have switched immediately if they were capable of doing so.

      Like I said, these may all seem like small things to you, but that's what the open-source community is like. Everyone contributes in their own way - whether it's contributing code, spreading the word about open-source, or contributing ideas - and, while each individual contribution may not be much, all of these contributions together work make a HUGE difference.

      We have higher standards for google because they're huge. What you're saying - many small contributions - works out well when you're talking about lone developers. A giant organization like google gets a lot of good out of open source. It's expected that they'll contribute a lot back. If they contributed nearly nothing, they would actually be hindering open source because other companies would follow their example.

      Look, I agree with your conclusion - that google does a lot of great stuff for the open source community - but your arguments still suck.

    14. Re:awesome! by MourningBlade · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Depends on where you live. Here in Oklahoma, $9.37/hr is pretty damn nice for a summer student internship.

      NYC it's not so hot.

      Also, given the nature of the project, it was possible to hold down a part-time job while working on it. So you're not comparing apples to apples.

      That "12 weeks * 40 hrs/week = 480 hours" would be with an office space they'd expect you to be in for those 40 hours.

    15. Re:awesome! by PierceLabs · · Score: 1


      Finally, Google knows that open source is a huge catalyst. For the $5,000/student they paid it would of probably cost Microsoft $50,000+ to do the same work. That basically means that for every million dollars Google puts in, they cost Microsoft $10million. It's a bit like the CIA funding the mujahadeen to fight the soviets, it probably cost them $1 to inflict $10,000 worth of damage onto the soviet economy (eg a $10,000 stinger missile launcher taking down a $10,000,000 helicopter).


      Not really. While certainly there are some cost savings involved, the work generated from the average college intern (which is really what they are) is not in the same ballpark as a fulltime employee working an entire year being paid $50k. If it were, much of the computing field would quickly find itself out of work :)

    16. Re:awesome! by nintendo_is_a_cereal · · Score: 1

      $9.37 an hour? I made $10 an hour working tech support for my university this summer. It definetly wasn't as enriching of an experience though.

    17. Re:awesome! by TheRaven64 · · Score: 2, Interesting
      You are missing one important thing:

      SoC students got to work on what they wanted.

      I was lucky in my summer placement in that they grossly underestimated my abilities and so I was able to finish the work they had set for me in the first week, and I then got to spend the next 9 weeks playing with any bit of the project I wanted. Other people I've talked to were less lucky, and ended up doing little more than data entry and uninspiring grunt-work coding.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    18. Re:awesome! by kuldkollane · · Score: 1

      Well, but for people who live in countries, where about $4/h is something like the average, this IS pretty darn good.

      --
      I was possibly drunk when writing that.
    19. Re:awesome! by L7_ · · Score: 1

      but in 3 years when those college students are full time employees at a large corporation, odds are they will still be working on and contributing back to those Open Source projects and others.

      I know a *huge* hurdle in getting developers started contributing is actually finding a (non-dead) project they could contribute to successfully with a minimal learning curve. Since this summer of work thing was basically payning the students for thier learning curve, they should be making contributions for a long while.

    20. Re:awesome! by laurensv · · Score: 2, Insightful

      OT, but still;
      " It's a bit like the CIA funding the mujahadeen to fight the soviets, it probably cost them $1 to inflict $10,000 worth of damage onto the soviet economy."
      That strategy did backfire upon the USA and did much more harm in the end.

    21. Re:awesome! by Jugalator · · Score: 1

      Since you'll likely be using these programs anyway, why would you want another program?

      I'm sure the parent knew there was alternatives, what he was saying is that Google focus on Windows apps. What alternatives you have is totally besides the point here. Just because Microsoft Office doesn't exist for Linux, doesn't excuse Microsoft just because OpenOffice exist as an alternative.

      --
      Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
    22. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 2, Insightful
      No, what alternatives you have ISN'T beside the point. MS is completely exempt from making MS Office for Linux because no one would want it - people switch to Linux to get away from MS products (this is why they stopped making IE for Unix/Linux - it sucks, and no Linux user would want to use it). Likewise, Google is exempt from making Linux versions of some of their products because Linux already has more powerful programs that do the same thing - and then some - and are already in your distro and that you probably use every day anyways.

      It's fine by me that Google didn't make Desktop Search and Gmail Notifier for Linux because I don't want them, as I already have programs that serve the same purpose. Likewise, it's fine by me that MS doesn't make MS Office for Linux because I would never buy it anyway.

      It's not that Google is focusing solely on Windows apps, it's that they're prioritizing and they realize that they shouldn't waste time making Linux programs that Linux users wouldn't use, and that, while they should try to please the Linux and Mac users, they have more to benefit from pleasing the Windows users. Obviously they do plan on porting some of their software to Mac and Linux, though - why else would they use the Qt toolkit for Google Earth? Qt is used mostly for Linux programs.

    23. Re:awesome! by ClosedSource · · Score: 0, Troll

      "but in 3 years when those college students are full time employees at a large corporation, odds are they will still be working on and contributing back to those Open Source projects and others."

      You've made a lot of assumptions:
      1. they will graduate
      2. they will find a job
      3. they will want to do programming for nothing after spending 40 hrs/week doing it for pay.

      If they buy into the "proprietary software is evil" argument, they should probably just drop out of school, get a job that leaves them a lot of free time and just program free/OSS out of love.

    24. Re:awesome! by Billly+Gates · · Score: 4, Interesting

      For a college student 9.37/hr is a ton of money.

      Even for underemployed former IT workers doing call center jobs for 10/hr (like where I work) is considered alot of money.

      This isn't 1999 anymore folks. IT is viewed as a cost center and perhaps maintance rather than long term investments if your lucky.

      Still it looks good on your resume and if I had more software programing experience I would be jumping over doing google's summer coding. $4500 is still money and my resume will look very very good and its a free advertisement to employers.

    25. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      The second was the pay. $4500 for the entire summer? Give me a break. Most REUs pay better than that per-hour and include room and board.


      Holy shit! $4500/hr Sign me up!! =D
    26. Re:awesome! by Breakfast+Pants · · Score: 1

      IE for Linux? It never existed. It did exist on Unix and they did stop making it.. but it was never made available on Linux.

      --

      --

      WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
    27. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1

      That's why I said "Unix/Linux". They didn't make it specifically for Linux, but most Unix programs can be compiled to run Linux (or any other Unix-type OS).

    28. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You state 4500 is low for an internship. You have obviously not applied for an internship in the reasonable past.

      Internship salaries have plummeted- I, being an Alumni of Wentworth Institute of Technology, know for a fact that several (over 20) of my contacts at the school would dive at a 5,000 dollar flexible internship for 3 months.

      To work for Google, most of them would do it for half. It's simply a great reference, and an absolutely phenominal thing to have on your resume when you get to the "real" market.

      Can you imagine the interview?

      "What did you do for your Co-Op?"

      "Oh, I worked under Google and X, rewriting file system structure and optomizing it for efficency and speed. You can download the results from X."

      "....Let me get the coders. By the way, how does 75k sound?"

    29. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no linux version fool. I've heard of people not reading the article, and even people not reading the blurb, but what the hell are you doing replying if you can't even be bothered reading the comments?

