Archive for 2013 emails

1. Call for ideas

When: 2-3 weeks before GSoC organization applications are due

Subject: GSoC 2014 call for ideas
To: desktop-devel-list , soc-mentors-list
CC: soc-admins

Dear GNOME hackers,

It's that time of the year again: Google Summer of Code is approaching. We've updated our program pages [1] to have the latest information and we need your help in creating a list of great project ideas. It's essential that we have a well-prepared ideas page when GNOME applies as a mentoring organization by February 14.

So what should you do? Please visit the ideas page [2] and enter your project ideas under the "Untriaged Ideas" section.

 * Discuss your ideas with designers in #gnome-design to get their input and plan collaboration, especially if your ideas are related to one of the core GNOME modules. If you are not sure who to speak to, start with Allan Day (aday).
 * Consider manageable ideas consisting of multiple smaller features that share a common theme, in addition to single large feature ideas. See the information for mentors page [3] for more on preferred project formats and other mentoring resources.

If you are interested in being a mentor this year or at any point find yourself drafted to be one, please join soc-mentors-list [4] to receive future communications about GNOME's participation in GSoC, including the information about important deadlines.

Finally, if you would like to throw your hat in the ring for triaging the ideas and proposals, helping students find their way in GNOME, and do other GSoC related tasks, pop on over to #soc-admin and join the team of friendly administrators. So far, it consists of Alexandre Franke, Christophe Fergeau, Fabiano Fidencio and Marina Zhurakhinskaya, and we would welcome a couple more members. Big thank you to Zeeshan Ali, who was an administrator last year, and to Daniel Siegel, who was an administrator for 5 years!

Cheers,
The GNOME Google Summer of Code Administrators

[1] https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014
[2] https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/Ideas
[3] https://live.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/Mentors
[4] https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/soc-mentors-list

2. GSoC and OPW are ON!

When: the day Google announces organizations accepted for GSoC

Subject: GSoC and OPW are ON!
To: desktop-devel-list , foundation-list, gnome-soc-list, gnome-women-list
CC: soc-admins, women-outreach, soc-mentors-list

Hi all,

GNOME was accepted for GSoC and we are organizing OPW! \\o//

Thanks to so many mentors who've already listed project ideas. It's not too late to add more coding ideas, which are shared between GSoC and OPW [1]. Also, please add your non-coding ideas for OPW [2].

In the next 3 weeks, prospective applicants are asked to work with mentors on making relevant contributions and putting together a project proposal [3] [4].

Everyone, please help us spread the word about both opportunities by encouraging people personally to apply, posting on social networks, sending the information to the university departments and technology groups, and posting the flyers on university campuses or handing them out at conferences. Sample e-mail, sample social network updates, and flyers are available on the spread the word page [5].

Thanks,
Marina

[1] https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/Ideas
[2] https://wiki.gnome.org/GnomeWomen/OutreachProgram/2014/MayAugust
[3] https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/Students
[4] https://wiki.gnome.org/OutreachProgramForWomen#Application_Process
[5] https://wiki.gnome.org/OutreachProgramForWomen/2014/MayAugust/SpreadTheWord

3. Ask mentors to register in melange

When: a few days after the GSoC applications open to students

Subject: please register to view student's applications
To: soc-mentors-list

Dear mentors,

The GSoC application system opened to students on Monday and we already have a few applications in. Here is what you can do to help:

 - register and "start connection" with GNOME
 - review proposals
 - provide public feedback to students
 - provide private feedback to other mentors and admins
 - score proposals; please provide your score and an explanation in a private comment
 - select "Wish to mentor" if you are willing to mentor the student

http://www.google-melange.com/gsoc/homepage/google/gsoc2014

Please use the following scoring system (and update any scores you have already set to reflect it):

5 = rockstar proposal, the student is very experienced and will excel
4 = strong proposal, the student will do a good job
3 = reasonable proposal, but the student is somewhat inexperienced
2 = marginal proposal, the student is unlikely to do a good job
1 = poor proposal, the student is not a good candidate

Thanks,
Marina

4. Welcome to summer of code

Placed in "Message to accepted students" on the organization page in Melange.

Dear GNOME-loving student,

Congratulations: you did it! The GNOME community is glad to welcome
you, and to have you participate in Google Summer of Code and work
on GNOME!

Some of you already know the GNOME community quite well, but it might
not be the case for every one of you. That's not a problem: GSoC has a
community bonding time, where you will have a few weeks to get to know
the community before starting the real work. That's a really good
thing, and we hope you'll be able to see how great, friendly and
helpful the GNOME community is!

The first thing we want you to do is to contact your mentor. Write her
or him a nice mail or buy her/him a beer (or some juice) if you happen
to live in the same city :-).

