GSoC

See also: Ideas for GSoC 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, previous GSoCs

All students and developers are welcome to participate in the Summer of Code program, with KDE. Here are the instructions on how to participate.

Instructions common to all participants

All participants should take a look at the Summer of Code every now and then to be informed about updates and advice. It is also important to read the Summer of Code FAQ, as it contains useful information.

All participants will need a Google account in order to join the program. You'll save some time if you create one now. In addition, all KDE students need to join the KDE student list, KDE-Soc. In addition, if you do not yet have a KDE account, set that up now.

Programming Language

While the main KDE development occurs in C++, we do have bindings for many other languages, including (but not limited to) Python, Ruby and C#. Some bindings are more stable and more mature than others. Some may not be suitable yet for serious development -- be sure to take that into account before making your choice.

C++ will be accepted for any project. Submissions and ideas for projects in any other language should specifically mention the choice.

Instructions for students

Students wishing to participate in Summer of Code must realise this is more than a mere formality. You will be required to produce code for KDE in 3 months. You will also take some resources from KDE developers, who will dedicate a portion of their time to mentoring you. Therefore, we'd like to have candidates who are committed to helping KDE.

You don't have to be a proven developer -- in fact, this whole program is meant to facilitate joining the KDE and other Open Source communities. However, experience in coding and/or experience with KDE/Qt libraries and applications is welcome. The KDE community maintains a separate wiki page with general information about getting started with KDE development.

You should start learning the components that you plan on working on before the start date. KDE developers are available on mailing lists and on IRC for help. Note that the timeline from Google reserves a lot of time for bonding periods: use those periods wisely.

General instructions

First of all, please read the instructions common to all participants and the GSoC FAQ. Pay special attention to the Eligibility section of the FAQ.

Recommended steps

1. Read Google's instructions for participating
2. Take a look at the list of ideas
3. Come up with project that you're interested in
4. Write a first draft proposal and get someone to review it for you
5. Submit it using Google's web interface

Coming up with an interesting idea is probably the most difficult part of all. It should be something interesting for KDE, for Open Source in general and the Linux/Unix desktop in particular and for you. And it also has to be something that you can realistically achieve in the time available to you.

Finding out what the most pressing issues are in the projects you're interested in is a good start. You can optionally join the mailing lists for that project or go into its IRC channel: you can make acquaintance with developers and your potential mentor, as well as start learning the codebase. We recommend strongly doing that and we will look favorably on applications from students who have started to act like Open Source developers.

Student proposal guidelines

A project proposal is what you will be judged upon. Write a clear proposal on what you plan to do, the scope of your project, and why we should choose you to do it. Proposals are the basis of the GSoC projects and therefore one of the most important things to do well. The proposal is not only the basis of KDE's decision of which student to choose, it has also an effect on Google's decision as to how many student slots are assigned to KDE.

Below is the application template.

Introduction

Every software project should solve a problem. Before offering the solution (your Google Summer of Code project), you should first define the problem. What’s the current state of things? What’s the issue you wish to solve and why? Then you should conclude with a sentence or two about your solution. Include links to discussions, features, or bugs that describe the problem further if necessary.

Project goals

Be short and to the point, and perhaps format it as a list. Propose a clear list of deliverables, explaining exactly what you promise to do and what you do not plan to do. “Future developments” can be mentioned, but your promise for the Google Summer of Code term is what counts.

Implementation

Be detailed. Describe what you plan to do as a solution for the problem you defined above. Include technical details, showing that you understand the technology. Illustrate key technical elements of your proposed solution in reasonable detail.

Timeline

Show that you understand the problem, have a solution, have also broken it down into manageable parts, and that you have an realistic plan on how to accomplish your goal. Here you set expectations, so don’t make promises you can’t keep. A modest, realistic and detailed timeline is better than promising the impossible.

If you have other commitments during GSoC, such as a job, vacation, exams, internship, seminars, or papers to write, disclose them here. GSoC should be treated like a full-time job, and we will expect approximately 40 hours of work per week. If you have conflicts, explain how you will work around them.

About me

Provide your contact information (IRC nick, email, IM, phone) and write a few sentences about you and why you think you are the best for this job. We also encourage you to list any prior contributions to KDE and to name people (other developers, students, professors) who can act as a reference for you. Mention your field of study if necessary.

Tell us if you are submitting proposals to other organizations, and whether or not you would choose KDE if given the choice.