      There really is no Linux version of GoogleTalk, even though it's been said above a hundred times, there is no Linux version of GoogleTalk.

    30. Re:awesome! by be-fan · · Score: 2, Informative

      I think the flexibility that came with the SoC counts for a lot. Numerically, the SoC was a fairly significant pay-cut for me. I would have made almost 3x as much if I had taken my regular summer job (60 hour work-weeks add up quite quickly...). On the other hand, with the SoC, I had a lot of flexibility in my schedule, and more importantly, I was able to choose my own project. That in and of itself is worth the difference, at least for one summer. Let's face it --- it's very hard to get paid working on Lisp :) While I do like my regular job, as well as my major, I doubt I'm the only one who has tangential interests that they would love to persue, but often cannot due to lack of time or money. The SoC, while it might not pay like my regular job, made persuing such projects much more palatable.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    31. Re:awesome! by rbaf · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Open source != developing apps for Linux.

      • I want to see their current windows apps to be open source.

      • I want to see GFS to be open source.

      • If they're really developing a browser or whatever OSish thing, I want it to be 100% open source :-)

      This is not to say what they've done is without merit, of course it is a good thing, but if we're going to talk about Google offering open source products, they could be doing it already, and instead, they're quite secretive with almost everything they do (which again, is fine with me, but it contradicts what some of you guys are saying here)...

      Oh and before someone jumps in, offering APIs is not the same as open source. MS has been publishing APIs for years, the reason many people can and do write stuff for Windows.

      Do they really open source LOTS of code? Where?

    32. Re:awesome! by drsquare · · Score: 1

      $9.37 is pretty good. Most students will end up stacking shelves or working behind bars for $5 an hour. That's almost double pay.

    33. Re:awesome! by Varun+Soundararajan · · Score: 1

      Google:
      Dont always be evil

    34. Re:awesome! by kesuki · · Score: 1

      There are projects dealing with security, networking, VoIP, Java, mono
      There is nothing like the highest worth technology company paying students to work their ass off in the summer to make and improve products and open source software in the name of Google.

      Not to mention health education teaching our young programmers about mono ;) i for one am one of those 5%ers who have never gotten mono (and likely never will)

    35. Re:awesome! by chesapeake · · Score: 1

      You American guys get seriously screwed over then. The standard here in Australia (at my university anyway) is about $25AUD/hr for an IT summer internship - that's over $19USD.

      For those of you saying, pah, that's a University, those pinko scum believe in keeping their employees above the poverty line, I should point out that I get paid more than that as a student doing my part time work (Sysadmin/programmer/dog's body).

      I am led to believe, however, that the amount that you're paid if you're an engineering intern can vary wildly - lots in mining, down to very little for some chem eng jobs.

    36. Re:awesome! by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1
      MS is completely exempt from making MS Office for Linux because no one would want it - people switch to Linux to get away from MS products
      The fact that people do buy CrossOver Office licenses, or even use WINE, suggests otherwise.
    37. Re:awesome! by Bob+Uhl · · Score: 1

      Which Lisp project did you do? I ask 'cause I'm a fellow Lisp fan and am currently playing with implementing GURPS Traveller:First In system generation to the game.

    38. Re:awesome! by Bob+Uhl · · Score: 1

      BIG-COMPANY paid me $19.84/hour back in '98 as a college intern. I did deskside, Unix sysadmin and miscellaneous perl scripts & projects. I'd be very surprised if $9.37/hour were the state of things seven years later, even with the tech downturn.

    39. Re:awesome! by arkanes · · Score: 1

      It's not *lots*, but there is some cool stuff involved. http://code.google.com/

    40. Re:awesome! by lababidi · · Score: 1

      CheckGMail for X11 (GNU/Linux) http://rss.freshmeat.net/freshmeat/feeds/fm-releas es-global?m=2037 Just an RSS aggregator as another /.er stated.

    41. Re:awesome! by rthille · · Score: 1

      Well, the companies who were selling the weapons to the mujahadeen thru the CIA are doing gangbusters now. So, it might have backfired on the USA as a whole, I think it worked out for some people just fine...

      --
      Awesome furniture, accessories and cabinetry in Santa Rosa, CA: http://humanity-home.com/
    42. Re:awesome! by Stephen+Gilbert · · Score: 1

      Chin up, guy! You'll get that kiss someday!

    43. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1
      Well by "lots" I mean quite a bit compared to what most open-source-using companies do (other than the ones who make open-source products, like Red Hat and Mandriva do). It's not really a whole ton of actual software, but they have plenty of open-source code - including APIs for ALL their services - available at http://code.google.com/.

      Yes, MS has been publishing APIs for years, but you're only allowed to USE it, not redistribute it. I can write a Windows app that uses the Windows API, but I can't give it to a Mac or Linux user because it's MS's intellectual property. If I write a Windows program that technically should be able to run on Windows 98 but can't because it uses a certain feature of WinXP's API, I can't just have Windows 98 users download the updated version of the Windows API. And like I said, Google has more than just APIs, too - check out the site, there's about 10 different open-source projects there, too.

    44. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1
      Okay, so some business users DO use these products. But the majority of desktop Linux users are actually trying to not have MS software on their machine and use OpenOffice.Org (or Star Office, if they want the paid, "more advanced" version) or another open-source alternative - and the majority of business users are probably using Linux as a server, in which case I don't see why they'd want to open Word docs on it.

      And WINE can be used for just about any Windows program - it's not specifically for Office.

    45. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1
      Getting paid that much as a sys admin, I can believe. Getting paid that much as a programmer, though. . . I'm not so sure about that. Sys admins have to maintain a big network of computers - which consists of everyone in the company's computers. Someone installs a virus, you've gotta fix it. Someone's computer keeps locking up, you've gotta fix it.

      Programmers just write and fix programs. They don't have to go around fixing other people's stuff (except for maybe other programmers' code).

    46. Re:awesome! by Bob+Uhl · · Score: 1

      Hmmm...I was always of the impression that we sysadmins are outranked by programmers, janitorial staff and strangers who wander in from off the street. But ICBW.

    47. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1

      Probably depends where you work, too - a programmer at MS probably ranks higher than sys admins, whereas other places programmers would be important but not as important as sys admins. Guess it depends on what your company is best known for.

    48. Re:awesome! by Vann_v2 · · Score: 1

      Well, any smart student will apply for summer research or internship opportunities in a subject they enjoy. I also got to research what I wanted during the summer, plus I had direction from people who were at the top of the fields in which I was interested.

      To me that sounds a lot more compelling than, say, being mentored by a Gaim developer writing code to implement ICQ file transfer.

    49. Re:awesome! by MourningBlade · · Score: 1

      You American guys get seriously screwed over then.

      Oklahoma is not exactly a tech center for anything but cow-tech. Most are so grateful for an actual internship, they'll sacrifice quite a bit of pay to get it.

      On the other hand, some of the positions pay well.

      Retention of CS majors in Oklahoma is very, very low. Can't say I blame them.

    50. Re:awesome! by chrisd · · Score: 1
      Yeah! What he said! :-)

      --
      Co-Editor, Open Sources
      Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
    51. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1

      What who said?

