[Mailman-Developers] GSoC Help Wanted

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Muhammad Rizvi writes:

 > I want to let you that I want to take part in Python Organization but don’t
 > exactly know what to do. The thing that I came to know so far is that,
 > first I have to find a mentor but don’t know from where I can contact a
 > mentor, secondly I have to submit a proposal but what proposal should I
 > give?

In a little more detail than what Terri wrote:

First, get signed up on the Google site at
https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/.  Become familiar with the guide
for students, there is a lot of help there.  Sign up for the students'
mailing list, and read it every day to see what kinds of things people
talk about.  Some kinds of help will be much more available there
(more on that below).

Next, go to the PSF GSoC page at http://python-gsoc.github.io.  As the
PSF is an "umbrella" organization, it does not actually provide any
mentoring itself, it handles financial matters and Google relations
for over a dozen suborganizations.  Browse the suborganizations, and
find one or more whose project is interesting.  Then check the
individual "Ideas" pages for each project for lists of tasks that may
interest you, and write one or more proposals to implement the ideas.
(I believe that GSoC allows you to submit up to five applications,
spread across 1 to 5 organizations.  In terms of return for effort, I
recommend two or three.)

You should submit something as early as possible.  You will be allowed
to revise and improve your proposal up until the submission deadline.
As a new student to GSoC, you should focus on organizations that give
you feedback promptly (a day or two).  Some put more effort into that
than others, so you will need to balance the intrisic interest in the
project against the help you get improving your proposals.

Sign up for the developers' lists for the projects you are interested
in.  *Browse their archives for the last month or two* to see how the
members tend to interact with each other.  Normally you should lurk
for at least that long before speaking up, but you're up against the
submission deadline so reading the recent threads is a reasonable
substitute.  Some organizations have specific lists for GSoC project
discussion, but most do it on their developer lists.  When you have
made a complete first draft, and after major revisions, you may
request review where the mentors are likely to see it.  Expect it to
take at least a couple of days, the best mentors are generally busy
people.  Of course if it takes longer than that, you won't get very
many chances to revise.  So you'll have to find an appropriate balance
for yourself between prompt responses and more detailed reviews and
more interesting projects.

Be very careful about email protocol.  Some organizations strongly
prefer that discussions of projects be kept on the mailing lists, so
that all applicants can benefit, and so that other mentors and
developers on the project can participate in the conversation.  In
many cases, private mail to mentors is frowned on.  Figure out how the
project you're interested in handles communications before going
private.  Be careful to check that the mailing list is among the
addressees of mail that you send.  You may need to use "reply to all",
depending on the list configuration.

PSF organizations generally require that student applicants submit
contributions to the organization during the application period, so
you should also find those organizations' issue trackers and look for
"easy" tasks you can work on right away.  (The point of the
requirement is more to ensure that you don't waste time during the
project period becoming familiar with infrastructure like repositories
and trackers, not very much to prove your coding ability.)

Be aware that you're already late to the party.  Almost all
organizations prefer to award internships to students who have already
been productive in their projects for months (and for some applicants,
years).  Remember that mentors are unpaid volunteers; the attraction
to mentors is working with motivated and productive junior developers
who make major contributions to their projects.  We appreciate your
interest and that you are inexperienced with GSoC, but realistically
the more you do for yourself and the less handholding you need, the
better your chances are.  It's worth the effort on your part.

Many of the students you are competing with will treat the GSoC
application as a fulltime job.  As much as possible, investigate the
process yourself, or on the students' mailing list.  When asking
questions of prospective mentors, do your homework and make them as
clear and specific as possible.  Again, this is a question of balance.
If it's something you can do for yourself, an hour of your time may be
a worthwhile trade to save 5 minutes for a prospective mentor.  If
it's something only the mentor can answer, you have to ask, of course.
And don't worry about screwing up by asking; getting the right balance
is something you only learn with experience.  Just keep your antenna
out and learn what excites the mentors and what drags them down as you
go along.

Good luck!

Steve