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Google Summer of Code Announces Mentor Projects

Posted by timothy on from the everyone-gets-a-free-mentors-album-too dept.

mithro writes "As everyone should already know, Google is running the Summer of Code again this year. For those who don't know, GSoC is where Google funds student's to participate in Open Source projects and has been running for 5 years, bringing together over 2600 students and 2500 mentors from nearly 100 countries worldwide. Google has just announced the projects which will be mentor organizations this year. It includes a great list of Open Source projects from a wide range of different genres, include content management systems, compilers, many programming languages and even a bunch of games!"

44 comments

  1. Re:anonymous coward announces first post by Quantos · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Unfortunately the oven to cook it in was demolished along with the rest of Auschwitz.

    --
    Some people are only alive because it's against the law for me to hunt them down and kill them.
  2. Pidgin is on the list... by Thelasko · · Score: 2

    maybe they will finally get video and audio chat working.

    --
    One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
    1. Re:Pidgin is on the list... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      maybe they will finally get video and audio chat working.

      It was on the list of projects last year.
      http://developer.pidgin.im/wiki/SummerOfCode2008

      Also FFmpeg, which developed many of the codecs, is participating
      http://wiki.multimedia.cx/index.php?title=FFmpeg_Summer_Of_Code

    2. Re:Pidgin is on the list... by muuh-gnu · · Score: 1

      Probably not, since they could have done so for years, if they wanted to, but they didnt. The Pidgin developers collectively suffered the "we want Pidgin to stay lean and mean, but cam and voice would bring bloat" mental illnes. So they wholeheartedly drove all of their potential users into Skype/MSN/YIM/ICQ/AIM. A decade older, they probably would have been the people who opposed IRC colors as "bloat"and fought them tooth and nail until practically everybody except them moved along.

    3. Re:Pidgin is on the list... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The Pidgin developers collectively suffered the "we want Pidgin to stay lean and mean, but cam and voice would bring bloat" mental illnes.

      And yet, it is bloated anyways. Oh, the irony.

    4. Re:Pidgin is on the list... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It was never about "bloat", it was about time and interest. Pidgin has 0 full time developers, only hobbyists, so what tends to be worked on is what they, themselves, are interested in.

      As far back as 2006 (when I was an SOC student) I saw one of the main developers saying he didn't find voice/video interesting, but if someone paid him to do it, he'd make the time. Some of the volunteer developers DO care, but they're time restrained with jobs, families, etc.

      As always is the case in open source, "Patches Welcome".

  3. Long term plan by Thelasko · · Score: 3, Informative

    Looking at the site, I noticed that Ubuntu has a list of projects to work on which are mostly from the Brainstorm site. Most of the other projects have no such plan. I think this is what puts Ubuntu ahead of so many other open source projects.

    --
    One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
    1. Re:Long term plan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      Did you actually look at the proposed Summer of Code projects ? Most of them are either absurdly short, absurdly long or outright impossible (like 'fix dvd support', it's not because of a software problem that no linux distribution can ship DeCSS...).

  4. What the hell is Durpal? by Facetious · · Score: 1

    One of the links in the summary is to http://durpal.org/ . I wonder if that is a fork from http://drupal.org

    Also, it is interesting to see the long forgotten WorldForge on that list. Maybe Duke Nukem should go open source to get some of that good Google cash.

    --
    Let us not become the evil that we deplore.
  5. A real education by rm999 · · Score: 4, Funny

    "GSoC is where Google funds student's to participate in Open Source projects"

    Maybe they should fund a class in grammar and spelling first :P

    1. Re:A real education by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What's wrong with that?

    2. Re:A real education by larry+bagina · · Score: 2, Informative

      student's

      --
      Do you even lift?

      These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

    3. Re:A real education by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 1

      student's

      Look out! Here comes an S!

      --
      Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
  6. Success stories by MrEricSir · · Score: 1

    I'm curious -- are there any success stories from the Summer of Code, or do these projects get abandoned after 3 months?

    --
    There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
    1. Re:Success stories by Chabo · · Score: 2, Informative

      Supposedly last year's GSoC helped a great deal with FFmpeg, Pidgin, and Rockbox, among others.