    52. Re:awesome! by be-fan · · Score: 1

      I did Verrazano (AKA Fetter). Lisp bindings generator for C++. You can track it at http://www.common-lisp.net/project/fetter.
      It's still pretty rough, but Kenny Tilton just did some OpenAL bindings with them, so they're getting there :)

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    53. Re:awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Programming internships generally earn $25/hour and up. At least around here. Also, you get the experience of working on a real product that has to go through a real release cycle.

    54. Re:awesome! by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1
      "Yes, that makes them a user of open source, as the grandparent was saying. If they contributed changes back to TrollTech, they would be contributing."

      But they're not making any changes to Qt.

      "Which was a continuous embarrassment to them. They tried several times to switch to Windows before they finally got it right. They would have switched immediately if they were capable of doing so."

      My point exactly. Google warmly embraces open-source, while MS's product deeply depended on it - and they made absolutely no mention of it and, instead, bashed the Linux/OS community, calling it a "cancer".

      "We have higher standards for google because they're huge. What you're saying - many small contributions - works out well when you're talking about lone developers. A giant organization like google gets a lot of good out of open source. It's expected that they'll contribute a lot back. If they contributed nearly nothing, they would actually be hindering open source because other companies would follow their example."

      You shouldn't expect Google to contribute a lot back. They're a search engine company, not a programming company. AFAIK Google isn't *required* to open-source ANY of their code (even if it does use the Qt toolkit).

      I think you're expecting that Google will bow down to Tux or something. They've gotta make money - they're not going to switch from being a search company to a company that makes open-source software. And they're doing what they can by open-sourcing the few programs that they actually make.

      Plus, what about MS? As I mentioned before, they used open-source software for Hotmail. What are they giving back to the community?

      What about companies like RedHat and SuSE who owe their entire existence to Linux? I don't know of any open-source programs released by either of these companies. Plus, even they generally don't create programs of their own - programs made specifically for Fedora may be released by RedHat, but they're still made by the open-source community. Is this to say that their existence is detrimental to the open-source community? I don't think so - they're still supporting Linux and spreading the good word about it.

  2. Summer's over? by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 4, Funny

    You mean the Summer of Code doesn't last forever?! It went by so fast...

    1. Re:Summer's over? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny
      You mean the Summer of Code doesn't last forever?! It went by so fast...
      Is "Summer of Code" supposed to be like the "Summer of Love" back in the 60's? For most geeks that would last less than 30 seconds.
    2. Re:Summer's over? by Gothic_Walrus · · Score: 5, Funny
      I got my first compiler
      Got it from the Google guys
      Tried to give Gaim file transfers
      It was the summer of two-oh-five

      Me and some guys from school
      Worked all night we tried real hard
      Jimmy quit and we never finished coding
      I shoulda known we'd never get far

      Oh when I look back now
      That summer seemed to last forever
      And if I had the choice
      Ya - I'd always wanna be there
      Those were the best days of my life...

      --
      Goo goo g'joob.
    3. Re:Summer's over? by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 0, Redundant

      The song "Summer of '69" by Bryan Adams?

    4. Re:Summer's over? by blamanj · · Score: 4, Interesting

      To be followed by the "Bleak Winter of QA".

      I jest, but in some respects, it seems like a couple months of student hacking could do harm as well as good. It's not exactly condusive to good development practices.

    5. Re:Summer's over? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is the funniest Slashdot comment in ages :-)

    6. Re:Summer's over? by muka3D · · Score: 0

      This is definately one of the best posts I've ever seen! Good job Gothic_Walrus.

    7. Re:Summer's over? by hritcu · · Score: 2, Informative

      Summer of Code: Mentoring Organization Faq:
      Q: Does the code have to become part of a mentoring organizations mainstream codebase?
      A: No, While we hope the code will be useful to the mentoring organization, we will not require that the code be used.

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    8. Re:Summer's over? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You mean, definitely.

    9. Re:Summer's over? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That is an AWESOME Filk!

  3. Dang. by Mikhailov · · Score: 4, Funny

    I wish I could have went, maybe they'll hold it this summer before I take the Visual Basic and A+ certification classes.

    1. Re:Dang. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      You have to be a student of an accredited school to do this.

    2. Re:Dang. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, I don't think any FOSS development is done in VB, and what is A+ going to do for you anyways?

    3. Re:Dang. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      *Please* tell me the parent was intended as mod: funny.

    4. Re:Dang. by laffer1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      No see they didn't take most of the applicants.. you would not have done any work. The rejection was even delayed by 9 hours!

      Visual Basic .NET might have worked if they had mono in there but of course mono barely supports VB. Novell doesn't get that many people know VB.

      My project idea was for the FreeBSD project. My wife was also rejected with her ideas for the KDE Kate text editor.

      What i'd like to know is how many people actually got paid. The projects got money up front but the individuals had to code all summer and if they completed their projects in a satisfactory member to the parent group THEN they got money.

    5. Re:Dang. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you need a class for A+? and you're posting on slashdot? pfft.

    6. Re:Dang. by dolphinling · · Score: 1

      you need a class for A+? and you're posting on slashdot? pfft.

      I know, what's he talking about? I give myself A+s all the time, and put gold stars next to them!

      --
      There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
  4. Where is the story? by hritcu · · Score: 4, Insightful

    When I saw the subject I was really expecting to see some analysis, some statistics, at least a list of projects. Well ... where are all these things? The only reference in the article is to the official Summer of Code page, and that has been unchanged for weeks. So I have ask: where is the story?

    --
    If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    1. Re:Where is the story? by jgaynor · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Amen. I've had a problem with this since they announced it - such a great idea but no content on their site re: the actual work. They should have paid someone $4500 to maintain their summer of code page!

    2. Re:Where is the story? by yootje · · Score: 5, Informative

      LOL, I forgot to put my source in it: http://www.internetnews.com/dev-news/article.php/3 547611 Slashdot editors, please put it in the story?

    3. Re:Where is the story? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe they'll send out the interview offers first before publicizing the projects :)

      You're right, where's the beef is a legit question. Is this just a fancy name for "Google college recruitment drive"?

    4. Re:Where is the story? by hritcu · · Score: 0

      Come on. My rant had nothing to do with Google. They did a very good job already, and they will release the results, when they are ready to do so. The actual coding phase has finished two weeks ago, so this is old stuff. I think that the eveluation process (by the mentors) is also ready, or almost ready, so we can expect a Google anouncement sometime soon. Now, there is simply, very little to see.

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    5. Re:Where is the story? by smittyoneeach · · Score: 0

      Even more interesting will be what happens in subsequent years. If it's not just a veiled early-ante-prior-pre-interview, its effects could snowball and lead to much weeping and gnashing of teeth in Redmond.

      --
      Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
    6. Re:Where is the story? by hritcu · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The article is interesting, and I really have to agree with the ending phrase:

      "Quite frankly, I don't know how Google will use the projects' results," Macieira said. "I hope they use it to promote free/open software and show that there is a healthy relation between the corporate world and the free software developers."

      I know that there will be enough of you trying to find a hidden (evil) reason for Google's action, but it is simply not the case. Google has very many benefits from open source, and now that they have the power to help back, they are actually doing it. Thank you Google.

