User:Fridgemagnet

A: An introduction

• Please describe yourself in three sentences, one of them regarding your current studies.

I am a final year student of a double degree in Science/Computer Science, with a major in mathematics mostly focused around computational and applied maths, particularly differential equations. I have an interest in ...to be continued.

• • Which languages do you speak?

I speak English and German, but I'm a bit out of practice in German.

• • What's your overall background? The general field you work in or are studying, e.g. computer science, physics, artificial intelligence, control theory...

My studies have been in: Maths - Computational maths, Partial Differential Equations, Ordinary Differential Equations, Dynamical systems, and I am now studying fluid dynamics. Computer Science - Artificial Intelligence, Computer Graphics, Computational Science, now studying parallel computing.

• Why do you want to participate in the Google Summer of Code? What do you hope to gain by doing so?

Knowledge, career preparation, friends, experience, and exposure to the open-source community in general.

• • Please also describe your previous experience with the GSoC, if any. Includes any community-bonding, mentor experience or application, not necessarily accepted. We use this subquestion to identify which students are unfamiliar with how the program goes, providing further support. It has no negative impact on your rating!

I have no previous experience with GSoC.

• Why are you choosing Octave?

It's been one of the most useful tools to me and is quite close to my current studies, I think it will be a very cohesive environment for my learning.

C: Contact

• Please state the (unique and identical where possible) nick you use on IRC and any other communication channel related to Octave. We really want unique nicks. You might want to bold it.

I've been lurking as Fridgemagnet on IRC, and I'm pretty sure it's unique.

• Which time zone do you live in? Will that change over GSoC duration? Perhaps DST adjustment or a relocation. Note that both UTC and GMT are not aware of daylight saving time! Please state UTC+x or -x.

At the moment I'm in Australia, at UTC+11, that will change to UTC+10 with the end of our daylight savings time, on the 5th of April at 16:00 UTC.

• Please state the timeframe (in UTC+0) when you feel most comfortable working during GSoC. Where are your time buffers? Example: I usually code around 9.00 to 18.00 and could also try to start earlier (~7.00) for few days ;-)

I'll get back to you on that later...

E: Coding experience

• Please describe your experience with C++, Octave or Matlab m-scripts, OpenGL and Qt.

I have a little experience in C++, from tiny side-projects I have occasionally touched on. I have 4-5 years of experience in writing Matlab/Octave scripts, through my university studies - so I'm fairly comfortable with those. I have about 6 months of experience with learning openGL through Java, which is how my university teaches computer graphics. I have no experience with Qt

• Please describe your experience with other programming languages.

The majority of my programming experience has been in python, I've built a couple of small projects on my own with that. My studies have taught me a fair bit of Java, and a little bit of C. I also have some limited experience with Ruby and R

• Please describe your experience with being in a development team. Do you have experience working with open source or free projects?

I do not have experience with open source or free projects. I've done some group work at uni, it's not really the same. We mainly followed a Scrum-style environment.

• Please describe the biggest project you have written code for and what you learned by doing so. Also describe your role in that project over time.

The biggest project I have written code for was a Cryptic crossword solver (in python). My role in this project was to build the GUI, design the project, write all of the code. It was a one person project. I'll go into a little more detail on this soon.

• Please state the commits and patches you already contributed to Octave. This question (one of the most important parts by the way) is the only part of your application our wiki admins will edit for you even after the application deadline. Code sometimes speaks louder than many words do.

Nothing so far, watch this space.

F: Feeling fine

• • IRC and mailing lists

I have a little experience with them, but I'm usually quiet.

• • Mercurial or other source code management systems

I'e used git and SVN before, so I know the basic commands, but I haven't really used them for group projects.

• • Mediawiki or other wiki software

Not really familiar with them, but I can copy and follow templates.

• • make, gcc, gdb or other development tools

I might have used them occasionally, but not very often.

• What will make you actively stay in our community after this GSoC is over? You can also tell us after applications close and we'll happily try to fulfill :-)

O: Only out of interest

• Did you ever hear about Octave before?

Yes, I've used MATLab and Octave quite a bit in my studies, over the past 3-4 years.

• • If so, when and where? How far have you been involved already?

I haven't been involved in the community, but Octave was useful when I needed to do uni work at home. I found out about it from one of my lecturers.

• What was the first question concerning Octave you could not find an answer to rather quickly? Of course more than one question can be stated. We try to improve based on this each year! Includes learning how to use it, code, website, GSoC application, …

I'll let you know when I find one :)

P: Prerequisites

• Please state the operating system you work with.

Windows 7 - personal home desktop, university computers Windows 8 - laptop Ubuntu Linux - laptop, personal home desktop I think the Linux build at uni is Scientific Linux, that may have changed.

• Please estimate an average time per day you will be able to (if separated) access
  • an internet connection

If I remember my phone, I should have emergency internet anywhere I have reception, which is always. This is very limited internet, but I could probably grab my progressing work if I had to. If I'm at uni, I'll have more internet than I can use.

• • a computer

I usually carry a laptop, but as an average I'll say around 23-24 hours a day (I'll be asleep for 8-9 of those, but that can be flexible).

• • a computer with your progressing work on

If I'm working on a laptop at the time, as above. If not, about 19-20 hours a day.

• Please describe the degree up to which you can install new software on computers you have access to.

I can install anything I want on any of my home computers or laptops. I can't install anything on the uni computers, but they come with a lot prepackaged.

To be continued...

S: Self-assessment

• Please describe how useful criticism looks from your point of view as committing student.
• How autonomous are you when developing? If you answer both subquestions with "Yes, definitely", we are a tad confused. ;-)
  • Do you like to discuss changes intensively and not start coding until you know what you want to do?
  • Do you like to code a proof of concept to 'see how it turns out', modifying that and taking the risk of having work thrown away if it doesn't match what the project or original proponent had in mind?

Y: Your task

• Did you select a task from our list of proposals and ideas?
  • If yes, what task did you choose? Please describe what part of it you especially want to focus on if you can already provide this information. Please also wiki-link the page for your elaborated proposal here.
  • If you apply for a task you have added yourself instead, please describe this task, its scope and people you already talked to concerning it. What field of tasks did you miss on the list?
• Please provide a rough estimated timeline for your work on the task. This should include the GSoC midterms and personal commitments like exams or vacation ("non-coding time"). Optionally include two or three milestones you expect.