      --
      Convert FLACs to a portable format with FlacSquisher
    2. Re:Success stories by vinn · · Score: 4, Informative

      Yup - Wine has had quite a bit of success with these projects. Here's a link:

      We have all sorts of people apply to work on our SoC projects. The most successful SoC projects are ones where the student already has active involvement in the community and has already committed patches.

      --
      ----- obSig
    3. Re:Success stories by Ironica · · Score: 2, Informative

      OpenMRS benefited from last year's SoC, and is on the list this year, too. Millions of people around the world are getting health care that's assisted by OpenMRS.

      --
      Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
    4. Re:Success stories by jeffstar · · Score: 4, Interesting

      i recall one student's work was pretty much ignored. He modified gnome so different workspaces could have different background images.

      maybe the changes were too obtrusive or unmaintainable, but to me it points to a poor mentor. The mentor should have helped the student implement the changes in such a way that they could be accepted.
      see the student's blog with the gnome bugzilla links.

    5. Re:Success stories by 68kmac · · Score: 1

      Google's own Open Source Blog has a bunch of success stories from last year.

    6. Re:Success stories by Kjella · · Score: 1

      i recall one student's work was pretty much ignored. He modified gnome so different workspaces could have different background images. maybe the changes were too obtrusive or unmaintainable, but to me it points to a poor mentor.

      Or just Gnome decided that was a too advanced feature that the user shouldn't have. I did run into it recently with an "advanced" tab that used to be here when you google, but it turned out wasn't actually there anymore. Developer reason: "We took it away, it was a mistake having it there and powerusers know how to use gconf" except the tab contained exactly what it should IMO. Why I'm still on KDE 3.5.10 and will be moving to KDE 4.2 with Jaunty, KDE4.0 might have been a technical trainwreck but at least code can be fixed.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    7. Re:Success stories by jeffstar · · Score: 1

      Or just Gnome decided that was a too advanced feature that the user shouldn't have.

      yeah. Bad choice if project for SoC then ... student slave Implement this feature we don't want!

  7. I'd like to try this out... by spiffmastercow · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm just intimidated by the magnitude of the requested projects. Anyone have any experience with GSoC? How much mentoring do you tend to get? I'd hate to sign up, then not know where to get started, or hit a brick wall, and be told "well you should have thought of that before you applied".

    1. Re:I'd like to try this out... by FishWithAHammer · · Score: 5, Informative

      I participated twice so far, applying again this year just because I enjoy it.

      My mentoring experience was very uneven. One mentor was very good, the other very crap. I completed my projects for both without a hitch, but the time without a good mentor was much more difficult.

      It's a little bit of a crapshoot. You're more likely to get in if you target smaller groups, but you're more likely to get good support if you target larger groups. YMMV.

      --
      "You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
    2. Re:I'd like to try this out... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What kind of skills do you typically need to work on these projects? I'm at the end of my sophomore semester in computer engineering, but the scope of what they're asking for is daunting. Do you recommend any particular groups or projects for the "beginner"?

    3. Re:I'd like to try this out... by FishWithAHammer · · Score: 2, Informative

      Uh...I knew how to program pretty much cold when I went in. I started when I was very young, though, so it's a little more natural to me than some folks.

      Whatever language you choose, you'd better be good at it. Your mentors will help you with project requirements, etc. if you get selected (and you should be hanging out in their IRC chats, talking with them, figuring out what they want to do, and getting your name in their minds), but they will expect you to be a solid programmer who doesn't need to be hand-held.

      I don't really recommend any groups in particular. For example, the Drupal guys seem way nice (not a group I've worked for, but one I'll be applying to this year), but generally expect some solid community interaction beforehand. WinLibre is a group that's kind of really dysfunctional, with only one or two people involved--who also happen to be your mentors; that was the organization I had the worst time with. Nice guys, not the right kind of org for GSoC.

      You're best off scattergunning a lot of quality applications to a lot of groups. My first year, I applied to 12, and got accepted for my favorite one. My second year, I applied to 3, and got accepted to two of them (one I knew was an acceptance, so that was foregone and I wasn't worried about getting too many apps in). This year, I don't have such a guaranteed project lying around, so I'll be going with as many quality applications as I can manage.