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    7. Re:Where is the story? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      s/simply/hopefully/

    8. Re:Where is the story? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Good God! He did! I'm shocked.

    9. Re:Where is the story? by JPriest · · Score: 3, Insightful

      My opinion is that Google is doing this to promote (improve) FOSS and Linux. It gives them a good opportunity to scout talent and also improve the only other real alternative to Microsoft products. If Ballmer ever does try to kill Google they could fight back by expanding this program.

      --
      Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
    10. Re:Where is the story? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Well, this isn't entirely altruistic, but then I'm distrustful of altruism. Google benefit because for a small investment they body of Free Software is improved. They can then skim these and use them as foundations for more of their own products. They also win because they gain good PR in the Free Software community. The projects benefit, because they receive funding and code. The students benefit, because they receive funding and mentoring. The world benefits because there is more Free Software available for them to use.

      Make no mistake though, Google are doing this because it benefits them. The fact that they choose to do things that benefit them and other people, rather than benefiting themselves at others expense, is why (for the moment) we like Google.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    11. Re:Where is the story? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I know that there will be enough of you trying to find a hidden (evil) reason for Google's action, but it is simply not the case. Google has very many benefits from open source, and now that they have the power to help back, they are actually doing it.

      Yeah, because you, random Slashdot user nr 871613, would know that, wouldn't you? Hey everyone, some student named Donald say Google did this just too be nice, so everyone relax.

      Sheesh. You don't know any better than the rest of us, so please don't pretend to.

    12. Re:Where is the story? by hritcu · · Score: 1

      Google benefit because for a small investment they body of Free Software is improved. They can then skim these and use them as foundations for more of their own products.

      2.000.000$ is not that small. And the improvements for free software as a whole will not be drastic, maybe not even visible. It's only 400+ students working for 2 months each. That is 66 programer-years scatered around 38 unrelated open source projects. That is an average 1.74 programmer-years per organization, which is not that much if you consider that some of these projects already have hundreds even thousends of programmer-years.

      Then there is the fact that Google does not use the most of the projects and even if they do internally use a project, the features the students implemented might be irrelevant to them.

      Finally, I am very skeptic that Google wants to use the code that students developed. Not even the mentoring organizations had to use it, so this is quite obvious. What they could use in their products is good ideas, and maybe they found a couple of these in the 8000 (?) project proposals.

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    13. Re:Where is the story? by krumms · · Score: 1

      I know that there will be enough of you trying to find a hidden (evil) reason for Google's action, but it is simply not the case.

      Wow. It's great that we've got people like you to think critically for the rest of us. God forbid we come to our own conclusion!

    14. Re:Where is the story? by hritcu · · Score: 1

      You have a right to your opinions. I just don't want to hear them.


      Sorry, I have to make this joke ;) What is your opinion then?

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
  5. Google sucks by gabecubbage · · Score: 5, Funny

    They rejected my application to write a search engine driven by sites linking in. It could've been huge!

  6. Lots of great projects by sznupi · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I see some fun and very usefull stuff that came out of it. Too bad my favourite project from GAIM camp didn't turn out much... Crazy Chat is a lovely idea IMHO...enhancing communication via IM to include emotional messages presented usually by webcam, but without the bandwith (and difficulties of transmitting video) overhead. (Matrox tried somthing similar with their Headcasting, but it was useless IMO - it merely guessed how the animated face on the other end should look like based on voice, but this didn't add any additional information to communication, like Crazy Chat would, by "scanning", transmitting and displaying on animated, cartoony head, real emotional responces) I wonder if someone else would pick up the idea...

    --
    One that hath name thou can not otter
  7. One Google Clapping by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 2, Insightful

    How "open" is the "Summer of Code" when there are no links to the projects? I've been looking for these projects, from which Google is getting the best PR since their IPO, since they started. Where are they? If source is released in a forest, and there's no one to read it, is it really open?

    --

    --
    make install -not war

    1. Re:One Google Clapping by hritcu · · Score: 1

      Every one of the mentoring organizations has one or more pages dedicated to the event. You can surelly find the different projects there. As of this time Google made no official announcement regarding the results of the event, and I am sure that when they will, there will be enough information about each project they sponsored. You just have to be patient :)

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    2. Re:One Google Clapping by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The "event" has lasted all Summer. Why not publish at least status of the projects? And I looked at the "mentoring organizations" page, which links only to the orgs' homepages, and their page of "ideas" projects which might have been candidates for the SoC. No readily available sign publications of the projects, which are now announced to be "concluded", which means the chance for the public to participate is over. Which would have been the point of an open project. Is Google trying to steal Netscape's irony crown of "unable to publish on the Web"?

      Why are you so sure the projects can be found, that Google will make the announcement? I'm pretty patient, especially since Google's SoC hasn't cost me anything, and any results are a bonus. But when a big corporation announces a feel-good project like SoC, and gets so much benefit from attracting developers and generating goodwill, it's hard to feel anything but left out when the Summer comes and goes, and all we have to show for it is the feel-good announcements.

      --

      --
      make install -not war

    3. Re:One Google Clapping by jmmv · · Score: 1
      Google and all the mentors from their respective organizations are currently evaluating each project to decide which ones have reached the initial expectations. After this is done (which can last until the end of September), Google will publish a complete list of all successful projects (or at least this is what I've heard).

      Anyway, from NetBSD's side, check out the NetBSD-SoC page where you can find information and code about all accepted projects.

      --
      The NetBSD Project
    4. Re:One Google Clapping by Nurgled · · Score: 1

      I found it very hard to track what was going on, since despite it allegedly being about open development most of the work went on behind closed doors and then suddenly hit projects' CVS repositories a couple of weeks ago. In most cases I couldn't even find out what the projects were until they were checked in.

      I'm sure some cool stuff has come out of this, but I wish it had been run better. The stated purpose of all this was to get the young 'uns into open source. For me, a major part of open source development is working with others, and yet I've seen little of that here. Instead, the students were essentially doing "work for hire" and releasing the results at the end. There's nothing there to keep the students interested now it's over; they didn't become part of the community and enjoy the social aspects of open source development, and so I would expect that many of them won't be seen again for some time.

    5. Re:One Google Clapping by VE3MTM · · Score: 1

      Actually, I think the "closed doors" are more that the individual SOC coders had more to worry about than keeping a web site up to date.

      Yes, more status updates would be nice, but really, give it time, folks.

      --
      09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 Whoops, silly middle mouse button...
    6. Re:One Google Clapping by hritcu · · Score: 3, Informative

      The "event" has lasted all Summer. Why not publish at least status of the projects?
      Because Google didn't know the status of the projects, at least not for the 400 projects not mentored by Google. That was the whole idea of having mentoring organizations: Google didn't have the resources to look after each of the 400+ students. However some students, and some mentoring organizations have made the status available to anybody (for example by spliting everything into tiny tasks and tracking them using JIRA) but nobody was forced to do so. Two months is very little time to finish a project, and most of the chosen projects were very ambitious. So my guess is that rather then providing status on the progress for the rest of the world, the students and mentors focused on developing software.