If during the GSoC, you have a problem with your mentor (lack of
communication, or misunderstandings, or deep disagreements, or
anything else), don't hesitate to report that to the GNOME
administrators (listed on
https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/ ):
they'll be there to help with this kind of things and their goal is
to make sure that you feel good, so they will work hard to fix any
issue with your mentor. But hopefully, this won't be needed: all
mentors and administrators are nice people (or at least, they're
supposed to be ;-)).

We will subscribe you to our mailing list for the Summer of Code:

 http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-soc-list

This is the list where mails will be sent when we need to reach all of
you. Feel free to use this list for discussion between all mentored
students, or to ask questions about GNOME, or about the community or
about anything you need.

To begin things, it would be great if you send to this list an
introduction mail so that the whole community knows about you, your
project, your plans, etc.

You can then use your introduction mail to fill the wiki page for your
GSoC project. First, add a link to it from a page that lists all
projects, then create a wiki page for your individual project.

 https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/Projects

This is a good place to introduce your project, link to the blog posts
you'll write, link to your code, etc. See the wiki pages from
last year if you need some examples:

 https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2013/Projects

Feel free to edit other pages of the GNOME wiki too. This is where we
post the information relevant to the GNOME projects. From time to time,
you might like to look through the recent changes page to see what's
going on in GNOME.

 https://live.gnome.org/RecentChanges

Planet GNOME is an aggregator of blogs of GNOME contributors. From now
on, it will serve as your morning newspaper :-). We ask that you add
your blog to Planet GNOME, creating a new blog if necessary, and write
updates about your work during the internship period every two weeks.
Of course, you are welcome to blog more often too! It is exciting that
you will have a voice on Planet GNOME right from the start and it is a
very important way to let the GNOME community know about the work you
are doing! This will also allow us to keep track of your progress.
Once your blog is added, please write an introductory post and start
blogging about your work on GNOME and other things that you see
relevant for Planet GNOME.

 http://planet.gnome.org

Here is what you need to do to get yourself added to Planet GNOME.
You need to have a link to your blog or to a category of posts in your
blog AND a hackergotchi ready for that. This page has all the details:

 http://live.gnome.org/PlanetGnome

In particular, see "Do I have to only blog about GNOME things?"
section which explains that it's great to have posts about other
things that interest you aggregated on Planet GNOME, as long as they
can be of interest to other people in the community. So you should
decide whether you want to add your full blog or just a category
based on how frequently you blog and the range of topics you blog
about.

Once you have the hackergotchi and the blog feed ready, file a bug
with them. Include your IRC nick as well. Be sure to use the right
Bugzilla product ('website') and component ('planet.gnome.org') for
your bug.

 https://bugzilla.gnome.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=website&component=planet.gnome.org

Mention that you are a GSoC student in the bug. That will get your
blog added fast even if it is completely new and will waive the
requirement of being the GNOME Foundation member. You will get a
special GSoC logo next to your posts on Planet GNOME.

Other mailing lists that might be of interest to you are the
desktop-devel-list and the gnome-love list:

 https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/desktop-devel-list
 http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-love

You can participate in the general discussion on the
desktop-devel-list, and ask questions if you have problems with
building GNOME, or if you're not sure how to do something on
gnome-love list. You should also subscribe to the mailing
list relevant to your project.

You should join #gnome-hackers, #gnome-love, and #soc IRC channels
on GIMPNet (irc.gnome.org), as well as the channels relevant to
your project and other channels that might be of interest to you.
It's fine to just lurk on IRC. IRC is where people talk in GNOME,
and it is a great way to learn and discuss things. See this page
for more information:

 https://wiki.gnome.org/Community/GettingInTouch/IRC

If you prefer to use an address different from your gmail (or
google account) address to communicate, please tell the
administrators.

If your school starts before August 18, and you have vacation
time between now and May 19, we would like to encourage you to
start on your projects early.

That's all for now. If you have any questions, feel free to send
a mail to the administrators or the mailing lists, or ask your
mentor.

Small summary:
 + make sure you're in contact with your mentor(s)
 + create the wiki page for your project
 + get your blog added to Planet GNOME
 + subscribe to relevant mailing lists
 + hang out on IRC
 + introduce yourself on gnome-soc-list and on Planet GNOME
 + start early if you will be busy with school towards the end

Welcome and Congratulations!

Cheers,
GNOME GSoC Administrators

5. Mail for rejected students

Placed in "Message to rejected students" on the organization page in Melange.

Dear student,

Unfortunately, your proposal has not been accepted as a Google Summer of
Code 2014 project for GNOME.

Thanks a lot for your proposal. We are very honored that you took the
time to submit a proposal to make GNOME better. 