      --
      "You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
    4. Re:I'd like to try this out... by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1

      In general, the successful projects are the ones where the student is a contributor before the SoC starts, and is using the funding to work full-time on a project that they are already familiar with. There are exceptions, but most of the projects where the student did not already have knowledge of the project have ended up being a waste of time for the mentor and student. If you want to participate in the SoC, my advice is spend some time reading the code for a project you're interested in, send in some patches, get to know the maintainers a bit (and the code a bit more), and then apply.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  8. Student's? by zindorsky · · Score: 4, Funny

    Google funds student's

    Google funds a student's what?

    Here's a link to explain 3rd grade grammar:

    Bob's Quick Guide to the Apostrophe, You Idiots

    --
    If the geiger counter does not click, the coffee, she is not thick.
    1. Re:Student's? by bar-agent · · Score: 2, Funny

      Um, I once accidently a student's...

      --
      i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
  9. Debian is participating and welcoming students by GrAfFiT · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Debian is welcoming students once again this year. I was a 2008 GSoC student at Debian and am returning this year to admin the GSoC program at Debian. I had a very exciting experience, participating in meetups with a lot of Debian developers all over Europe and I recommend you to apply at Debian to share this experience.

    We have a huge range of project possibilities, from our famous packaging system (.deb ftw) to debian-specific developer tools and infrastructure (want to work on our multi-arch distributed build farm ?) or hardware support (because Debian runs everywhere, from tiny ARM devices to country-wide computing grids). We have you all covered.

    Remember that Debian and its derivatives are the largest group of Linux distributions in the world. That's a huge community you'll be working with, and I should say, an amazing concentration of talent.

    If you are interested, visit: http://wiki.debian.org/gsoc, join us on IRC on: #debian-soc on irc.debian.org or follow us on twitter of identi.ca (DebianGSoC).

    Also, see our mailing-list announcement for more pratical information.

  10. Typo in Drupal site by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Nice job, editor! How about correcting the Drupal link so that it points to the real website and not another typo site.

  11. Fix the Drupal link in the article please by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Fix the Drupal link in the article please

    It's not a good idea to link to a domainer site.

  12. Applying This Year! by Eli+Gottlieb · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm applying with a group of students from UMass to write Java bindings for the LLVM intermediate-code generation libraries. Anyone want to help?

  13. The project that will end in a few years! by Sybert42 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Opencog and the Singularity Institute. When it's done, there won't be any more summer of codes. You'll become the code--seriously.

    1. Re:The project that will end in a few years! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whoa.

    2. Re:The project that will end in a few years! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only thing you'll become is dead. No rational person would ever believe in the fairy tale that is mind uploading. It's just the same old fear-of-death-induced belief in the afterlife, now repackaged in a pseudo-scientific form for the modern age. Kind of like how creationism has now become "intelligent design".

    3. Re:The project that will end in a few years! by wezeldog · · Score: 1

      My computer. It...

  14. Durpal! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I didn't know this was a content management system.

  15. Re:anonymous coward announces first post by Quantos · · Score: 1

    How the FUCK did I get modded down?

    I happened to be slammin the @$$ that posted first.

    --
    Some people are only alive because it's against the law for me to hunt them down and kill them.
  16. Google Summer of Code 2009 and The Perl Foundation by duke_leto · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The Perl Foundation was accepted as an organization in Google Summer of Code 2009! I am excited to be the organization administrator.

    Students interested in learning more about applying for GSoC2009 with TPF can join the mailing list and read up on The Perl Foundation wiki . For breaking news you can follow me at @dukeleto or join us on IRC on #soc-help on irc.perl.org .

    Parrot Foundation is within the umbrella of The Perl Foundation this year, so if you want to work on the hottest virtual machine that just hit 1.0.0, then you are in the right place.

    Remember, student applications are due at ~Noon PDT April 3rd 2009. That is surprisingly soon.

    Hope to see lots of great applications coming down the pipe!

    --
    http://leto.net
  17. Re:anonymous coward announces first post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You shouldn't feed the trolls.

  18. Re:anonymous coward announces first post by Quantos · · Score: 1

    Aaah, damn, I guess it was a few too many wobbly pops...

    --
    Some people are only alive because it's against the law for me to hunt them down and kill them.