      Why are you so sure the projects can be found, that Google will make the announcement?
      I'm just guessing. It just makes sense that when you invest so much money into sponsoring projects you will want the world to know that you did so, and that many of them were successful. Google could gain some more press coverage because of this. But I think that this was not the goal of the whole thing, and they might even skip it. I'm very currious about what they could tell, so I really hope they won't.

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    7. Re:One Google Clapping by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 1

      As required by professional project management, I'll believe it when I see it. Meanwhile, it's clear that the "story" we're discussing is just an alarm going off in a Slashdot story submitter's calendar. Not any actual new development or announcement from Google. It's a premature story submission.

      However, there's no reason Google couldn't publish some status from these projects. That's what "open" means: not closed to outsiders. As OSS becomes mature, we realize there are degrees of openness. And "project transparency" is one of them. Waiting for the project to (maybe) finish before releasing any details, especially status, let alone source code, is a proprietary framework that is at odds with the "open" way of doing things. So I'm not quite as optimistic as you are.

      --

      --
      make install -not war

    8. Re:One Google Clapping by hritcu · · Score: 1

      I found it very hard to track what was going on, since despite it allegedly being about open development most of the work went on behind closed doors and then suddenly hit projects' CVS repositories a couple of weeks ago. In most cases I couldn't even find out what the projects were until they were checked in.

      I really don't think that this the way things happened, although it could be, because the whole thing lasted only two months so the last 2-3 weeks is actually, the last 30% of the time, and it is very usual that newbies commit very late. So, supposing it did happen this way, how could be something like this be improved? Would you force students to make commits every day? Yes it was hard for outsiders, for Google and maybe even for mentors so track everything ... but why should they had? Open source is about freedom not about control.

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
    9. Re:One Google Clapping by Otter · · Score: 1

      It seems to me that open-source has enough wannabe celebrities and unfinished projects already. If people spent their time on adding useful, complete features instead of on self-promotion, that doesn't seem like something to criticize them for.

  8. Ended 10 Days Ago by DrIdiot · · Score: 3, Informative

    The "pencils down" for Google's Summer of Code was September 1st.

  9. I wonder... by fredrickleo · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    ...if they came up with anything that runs on Linux, unlike Google's other software offerings...

    --
    Yay me! ^^
    1. Re:I wonder... by 9mm+Censor · · Score: 1

      "410 participants helping 38 projects suchs as Apache, KDE and FreeBSD."

      I think they may have.

    2. Re:I wonder... by the_aleph · · Score: 1

      Well, since most mentor organizations (as Google calls them) are actually focused on the development of open source software that already runs on Linux, most projects will be available for GNU/Linux systems.

    3. Re:I wonder... by fredrickleo · · Score: 1

      I'm just bitter about Google Earth :)

      --
      Yay me! ^^
  10. ever wonder if google are going to turn evil by rhade · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Maybe im just paranoid, but whats that saying about absolute power... Now Google may not be the ultimate power yet, but they have some fair sway and this abundant generosity could all be farce to lock us in to their future. GoogleOS and such.

    --
    http://www.awfullybigmoustache.com
    1. Re:ever wonder if google are going to turn evil by cz_eye · · Score: 0

      If you are a shareholder their evil will do you good.

    2. Re:ever wonder if google are going to turn evil by JamesInsomniac · · Score: 1
      Gmail is too creepy.

      I think we've all seen this web site about Google's power.... or it's potential for power..

    3. Re:ever wonder if google are going to turn evil by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, it's not as if their founders aren't spending millions of dollars on a private 767 airplane. Oh wait, they are.

      These are the same people who once touted the fact that they each drove a Toyota Prius to be environmentally friendly. Now they have a giant flying metal monster that is one of the most inefficient methods of transportation known to man. I'd consider that to be a little bit evil.

      However, I never believed their mantra to "do no evil" anyway - they're a company who's primary product is advertising. In what way is advertising ever not evil? When it's pushed by Google? Er.. no. Advertising is still evil.

      Anyway, with their unnecessary airplane purchase I guess they weren't meant to be rich - private airplanes aren't transportation favored by those who intend to keep their wealth. I remember Bill Gates saying when he was younger (but probably about where the Google founders are in terms of their company's success) that he (and all Microsoft executives) still flew on regular airplanes in economy class because anything else was going to be a waste of money (although even if they'd actually flown business class I wouldn't have faulted them).

    4. Re:ever wonder if google are going to turn evil by NetRAVEN5000 · · Score: 1
      Not really. How is Google going to force you into anything? So far the only way to get in on Google's projects is by your own choice. Unlike with MS where it's pretty much if you want a PC, you're stuck with MS. For search engines, though. . . which one you use is still your own choice. There's still PLENTY of people who use Ask Jeeves, Yahoo!, and others.

      What if they had GoogleOS? It wouldn't matter unless everybody used it. If they made it like Linux, most Linux users would probably still stick with their own distros.

  11. Journalling for BSD filesystems? by Alwin+Henseler · · Score: 4, Informative
    Checking out FreeBSD's ideas page, my eye was caught by this: "UFS Journaling: Add transaction journaling and playback to the UFS filesystem. The goal is to increase the reliability of the filesystem and greatly reduce the need for a full 'fsck' after a crash or power loss."

    If I'm not mistaken, all major BSD's (Free, Open, and Net) support a feature called 'soft updates'. Basically, re-ordering filesystem updates in such a way, that the filesystem remains in a consistent state, even in the event of a badly-timed crash or powerout. All this to avoid the need for a full fsck on reboot.

    Quote from the FreeBSD features page: "Soft Updates allows improved filesystem performance without sacrificing safety and reliability. It analyzes meta-data filesystem operations to avoid having to perform all of those operations synchronously. Instead, it maintains internal state about pending meta-data operations and uses this information to cache meta-data, rewrite meta-data operations to combine subsequent operations on the same files, and reorder meta-data operations so that they may be processed more efficiently. Features such as background filesystem checking and file system snapshots are built on the consistency and performance foundations of soft updates."

    From the NetBSD site: "Soft Updates permit metadata writes to be ordered to achieve close to asynchronous disk performance without risk of metadata corruption. This significantly improves the performance of FFS file systems."

    You might still do a full fsck later (as regular maintenance), perhaps even as background task, but it wouldn't be needed for a reliable restart.

    Journaling is another way to do this, by adding an extra 'log' of the latest updates to a filesystem. Then in the event of a crash, you don't need to check the entire filesystem, but can bring it back into a consistent state by 'replaying' those latest updates from the journal.

    Now here's what I don't understand: why add journalling to a filesystem, when you're already updating it in a 'crash-proof' manner (soft updates)? What's the point? Seems rather like a step back to me, with soft updates looking like a smarter way to archieve crash-proof filesystem handling.

    I assume that this soft updates feature is limited to certain OS/filesystem combo's. And maybe journaling provides some thing(s) that soft updates doesn't? Can some knowledgable BSD user shed some light on all this?

    -- This sig just wasted another 0.x seconds of your precious time. Supporting banning sigs!
    1. Re:Journalling for BSD filesystems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Journalling and soft updates are useful in different circumtances; in particular, (as I understand it) there are situations in which one or the other will give you better performance. I doubt they are planning to add journalling by default and with no way to turn it off, so it shouldn't matter to anyone who doesn't want journalling anyway.

