Excellent Summary Shameera, a big + 1. GSoC Students,
Shameera is one of the fine exemplar for a success at GSoC project and who eventually got voted into Airavata PMC and as you can see still stays as the core active contributor. You will also notice Supun is another example. The advices below are not just a theory and Shameera has worked them in action and I suggest you take on these seriously. Feel free to prod if you have more questions. Total number of GSoC slots is remaining flat (around 1000 world wide combined for all open source projects) but the students applying is significantly increasing. Within Apache alone we have seen the interest is dubbed already and I will not be surprised if the applications will be tripled from last year. This is all good, GSoC as a program is gaining more prominence and with mentors and students are getting into it much more. What this means to you is, expect lot more scrutiny. If you put in effort now, it will pay off in many ways. Lastly, do not stop on Friday and relax. There are two or three stages of reviews (mentors, foundation level and from google administrators). All these review your applications in various ways up until April 22nd. Central to everything is to understand if you are embracing open source. A key aspect of Open Source is working with the community and understanding the problem you are going to solve in a deep way. So try and work in bits and pieces around your academic schedules and convince the reviewers you are take advantage of the opportunity. Most of the applications today are superficial, they are a good start. But you need lot more convincing details and now is the time for it. Here is a fine example from last year - If you are unable to get around the project much, still put in effort and ask reasonable question and seek help. Lack of public mailing list activity will be a number 1 red flag you need by by pass. Suresh > On Mar 21, 2016, at 1:58 PM, Shameera Rathnayaka <[email protected]> > wrote: > > Hi All, > > It is great to see lot of GSoC proposals coming up for Airavata. More > proposals -> more competitive proposal acceptance. This year Airavata PMC > will try to evaluate proposals regarding some guidelines, having a good > comprehensive proposal with doable milestone is a best way to start. > Evaluation depends not only on how good your proposal is but also how much > you have stepped in that direction. For an example, understanding Airavata > architecture is one major step for those who will work with Airavata server > side or/and some PoC level implementation would help you to show us how much > you are capable of completing the task that you are proposing with your > GSoC proposals. This time Apache GSoC is more competitive hence use your > time wisely from right now to 22nd April(Accepted student proposals announced > date). I think this is fair decision as whole purpose of GSoC is for students > to learn something new and contribute to the Open Source. > > As Airavata PMC we would like to get a GSoC slot for every student, but in > reality we are part of Apache projects pool so let's show your talent and > try to reserve a GSoC slot with Apache this time. > > Good luck with your GSoC 2016, > Thanks, > Shameera (on behalf of Airavata PMC). > -- > Shameera Rathnayaka