The response to the program has been very strong this year, with more
students than we could accept successfully completing the required
contribution and establishing a relationship with a project they applied
for. We looked at the strength of the student's coding sills, history of
involvement in GNOME and free software, and relevance of the proposed
project for GNOME, when making the selection decisions.

We would love to have you as part of GNOME and help you gain more
experience with the project. There's no need to be a GSoC student to make
great contributions and learn more!

The mentor you worked with during the application process would be
happy to continue informally guiding you in your contributions to the
project. Please reach out to them with any questions you have and
continue creating patches as your time allows. Feel free to stick to the
project plan in your proposal. Be sure to join the IRC channel and the
mailing list of the project you are interested in, and talk to other
people too. Every project appreciates and respects new contributors!

Check out the GNOME Love initiative at http://live.gnome.org/GnomeLove .
Its whole purpose is to help people get on their feet in the GNOME
community. There is a mailing list, an IRC channel, a list of mentors,
and a huge list of bugs that would be good for newcomers to work on.
Feel free to find a different project or try contributing to a few.

If you have any questions or concerns about how to proceed now or
throughout the summer, please don't hesitate to contact GNOME GSoC
administrators listed on https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/ .

Again, thanks for showing an interest in working with the GNOME
community. We hope to see you around, and perhaps in a future GSoC!

Best wishes,
GNOME GSoC Administrators

6. Introducing the interns

Subject: Welcome interns!
To: foundation-list, desktop-devel-list, gnome-soc-list, gnome-opw-interns-may-2014

Hi all,

GNOME accepted 35 Google Summer of Code and 3 Outreach Program for Women interns! Additionally, one student submitted the same proposal with GNOME and with the Mono Project to work on F-Spot, and was accepted by the Mono Project. All the interns made a contribution to the project they were applying to work on and connected with their mentors during the application process. We are thrilled to have these talented and dedicated contributors have a chance to spend the whole summer working on GNOME! Thanks to Google, Red Hat, HP, and the Linux Foundation for making these internships possible!

Thank you to all the mentors who helped the applicants along the way and will guide the participants this summer! We are especially glad to have returning mentors Cosimo Cecchi, Izidor Matušov, and Arth Patel, as well as new mentors Fabiano Fidencio, Mattias Bengtsson, Giovanni Campagna, Mathieu Duponchelle, Tobias Mueller, and Sindhu Sundar, all of whom have participated in GSoC before (and Sindhu participated in OPW too)! Everyone, please help out mentors from your project by also helping the participants when possible.

Please feel free to arrange to meet with interns from your town for beer, juice, and/or hacking! (Interns, please feel free to reply with an update if you are in a different city this summer from where your school is.)

Below, is the list of all the interns’ projects. You can learn more about them at https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/Projects and https://wiki.gnome.org/GnomeWomen/OutreachProgram/2014/MayAugust/Projects as the interns fill these pages out. The interns will blog about their work on Planet GNOME throughout the summer.

Thanks to everyone and welcome to the interns!
Marina, on behalf of GSoC and OPW admins

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[List of interns and their projects grouped by module. Format:

= Module Name =

Intern Name (IRC nick) - “Project Name”
location: City, (State), Country ‎ 
mentor: Mentor Name

See https://mail.gnome.org/archives/foundation-list/2014-April/msg00098.html ]

7. Midterm evaluations are due

Subject: Midterm evaluations are due!
To: soc-mentors-list
CC: soc-admins

Dear mentors,

GSoC midterm evaluations are due on Friday at 7pm UTC. However, to keep your friendly GSoC admins unoccupied, please fill them out by end-of-day on Wednesday, so that we don't need to be tracking you down on Thursday.

http://www.google-melange.com/gsoc/dashboard/google/gsoc2014

Please let us know if you have any concerns about your student.

Thanks,
Marina

8. Organizing interns' lightning talks at GUADEC - e-mail 1

When: as soon as the interns received sponsorship decisions from the travel committee; can get a preliminary list of attending interns from the travel committee; content in e-mail 1 and 2 can be mixed and matched or combined into one e-mail

Subject: interns' lightning talks at GUADEC
To: gnome-soc-list, gnome-opw-interns-december-2013, gnome-opw-interns-may-2014
CC: soc-admins, soc-mentors-list, women-outreach

Dear interns,

Every year, we have an interns' lightning talks session at GUADEC, which is a very popular event. You will likely have 3 minutes allocated during which you will be able to present your work using no more than 5 slides.