    2. Re:Journalling for BSD filesystems? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The practical difference between soft updates and journaling is in performance characteristics.

      Soft updates is somewhat faster overall, but causes occasional I/O storms when syncing dependency trees onto disk. It also still requires fsck, although it can now be done in the background when the system is already up and running.

      Journaling is somewhat slower (as it does journal writes frequently), but more consistent in performance.

      Note that soft updates could be done for any filesystem, but it's pretty complicated. Alternately, a filesystem could be designed so that the structure of the filesystem itself makes some of the same assurances as soft updates.

      The purpose of soft updates wasn't as much to eliminate fsck altogether, but to allow filesystems to be safe without being synchronous (previously, BSD FFS performance wasn't usually great because it did certain operations synchronously to avoid corruption - meanwhile, Linux used ext2 asynchronously and unsafely by default).

  12. Here's one Summer of Code project... by Jim+Buzbee · · Score: 2, Informative

    Tsync is a Summer of Code project. Looks cool...

  13. still need fsck by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    If you are using soft updates and not running fsck after a dirty reboot, then you don't understand soft updates.

    Here is what you are missing. Soft updates is a method of ensuring that disk metadata is recoverably consistent without the normal speed penalty imposed by synchronous mounting. At heart it is a fancy specalized cache. The only guarantee that softupdates makes is that your file system can be recovered to a consistent state by running fsck. Soft updates is designed to aid the running of fsck, but does not eliminate the need.

  14. The article forgot NetBSD by hubertf · · Score: 4, Informative
    NetBSD got 7 slots assigned, see the NetBSD-SoC webpage for all the details. One of the projects (tmpfs) is already integrated into NetBSD, even.

    - Hubert

  15. I doubt it by WindBourne · · Score: 0

    Too be really good would require 100 of thousands or millions of computers networked together. If you had the money to do that, then you would not require a simple stipend from Google.

    --
    I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
  16. Any results? by shish · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Projects I've been looking forward to:

    Apache Perchild MPM: Coder selected, can't find any code
    Apache mod-bandwidth-limit: 2 people have shown an interest, can't find any code
    Firefox bittorrent: Alpha 0.0.2
    Several gaim projects: One project has commited *something* to HEAD
    Several gnome projects: Can't find any news
    Several SVN projects: Can't find any news

    So has anything really changed?

    --
    I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
    1. Re:Any results? by DrIdiot · · Score: 2, Informative

      Firefox bittorrent (firepuddle):
      http://firepuddle.mozdev.org/

    2. Re:Any results? by sqrt529 · · Score: 1

      in gaim at least icq filetransfer, sip/simple, yahoo doodle and upnp commited their work it seem to work.

    3. Re:Any results? by Apathetic1 · · Score: 2, Informative

      If you weren't aware, a list of the SVN projects is here:
      http://svn.haxx.se/dev/archive-2005-06/0975.shtml

      You can find more on the status of the projects in the Subversion dev list archives. I believe David Anderson's "Path-based authorization for svnserve" project was completed. I haven't really been watching the rest of the SVN SoC projects.

      --

      My username does not make me Apathetic. It's irony, get it?

  17. Yes and No. by WindBourne · · Score: 1

    Google is not evil, NOW. You have larry, serge, and eric in charge. BUT, if they ever start losing (economy goes down, something better comes along, etc) or eric quits, then stockholders will call for a new CEO. At that point, you could find somebody like elison, gates, McNealy, etc. who would turn it evil.

    Google is a weird problem for me. Back in the 80's, I was busy pushing a small start-up. I was certain that anything was better than IBM who was EVIL. Of course, I was pushing MS. IOW, I helped replace one evil with something as bad or worse.

    --
    I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
    1. Re:Yes and No. by ClosedSource · · Score: 1

      Well, sometimes the term "selling out" has a literal as well as a figurative meaning. If these guys are such angels they made sure they still had a controlling interest after going public and wouldn't release that control even if it meant losing their individual fortunes.

      It's rather easy to talk about "doing no evil" when the money is flowing in. It's only when things go south that you really find out what you're made of.

  18. Python to C++ compiler. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    My favorite so far ...

    http://shed-skin.blogspot.com/

    Uses type inferencing to create pure C++ code and make files that compiled to a tiny stand alone executable with no Python dependencies at all and reportedly runs upto 10 times faster than running on VM.

    Not a magic solution yet but has a lot of potential.

  19. Blenders Summer of Code projects by LetterRip · · Score: 4, Informative

    Here are SOC projects done for Blender,

    http://wiki.blender.org/bin/view.pl/Blenderdev/Sum merOfCode2005

    We had some really awesome projects happen (fluid simulation, high quality boolean tools, improved nurbs, 'Verse network integration, animation constraints improvements, and a drawing tool, alas two projects - ODE integration, and a live tutorial didn't happen).

    LetterRip

    1. Re:Blenders Summer of Code projects by LetterRip · · Score: 1, Informative

      oops forgot to list ffmpeg integration, sorry about that.

      LetterRip

    2. Re:Blenders Summer of Code projects by TheQwe · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You also forgot to mention PyTexture, IMO one of the cooler projects to come out of SoC. qwe

  20. Perl Foundation by publius_ovidius · · Score: 3, Informative

    For those who are curious, the Perl Foundation had 8 Summer of Code projects funded. They were a blast to work with.

  21. One thing i'm bit pissed off... by ratta · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    SOC was really great, but i found quite sad to see that some guys' project (mentored but some *BSD) was to just to rewrite some already existing GPL licensed tool as BSD. I don't want (and i don't like) any GPL vs BSD flamewars, but i simply prefer original projects (and luckily there was a lot of them).

    --
    Wondering why i am doing so strange posts? I am trying to get a "+5,Flamebait" or "-1,Insightful" rating.
  22. Rejects by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I was a reject. So while I was going to code through the summer anyway I decided to go on vacation to protest. WTF? Didn't like my project? Well, I *don't* have to do it then. Eventually I went free camping (many nudists, drinking and smoking joints) and got a new girlfriend. Ahh. Now its September. Well, back to work fellas!

    1. Re:Rejects by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Summer's almost gone
      Summer's almost gone
      Almost gone
      Yeah, it's almost gone
      Where will we be
      When the summer's gone?
      Morning found us calmly unaware
      Noon burn gold into our hair
      At night, we swim the laughin' sea
      When summer's gone
      Where will we be
      Where will we be
      Where will we be
      Morning found us calmly unaware
      Noon burn gold into our hair
      At night, we swim the laughin' sea
      When summer's gone
      Where will we be
      Summer's almost gone
      Summer's almost gone
      We had some good times
      But they're gone
      The winter's comin' on
      Summer's almost gone

    2. Re:Rejects by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My son worked on a project for Wine (something to do with input devices, esp. joysticks, I think). It wasn't an earthshaking project, full of glory, and true, the pay wasn't as good as he might have been able to get elsewhere, but it was some good experience, it'll probably look good on his resume, and he didn't spend all summer ogling a bunch of old naked people (half of whom would've been male) and destroying brain cells :) And no new girl friend to distract him this term when he should be studying :)

  23. Google Summer of Code's first results by astrab · · Score: 1
    [Sep 03, 2005] After September 1st (deadline for all student work), the first results of Google Summer of Code are being launched. These are some of the 'Open Source' projects developed with the help of the $4,500 provided by Google:

    http://google-blog.dirson.com/post.new/0279/

  24. fsck in background by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What I remember from fbsd and softupdates is that the fsck can be performed in background, so you can get the system boot as if no fsck was needed, and run the task as IO allows.