Other things to think about:

• Are you comfortable working independently under a supervisor or mentor who is several thousand miles away, and perhaps 12 time zones away? How will you work with your mentor to track your work? Have you worked in this style before?

• If your native language is not English, are you comfortable working closely with a supervisor whose native language is English? What is your native language, as that may help us find a mentor who has the same native language?

• After you have written your proposal, you should get it reviewed. Do not rely on the KDE mentors to do it for you via the web interface, although we will try to comment on every proposal. It us wise to ask a colleague or a developer to critique your proposal. Clarity and completeness are important.

Hints

Submit your proposal early: early submissions get more attention from developers for the simple fact that they have more time to dedicate to reading them. The more people see it, the more it will get known.

Do not leave it all to the last minute: while it is Google that is operating the webserver, it would be wise to expect a last-minute overload on the server. So, make sure you send your application before the final rush. Also, note that the applications submitted very late will get the least attention from mentors, so you may get a low vote because of that.

Keep it simple: we don't need a 10-page essay on the project and on you (Google won't even let you submit a text that long). You just need to be concise and precise.

Know what you are talking about: the last thing we need is for students to submit ideas that cannot be accomplished realistically or ideas that aren't even remotely related to KDE. If your idea is unusual, be sure to explain why you have chosen KDE to be your mentoring organisation.

Aim wide: submit more than one proposal, to different areas of KDE. We also recommend submitting to more than one organisation too. This will increase your chances of being chosen. If you do submit to more than one organization, please tell us that and which proposal you would choose, if both were selected.

The PostgreSQL project has also released a list of hints that you can take a look.

Instructions for mentors

Ideas

If you're a KDE developer and you wish to participate in Summer of Code, make a proposal in the ideas page, based what your KDE project needs.

If you wish to mentor, please read the instructions common to all participants and the Summer of Code FAQ. Also, please contact the maintainer for your application or module and get the go-ahead from hir. Then edit the ideas page, adding your idea.

Your idea proposal should be a brief description of what the project is, what the desired goals would be, what the student should know and an email address for contact. Please note, though, that the students are not required to follow your idea to the letter, so regard your proposal as inspiration for the students.

Mentoring

Any KDE developer can be a mentor if you meet the GSoC eligibity requirements. We will potentially assign a student to you who has never worked on such a large project and will need some help. Make sure you're up for the task.

Before subscribing yourself as a mentor, please make sure that your application or module maintainer is aware of that. Ask hir to send the Summer of Code KDE Administrators an email confirming your involvement in the team. This is just a formality to make sure you are a real person we can trust; the administrators cannot know all active developers by their Google account ID. Then ping us in IRC, Telegram or mail.

Prospective mentors should read the mentoring guide. Also, Federico Mena-Quintero has written some helpful information based on his experiences in previous years. His HOWTO has some useful suggestions for anyone planning to mentor this year.

You will subscribe to the KDE-Soc-Mentor mailing list to discuss ideas. We will also require you to read the proposals as they come in and you will be allowed to vote on the proposals, according to rules we will publish later.

Finally, know that we will never assign you to a project you do not want to work on. We will not assign you more projects than you can/want to take on either. And you will have a backup mentor, just in case something unforeseen takes place.

Subscribing as mentor

To subscribe as mentor, you need to complete a few easy steps.

1. Contact the administrators in #kde-soc on freenode to let them know which project you want to mentor for, and give us your google-connected account email
2. Log in to GSoC webapp
3. Subscribe to kde-soc-mentor at kde org

Instructions for module/application maintainers

If you are a maintainer of a particular sub-project within KDE, you may be contacted by developers in your project about an idea they want to submit. This step is here only to make sure the developers are legitimate people involved in the project; KDE has become too big for the Summer of Code administrators to know each and every developer. Therefore, we delegate this task.

You should also judge whether the idea being proposed coincides with the general goals for your application/module. If you feel that is not the case, you should reply to your developer and suggest that she modify the proposal.

Also, please contact the administrators with your module/application name. If we receive an application in the Google web interface regarding your module, we'll need your input to judge whether the application makes sense or not, whether it should be improved or not, etc. We will also contact you for recruiting mentors if your application turns out to be very popular.

You do not need yourself to be a mentor, but we would like you to help us out.

To reach the KDE administrators for Summer of Code, please send email to [email protected].