Sometimes interns hesitate about doing the talk because they've never done one before or English is their second language. I'd like to assure you it will be the friendliest and most supportive environment to make your speaking debut and English is a second language for the majority of GUADEC attendees. GSoC admins, your mentors, or other interns will usually be happy to help you rehearse your talk at some earlier point during GUADEC. Interns also typically enjoy having an opportunity to speak about their project after going to many talks by other people. You can watch the video of the interns' lightning talks session from last year to see what it was like: http://www.superlectures.com/guadec2013/interns-lightning-talks

To finalize how much time we need for the session and how much time we can allocate per talk, we need to know who among you is planning to attend GUADEC. I'm aware of the following interns planning to attend. Please let me know in the next few days if your plans change or if you are attending, but I'm missing you on the list.

1) Intern Name
2) ...

I'll provide more information about preparing for your talks once I know how many of you will be at GUADEC.

Thanks,
Marina

9. Organizing interns' lightning talks at GUADEC - e-mail 2

When: when the number of interns attending GUADEC is updated based on replies and the session time and length are finalized

Subject: Re: interns' lightning talks at GUADEC
To: gnome-soc-list, gnome-opw-interns-december-2013, gnome-opw-interns-may-2014
CC: christophe, soc-admins, soc-mentors-list, women-outreach

Dear interns,

We have an interns' lightning talks session scheduled at GUADEC for 4:45pm - 6:30pm on Sunday, July 27. It's organized by me and Christophe Fergeau (christophe e-mail). Please send your attendance updates, questions, and slides to us off list. If you think others might have the same question as you, please feel free to reply-all.

You will have 3 minutes for your presentation, and all the slides will be compiled in one presentation file ahead of time. Please send your slides to us in the .pdf format by Wednesday, July 23. (If you are using LibreOffice, you can use File -> Export as PDF... to convert slides to .pdf format.) You can have up to 3 slides with text/screenshots, and optionally up to 2 more slides with screenshots and only a short caption. Please include your name, your mentor's name, project, and program on the first slide. Please practice to be sure you can complete your presentation in under 3 minutes.

We will compile all your slides in one big pdf, so there will be no time lost on switching between files or computers.

We are now aware of the interns on the list below planning to attend GUADEC. Please let us know if your plans changed or if you are attending, but we are missing you on the list.

The core days schedule is at https://www.guadec.org/schedule and the hackfest and BoF days schedule is being planned out on https://wiki.gnome.org/GUADEC/2014/BOFs . BoF stands for "Birds of a Feather", as in a saying "birds of a feather flock together", which means a working discussion about a specific topic of interest in a group of people who share that interest. If you don't have specific plans for BoF days, but are planning to be at the conference, please see if there is any BoF you would like to attend or talk to your mentor about adding a BoF relevant to the project you are working on to the list. At the very least, please plan to have some time for a hacking session with your mentor.

We'll also plan on grabbing tables together for lunch on Saturday, July 26, the first day of GUADEC.

Thanks,
Marina

Updated list of interns attending GUADEC:

1) Intern Name
2) ...

10. Final evaluations are due

Subject: Final evaluations are due!
To: soc-mentors-list
CC: soc-admins

Dear mentors,

GSoC final evaluations are due on Friday at 7pm UTC. However, to keep your friendly GSoC admins unoccupied, please fill them out by end-of-day on Wednesday, so that we don't need to be tracking you down on Thursday.

http://www.google-melange.com/gsoc/dashboard/google/gsoc2014

Please let us know if you have any concerns about your student.

Thank you for being a mentor this summer! Please be sure to encourage your student to stay involved with specific recommendations for what they can work on and continue mentoring them in their involvement in GNOME! 

Thanks,
Marina

11. Wrap-up e-mail for interns

Subject: GNOME internships wrap-up
To: gnome-soc-list, gnome-opw-interns-may-2014
CC: soc-mentors-list, women-outreach, soc-admins

Dear GNOME GSoC and OPW 2014 interns,

Thank you for all your contributions to GNOME this summer!

If you have not done so already, please be sure to do the following this week:
1) Update your page at https://wiki.gnome.org/Outreach/SummerOfCode/2014/Projects or https://wiki.gnome.org/GnomeWomen/OutreachProgram/2014/MayAugust/Projects , including links to your merged or work-in-progress contributions
2) Write a wrap-up blog post
3) (GSoC only) Fill out the final evaluation from Google

If your code or other contributions have not been merged yet, please do your best to follow through the review process to merge what you worked on this summer as soon as possible.

We would love to see you continue contributing to GNOME. Please feel free to continue asking your mentor and other members of the GNOME community for guidance and advice in your participation in GNOME.

Your blogs will continue being aggregated on Planet GNOME for another half a year. After that, you would need to be the GNOME Foundation member to keep your blog on Planet GNOME. If you contributed to GNOME before the GSoC application process and are not yet a member, you should consider applying for the membership soon. If you only started contributing to GNOME after February 2014, we ask that you continue contributing for another half a year before applying. http://www.gnome.org/foundation/membership/apply/

Thanks,
Marina

CategoryGsoc