    1. Re:fsck in background by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Good luck trying to fsck a 2TB FFS partition. Journaling is badly needed on the BSDs.

  25. I knew Merredith who wrote the qualitive search by Billly+Gates · · Score: 1

    She was part of the debate club back in highschool and was more of a political science nerd than a computer one.

    I am curious how the qualitive search works vs a quantitive? My guess is the difference deals with some heavy duty mathmatics.

    I assume all a database does is link tables and arrays of data together based on sort and index routines. How would the qualitiave work for a site such as okcupid.com?

    1. Re:I knew Merredith who wrote the qualitive search by abiggerhammer · · Score: 1

      Yep, that would be me. It's been a long strange trip, but eventually I ended up in the CS department at the University of Iowa.

      My Query By Example project uses a support vector machine (a type of machine learning algorithm) to learn classification rules based on the set of examples you specify. Those rules then get applied to the rest of the data points in whatever table you're looking at. So, yes, there's a lot of big nasty math -- at its core it's a quadratic programming problem. I didn't want to get into that in the interview because I figured nobody would get it. :P

      How would it work for a site like OKCupid? Their matching algorithm is based on users' responses to multiple-choice questions -- assume each response has some numeric (enumerated) value. Throw all those values into a table, probably via a join, such that each row is a user and each field corresponds to a question. (Let NULL values correspond to questions a user hasn't answered.) You in front of your computer will be looking at people's profiles, but the system operates under the assumption that the person will answer questions in a manner consistent with their profile, so if you mark several people that you're interested in and several that you're not interested in, based on their profiles, the system can train a classifier based on their answers to questions and find people whose responses are similar.

      I don't think OKCupid is using the same math I'm using, but their approach is probably pretty similar.

      --
      Dance like nobody's watching. Sing like you're in the shower. Fuck like you're being filmed.
    2. Re:I knew Merredith who wrote the qualitive search by Billly+Gates · · Score: 1

      Gotcha.

      I did some scripting when I was a jr admin years ago but have not really played with database programing other than basic sql.

      I would be the annoying guy named Tim with the short hair from your junior year at Kingwood High from debate.

        I eventually ended up in Florida where I sold my soul to the devil (err got employed at AOL) doing tech support, and take lovely calls such as these.

      I am in school currently majoring in economics fulltime and minoring in CIS.

  26. Nmap Project Results by fv · · Score: 5, Informative
    such a great idea but no content on their site re: the actual work. They should have paid someone $4500 to maintain their summer of code page!

    Yeah, for a $2 million dollar project it was ridiculously understaffed on the Google side. But Googlers like Chris DiBona and Greg Stein worked extraordinarily hard to keep things flowing relatively smoothly. So it still turned out to be a huge success for Nmap and most/all of the other participating projects. Thanks, Chris and Greg!

    So what did we (Nmap project) accomplish in those two months? The sponsored students and their credentials/projects are listed here. Much of their work can be found in Nmap 3.90, which was released on Thursday. SoC changes include:

    • Doug Hoyte nearly tripled the size of the version detection database, added OS/device type/hostname detection using the version detection DB. He made numerous other improvements as well.
    • Zhao Lei added more than 350 OS detection fingerprints to Nmap, bringing the total to 1684. He also helped design a 2nd generation OS detection (stack fingerprinting) system.
    • Adriano Monteiro designed and implemented an advanced Nmap GUI and results viewer named http://sourceforge.net/projects/umit">UMIT (screenshots).
    • Ole Morten Grodaas designed and implemented another advanced Nmap GUI and results viewer (its nice to have choices in open source!) named NmapGUI. Details and download here)
    • Chris Gibson has written a sweet little network tool named Ncat, which takes the venerable Netcat in an interesting and extremely useful direction with features such as connection brokering, socks proxying, and much more.

    It has been a crazy two months, but I'm very pleased to see so much accomplished! If you're using an older version of Nmap, you really should consider upgrading to 3.90 to see the difference.

    Cheers,
    Fyodor

    1. Re:Nmap Project Results by jgaynor · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Two points here -

      1. Holy shit. wow. The above list just goes to show how much work can be involved in maintaing a tool which im sure many administrators take for granted and assume is more or less static.

      2. This is exactly the kind of summary each project needs. A list of developers and features (or at least a link to the relevant changelogs) and the version number (or future version number) we can see those changes in.

  27. Summer? How can it be summer? by ShakiirNvar · · Score: 2, Funny


    Its only just turned spring here!

    --
    "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public." - HL Mencken
  28. Re:Summer was over in 4 weeks... by quadra23 · · Score: 1

    Yeah, I applied following all application form rules and then two weeks later I recieved a notice saying "thanks for applying, but you have not been selected" with no other unique content and that's all I got all summer. That 'summer' lasted around 4 weeks total for most (oh, 7590+ out of 8000+ applications -- not sure people-wise). Short indeed, yes I understand there were 8000+ apps but the short response back from Google in 1 email could have at least said something as to why, they obviously thought about it...wouldn't it have been a simple cut-and-paste? Obviously this isn't going to be easy for students who have at least 1 school semester in the summer as part of their program, assuming this happens again next summer.

  29. Re:Summer was over in 4 weeks... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2, Funny

    You think that's bad. Try applying for a job at Google. You get the same email.

  30. CAN GOOGLE OUT GOOGLES GOOGLE GOOGLE111!!@#$@!#$ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    splat! >p, one one

  31. Game? by Pixelmixer · · Score: 2, Funny

    What is the game they worked on? File searching, while being attacked by ravaging zombies that you have to search for their weakness by probing them with a google scanner. Then you attack them by searching for a weapon with your google auto-materializer that will materialize any weapon you can find in the google search database... how cool?!?

    --
    "What happend to just paying for a product without being constantly nibbled to death by Credit Card Ducks?"
    1. Re:Game? by Chicane-UK · · Score: 1

      Hm..

      How about 'Where on Google Earth(tm) is Carmen Sandiego?' ;)

      --
      "Hey! Unless this is a nude love-in, get the hell off my property!!"
  32. Re:Summer was over in 4 weeks... by quadra23 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You think that's bad. Try applying for a job at Google. You get the same email.

    Come to think of it, I remember applying for one of the of their moderator positions and the email I got consisted of this:

    We received your resume and would like to thank you for your interest in Google. After carefully reviewing your experience and qualifications, we have determined that we do not have a position available which is a strong match at this time.

    Thanks again for considering Google. We wish you well in your endeavors and hope you might consider us again in the future.

    Sincerely,
    Google Staffing


    Funny, it didn't address names or anything ... couldn't get much more generic indeed. At least the Google Summer of Code email said my name back!

