Google Summer of Code 2017: Call for students for Pharo Consortium

*** Please forward this message to students that might be interested ***

Heartiest Congratulations !
Pharo Consortium has been selected as a mentor organisation for Google
Summer of Code 2017.

Google Summer of Code is a global program focused on introducing
students to open source software development.
Students work on a 3 month programming project with an open source
organisation during their break from university.
Read more at https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/

Pharo is a pure object-oriented programming language and a powerful
environment, focused on simplicity and immediate feedback (think IDE
and OS rolled into one).

Everything in Pharo is an object. The entire syntax of Pharo fits on a
postcard coding can be done directly in the debugger. Pharo has super
cool tools that empower you and make you super efficient. Pharo's goal
is to deliver a clean, innovative, free and open-source immersive
environment. By providing a stable and small core system, excellent
developing tools, and maintained releases, Pharo is an attractive
platform to build and deploy mission critical applications. Pharo
fosters a healthy ecosystem of both private and commercial
contributors who advance and maintain the core system and its external
packages.

More information about Pharo is available here: http://www.pharo.org/

We invite all the prospective eligible students to code their summer
away with Pharo Consortium.

Student Responsibilities
...to your Mentor
- Submit quality work
- Regularly communicate work completed, what you intend to do next, and blockers
- Ask for help when something is preventing you from achieving a goal
- Give indication that you are alive and working daily (GSoC)
- Re-evaluate work scope when significantly ahead of expectations (GSoC)
- Communicate with your mentor AND the broader community
- Inform when work capacity will be reduced, as early as possible
(e.g., family, health, other work) (GSoC)
- Listen and respond to feedback

...to the Org Admin

Let them know when there are

- Interaction issues with any mentor or community member
- Significant disagreements involving your work or changes to your work plan

Read more about responsibilities here:
https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/help/responsibilities

Hence, we invite enthusiastic student developers contributors to work
with Pharo Consortium for GSoC 2017.

1. A first list of projects are available here :
http://gsoc.pharo.org/ but more can be found by interacting with
mentors from the Pharo community.

2. Join dedicated channels, #gsoc-students for general interactions
with students on Pharo slack. In order to get an invitation for
pharoproject.slack.com visit the URL here:
http://slackinvites.pharo.org/
Discuss with mentors about the complexity and skills required for the
different projects.

3. Please help fix bugs, open relevant issues, suggest changes,
additional features, help build a roadmap, and interact with mentors
on mailing list and/or slack to get a better insight into projects.
Better the contributions, Better are the chances of selection.

Before applying:
* Knowledge about OOP
* Basic idea about Pharo & Smalltalk syntax and ongoing projects
* Past experience with Pharo & Smalltalk
* Interaction with organisation
You can start with the Pharo MOOC : http://files.pharo.org/mooc/

Guidelines for Proposal:
* Introduction: Clearly defined problem. Current state of things.
Issues you wish to solve and why. Conclude with solution.
* Project goals: Format it like 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. It is
better to promise less and deliver more than to promise a lot and then
fall short.
* Implementation: Longer and more detailed. Provide technical details,
show that you understand the technology and illustrate key technical
elements of your proposed solution.
* Timeline: Make it weekly. Set goals for each week. Be upfront about
other commitments, including exams, classes, travel, internships,
jobs, etc.
* Benefits to Community: Make your case a benefit to the organization.
* Related Work: Research and write how the project fits into the
target organization. Explain related works, similarities &
differences.
* About me: Provide full contact information, email addresses,
websites, IRC nick, postal address and telephone. Write a few
sentences about yourself, previous experiences and why you think
you’re the best for this job.

Submit your proposal early. Keep it short. Include necessary
information. Get it reviewed in the mailing list or Slack channel
before submitting it.

The deadline for submitting your proposal is March 20th to April 3rd
on https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/

Looking forward to great talent joining our organisation this summer.

Warm Regards
Pharo Organisation Admins
(Alexandre Bergel, Jigyasa Grover, Serge Stinckwich & Yuriy Tymchuk)

Advice for Students interested in Google Summer of Code...

This is the time of year when a lot of questions coming to the discuss list are about "How do I get started?"". Here is some step by step advice that should help.

1. *Read the entire g.co/gsoc site; the whole site and the linked materials.*
We spend a lot of time making sure all the information you need available there and at the main program site. Remember, a big part of open source is self-reliance. We expect you to look for answers before you come to us for help.

2. From there go to the main program site: https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/ Read the timeline and the instructions. This will tell you when the student application period opens and when it closes so you know how much time you have to prepare.

3. Now think about you. What computer science subject area or specific issue or problem interests you? What are your skills? What languages do you know? What tools are you familiar with? Make a list.

4. It's time to look through the mentoring orgs on the program site, using tags and your list to narrow down what can be an intimidating list. Pick 3-5 orgs to research in depth.

5. Visit their site and repos. Look at the code. Review the mailing lists and IRC logs to see if you're comfortable with the style of the communication each community uses. Think about what you see versus what you want to work on.

6. Narrow your list down to 1 or 2 orgs and get involved with the Org. File a bug. Better yet, file a patch. Orgs want to see that you are genuinely interested in them.

7. Write your application, one or two at most. This isn't a lottery. Doing a bunch of weak applications *hurts* your chances of being accepted.

8. Make sure your application includes the specific information and format the org asks for as well as what is required by the GSoC app. Double check your work before submitting the application: misspelling in writing has a similar result as does misspelling in code :-)

9. Lastly - but importantly - DO NOT WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE TO APPLY. Every year we get students asking for extensions to the application deadline. We do not give extensions, even if your internet is down, you were in exams, your computer was stolen, the Internet Cafe was unexpectedly closed, you misunderstood the timezone, you were on a plane, or in the hospital, or a riot or a remote place tagging endangered species*. We can't give exceptions so please apply at least one day before the deadline, if not more.

Plus, the longer the org has to review your application the better the chances of acceptance for you.

I hope this helps! Good luck!
Cat

*Actual examples of reasons given.
--
Cat Allman
Open Source Programs Office
Google

developers.google.com/open-source

"Real science studies and makes accessible that knowledge which people at
that period of history think important, and real art transfers this truth
from the domain of knowledge to the domain of feelings. " Leo Tolstoy