Google Summer of Code

Google Summer of Code (GSoC), for those who are not familiar, is an initiative led by Google to encourage students to participate in Open Source projects during their summer break. Projects like JBoss Community, Eclipse Vert.X or Fedora apply to be a mentoring organization and if selected by Google, are paired with students with whom they will mentor. Selected and successful students will receive a stipend from Google for their participation.

The JBoss community has been participating in GSoC for the past several years, with outstanding success, and I am happy to announce that the JBoss community has once again been selected as a mentoring organization for GSoC 2017. I have written about last year's results in the past.

We have posted a list of ideas for proposals for students, but students are also encouraged to submit their own ideas.

How can I participate?

First, review the official timeline for this summer of code, the following is a summary:

  • March 20-April 3: Students submit proposals, interact with mentors and refine proposals
  • April 3-April 21: Projects evaluate proposals, request slots from Google, get slots and assign students to slots
  • May 4: Accepted proposals and students are announced by Google
  • May 4-May 30: Community bonding period - students get to know mentors
  • May 30-August 21: Coding happens
  • September 6: Results are announced

Next, if you are submitting a proposal, it is a good idea to contact the projects and possible mentors as soon as possible, because the individual projects may have additional requirements. Hawkular, for example, requires a non-trivial contribution (i.e. not just code cleanup) from a potential student to be considered.

When submitting, make sure to provide a detailed timeline on what you want to achieve, and when - especially for midterm and final evaluations. Your timeline should probably show weekly and bi-weekly goals against which you can track your progress.

We look forward to seeing your proposals, and to working with you to not only advance open-source software but to also provide an experience in which students can learn and grow in a professional open-source environment.

If you are interested in Vert.X, then you may want to check out their GSoC organization page. Others of interest may be Fedora, Ceph or oVirt.


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Last updated: June 26, 2023