  33. Re:awesome! NOT! by ivoras · · Score: 2, Interesting
    (I'm one of the "SoC students") There are couple more problems:

    - That's $4500 before taxes. Where I live at least jobs and services are usually negotiated with after-taxes sums, so I was disappointed that I had to give up 30% of the sum.

    - I'm not the only one that hasn't received even the so-called "initial" payment ($500 - 30%) even after it's been more than a week since the project ended

    - Not a single deadline Google set for themselves was honoured. Not for announcements, forms, nor payment.

    Organization of the SoC project from the Google's side was just horrible - they obviously didn't know what they are getting into. Some students didn't know details about how and when they will be paid until the end. Students were left to deal with taxation issuses without help from Google (and have did extraordinarily well - on occasions even proving what little advice Google gave was wrong).

    All this is inexcusable for such a large corporation, and one that actually has lots of experience with international issues. The have a lot to improve.

    --
    -- Sig down
  34. Submittor? by earthbound+kid · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Is that a tribute to the Mighty Mightor, Zonk?

    Com'mon man, your job is to be able to spell words like submitter. It ain't that hard.

    And goodbye karma, but it's the truth!

  35. Re:awesome! NOT! by be-fan · · Score: 1

    I can understand being pissed off if you needed the $500 to cover incidentials, but other than that, I think Chris and crew did a good job given their circumstances. It's not easy to organize something like this (the ITIN stuff alone must've caused at least a couple of ulcers), and it's their first time doing it. Not to mention the fact that they have regular jobs to attend to as well.

    IMHO, a lot of the SoC participants came off as overly demanding and self-righteous, kinda like you. The mailing lists were full of complete drivel (to the point where I just unsubscribed and just used dejanews to find the occasional bit of info). If I had to read those to pick out the 0.1% of info that actually consisted of pertinent questions, well, that'd make me reconsider my line of work...

    --
    A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
  36. Re:Summer was over in 4 weeks... by be-fan · · Score: 1

    Hmm. Let's see. 9000 applications, and average of 3 pages apiece, that's almost 30,000 pages of proposals to go through. So that's what they did most of June, read those proposals. Now, sending out personalied replies? Assuming it takes 2 minutes to write a reply (with some actual content referring to "why"), that's 18,000 man-minutes, and assuming 5 people working full time on the program (about how many they had), that's 60 hours of non-stop work per person. That'd be a full tech-workweek, doing nothing but sending out personalized replies!

    --
    A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
  37. WinLibre project results by pierrejean.coudert · · Score: 1

    Here is the SoC page for WinLibre projects. Nine of them have succeeded. It has been a wonderful experience !

  38. Re:awesome! NOT! by ivoras · · Score: 1
    I've only two things to reply:

    - Philosophy doesn't pay the bills
    - In any serious business, continually neglecting deadlines is extremely bad.

    --
    -- Sig down
  39. Someone at Google Farted! Must Post by syousef · · Score: 1

    If it were any other company but Googe would we hear about this. /. continues to slide in relevance!

    --
    These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
  40. Spoiled Brats by FacePlant · · Score: 1

    In my day, interns didn't get paid. If you got paid, it was called "a job."

    --
    My Heart Is A Flower
    1. Re:Spoiled Brats by Vann_v2 · · Score: 1

      There are plenty of unpaid internships to go around, still. What I did over the summer wasn't an internship per se, it was a program funded by the NSF which allowed the university at which I was studying to give me a stipend. There are many summer opportunities like this, though of course they tend to be more competitive.

  41. A different take on it by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 1

    I worked my way through college as a motel night auditor (so I could do homework on the job). $4,500 was a lot more than I'd earn during summer break, and I'd actually enjoy the work I was doing. While I can see your point, understand that the Summer Of Code would be a huge step up for many would-be contributors.

    --
    Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
    1. Re:A different take on it by Vann_v2 · · Score: 1

      If a college student today had the skills necessary to do the Summer of Code he probably has the skills necessary to find a much better paying job, even if just over the summer. If he also has good grades it wouldn't be impossible for him to find a paid internship or paid research opportunity, either.

      Like I said, if someone has exhausted these opportunities, then yes, Summer of Code is compelling. If not, well, he'd be stupid not to look elsewhere first.

    2. Re:A different take on it by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 1
      If a college student today had the skills necessary to do the Summer of Code he probably has the skills necessary to find a much better paying job, even if just over the summer.

      Get over yourself. Some (many) students don't want to leave their regular jobs over the summer for whatever reason. I didn't, although I certainly could have.

      --
      Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
  42. Re:awesome! NOT! by be-fan · · Score: 1

    - What philosophy? Again, I agree that if you needed the startup money as, well, startup money, that would be a problem, but other than that, I don't see the problem here.

    - For Google, the SoC isn't a serious business, its a tangential project. In any case, we didn't pay Google for services, it was the other way around. Since they are the ones cutting the checks, they can miss whatever deadlines they want. I'm not being facetious about this. In the real world, missed deadlines happen all the time, especially on the customer's end. In previous summers, I worked with a company bidding on a DARPA project, and they once missed a major deadline by a month and a half. And you know what? That was okay, because they were the ones writing the checks!

    --
    A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
  43. Re:awesome! NOT! by be-fan · · Score: 1

    Hmm, that last statement was perhaps a bit unclear. The company didn't miss the deadline (that would have lost us the project). DARPA missed their own deadlines.

    --
    A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
  44. huh? Though I agree with your point. by superspaz · · Score: 1

    I went somewhere intense for CS, but what I am hearing from current students is that $15/hr is low for summer interning. The kids are getting $20-25/hr to TA CS classes or as summer interns if they are focused on the $$$. However almost all of them will take a big pay cut to work on something interesting, or to get an in on a company they really want to work for.

    Hmm, fast track for Google job after college or $5k more this summer? What would you choose?

  45. Re:Summer was over in 4 weeks... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    yes I understand there were 8000+ apps but the short response back from Google in 1 email could have at least said something as to why.

    You said: Hmm. Let's see. 9000 applications, and average of 3 pages apiece, that's almost 30,000 pages of proposals to go through. So that's what they did most of June, read those proposals...

    Obviously some people don't read the comments to which they reply that well. I don't see anything requesting a 'personalized reply' but more that some mention as to why, which Google obviously had thought of if they are going to reject people. You could have started there but you didn't because that would destroy your argument before you even got anywhere with it.

  46. Re:Summer was over in 4 weeks... by be-fan · · Score: 1

    First, by including a "why", it is automatically a "personalized e-mail"! In any case, Google, by and large, didn't know why people were rejected, only why people were accepted. They had the mentoring organizations rank proposals before they ever looked at them. They mostly just took the top N proposals from each organization, did a final review, and sent out acceptance and rejection letters. Whether individual mentoring organizations gave applicants more feedback was their business (I know some did).

    --
    A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
  47. where are the finished project links? by root-a-begger · · Score: 1

    I've read many articals about Summer of Code. Yet, I've seen no web page listing all the accepted projects (not proposed). Now that its over, shouldn't there be a link list of finished work so we can go and see what these kids did?

  48. mod-mbox by (1+-sqrt(5))*(2**-1) · · Score: 1

    I, for one, can attest that mod-mbox generated a great deal of traffic on the httpd-mod developers list.