Summer of Code - Getting Started: Difference between revisions

:: '''Join the maintainers mailing list''' or read the archives and see what topics we discuss and how the developers interact with each other.

:: '''Hang out in our IRC channel'''. Ask questions, submit patches, show us that you are motivated and well-prepared. There will be more applicants than we can effectively mentor, so do ask for feedback on your public application to increase the strength of your proposal!

: It's '''critical''' that you '''find a project that excites you'''  You'll be spending most of the summer working on it (we expect you to treat the SoC as a full-time job). But don't just tell us how interested you are, show us. You can do that by fixing a few bugs or interacting with us on IRC well before the deadline. Our experience shows us that successful SoC students demonstrate their interest early and often.

: By working with us to prepare your proposal, you'll be getting to know us and showing us how you approach problems. The best place for this is your wiki user page and the IRC channel.

Octave is mostly written in C++ and its own scripting language that is mostly compatible with Matlab. There are bits and pieces of Fortran, Perl, C, awk, and Unix shell scripts here and there. In addition to being familiar with C++ and Octave's scripting language, successful applicants will be familiar with or able to quickly learn about Octave's infrastructure. You can't spend the whole summer learning how to build Octave or prepare a changeset and still successfully complete your project.

: You will be helping current and future Octave developers by using the same style for changes, commit messages, and so on.  You should also read the same [http://www.gnu.org/software/octave/doc/interpreter/Contributing-Guidelines.html#Contributing-Guidelines contributing] [http://hg.savannah.gnu.org/hgweb/octave/file/tip/etc/HACKING guidelines] we have for everyone.

: We primarily use [https://mailman.cae.wisc.edu/listinfo/octave-maintainers mailing lists] for communication among developers.

: You should follow basic mailing list etiquette. For us, this mostly means "do not [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_posting#Top-posting top post]".

: "I'm good at this, so trust me" isn't enough. You should desribe which algorithms you'll use and how you'll integrate with existing Octave code. You should also prepare a full timeline and goals for the midterm and final evaluations.