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GSoC 2013 application: Difference between revisions

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GSoC 2013 application (view source)

Revision as of 19:40, 21 March 2013

30 bytes added ,  21 March 2013
Overhaul for 2013 format
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Octave's application for GSoC 2013.
Octave's application for GSoC 2013.


=== Describe your organization ===
=== Organization description ===


GNU Octave (http://www.gnu.org/software/octave/) is a free numerical computing environment largely compatible with Matlab. It is an old project, started in 1992 by [[John W. Eaton]] and used by hundreds of thousands of people worldwide as a free alternative to Matlab.
GNU Octave (http://www.gnu.org/software/octave/) is a free numerical computing environment largely compatible with Matlab. It is an old project, started in 1992 by [[John W. Eaton]] and used by hundreds of thousands of people worldwide as a free alternative to Matlab.
GNU Octave has an extensive core of functions useful for numerical computations in several fields, such as numerical analysis, optimisation, signal and image processing, and control theory. In order to speed up development, increase user contributions and test code before it is included in GNU Octave's core set of functions, a sister project, Octave Forge (http://octave.sourceforge.net/), hosts many field-specific packages.
GNU Octave has an extensive core of functions useful for numerical computations in several fields, such as numerical analysis, optimisation, signal and image processing, and control theory. In order to speed up development, increase user contributions and test code before it is included in GNU Octave's core set of functions, a sister project, Octave Forge (http://octave.sourceforge.net/), hosts many field-specific packages.
=== Organization home page url ===
http://www.octave.org
=== Main organization license ===
GPLv3
=== Veteran/new ===
New
=== Backup admin ===
jwe
=== If you chose "veteran" in the dropdown above, please summarize your involvement and the successes and challenges of your participation. Please also list your pass/fail rate for each year. ===
[blank]
=== If you chose "new" in the dropdown above, have you applied in the past? If so, for what year(s)? ===
Yes, in 2012. We've participated during 2011 and 2012 under GNU. Additionally, in 2012, we also mentored two students under ESA's Summer of
Code... IN SPACE.


=== Why is your organization applying to participate in Google Summer of Code 2013? What do you hope to gain by participating? ===
=== Why is your organization applying to participate in Google Summer of Code 2013? What do you hope to gain by participating? ===
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The challenges have been about managing very diverse problem domains and finding people who are competent in all of them.  We have not had great trouble keeping students interested, although we've seen lulls in their productive output a few times, which were always thankfully remedied with a little prodding.
The challenges have been about managing very diverse problem domains and finding people who are competent in all of them.  We have not had great trouble keeping students interested, although we've seen lulls in their productive output a few times, which were always thankfully remedied with a little prodding.
=== If your organization has not previously participated in Google Summer of Code, have you applied in the past? If so, for what year(s)? ===
This is the second time we apply as an independent organisation. We applied last year, but were rejected as an independent, and instead worked under GNU. We believe our community is strong and diverse enough to warrant its independence.
=== What Open Source Initiative approved license(s) does your project use? ===
We prefer the GPLv3+ and may use the AGPLv3+ for a side project. We can accept any GPL-compatible free license.


=== What is the URL for your Ideas page? ===
=== What is the URL for your Ideas page? ===
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<tt>#octave</tt> in Freenode
<tt>#octave</tt> in Freenode
=== Does your organization have an application template you would like to see students use? If so, please provide it now. ===
We <s>freely stole</s> worked derivatively from [http://wiki.unknown-horizons.org/w/Student_application_template the Unknown Horizons template] and adapted it to [[Student Application Template|this]].
=== Who will be your backup organization administrator? ===
John W. Eaton <jwe@octave.org>


=== What criteria did you use to select your mentors for this year's program? Please be as specific as possible. ===
=== What criteria did you use to select your mentors for this year's program? Please be as specific as possible. ===
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Distribute the workload amongst the remaining mentors. The mailing list is active enough and questions almost never go unanswered. Reassign the student to a backup mentor. In the worst case, the project admin can become a mentor for the student until another backup mentor is found.
Distribute the workload amongst the remaining mentors. The mailing list is active enough and questions almost never go unanswered. Reassign the student to a backup mentor. In the worst case, the project admin can become a mentor for the student until another backup mentor is found.


This should be infrequent and we hope to prevent this to begin with by selecting mentors with proven involvement in Octave or other free projects.
This should be infrequent and we hope to prevent this to begin with by selecting mentors with proven involvement in Octave or other free projects. We will also pair new mentors with older ones.


=== What steps will you take to encourage students to interact with your project's community before, during and after the program? ===
=== What steps will you take to encourage students to interact with your project's community before and during the program? ===
Invite them to IRC. Set clear expectations on the minimum frequency of email progress updates (probably every two or three days). Be nice and friendly to them.
Invite them to IRC. Set clear expectations on the minimum frequency of email progress updates (probably every two or three days). Be nice and friendly to them.


Octave community boasts developers from academia and industry, and we believe that emergence of joint projects is not unlikely. Connections made while contributing to the Octave community represent potential career opportunities for students, and successful student interns will be encouraged to continue their collaboration. This will be achieved by actively inviting students to continue and extend participation in Octave and Octave Forge projects, depending on their interests and code submitted.
Everything should be very open. Almost all interactions with the student should be public, so that e.g. contacting the mentor should happen in the public IRC channel or CC'ing the public mailing list. For shy students, The reports should be on a blog. The blogs will be aggregated at http://planet.octave.org.
 
For some projects, there may be way to bridge them directly into industry projects. We hope that we can increase the student's participation this way.
 
=== What will you do to encourage that your accepted students stick with the project after Google Summer of Code concludes? ===
 
We will encourage students and mentors to keep in touch after the program. We will integrate as soon as possible the code into our codebase, and we will forward bugs and positive feedback directly to the responsible students. Possibility of the student staying after GSoC  will be our primary concern when selecting students.


=== Are you a new organization who has a Googler or other organization to vouch for you? If so, please list their name(s) here. ===
=== Are you a new organization who has a Googler or other organization to vouch for you? If so, please list their name(s) here. ===


Yes, GNU can vouch for us.
Yes, GNU can vouch for us.
Dick Lyon <dicklyon@google.com> will also vouch for us.


=== Are you an established or larger organization who would like to vouch for a new organization applying this year? If so, please list their name(s) here. ===
=== Are you an established or larger organization who would like to vouch for a new organization applying this year? If so, please list their name(s) here. ===


No.
No.
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