GSoC/2016/Introduction for Students (Meeting)

This is the log of the IRC meeting that was held on March 10 for students to get started. arushi malayaleecoder m_ @stultus Apollyon anushbmx noteness Irumbu_Moideen sagarhani jp-logger manu-chroma grambot bsc wm-bot4 santhosh_ @jishnu7 santhosh @ChanServ shall we begin? ok [20:29] hope everyone is here I am in :) [20:30] present.    #smc-project yes jishnu7, asdofindia bsc Irumbu_Moideen  bsc, please take a log   [20:31] is nkn__ not attending? jerin, this is just a general meeting for students   [20:32] stultus, okay.  ok. so  I suppose everyone is applying for the gsoc for the first time								        [20:33] yes yes yes yes. Yes. the main purpose of GSoC is to spread opensource culture among	  students   [20:35]								        [20:36] So we are expecting the students to be passionate about a few things 								        [20:37] 1.  Technology (obviously)  2. The FOSS philosophy  3. The Community  mainly this should be the main motivational factor for participating  the stipend google gives is an added advantage. but please don't	  apply just for the money. If money is the motivation you should try	  to get a freelance project instead   [20:39] About 2 & 3, many students might be new to open source development. So I wouldn't call it a hard requirement. I'm not saying that the students should be already familiar with 2 & 3  [20:40] But, the hopes that Google has and we have is definitely about cultivating that passion. as an organization this is our 4th time in gsoc  [20:42]  yes most of our past gsoc participants are currently very active in our community  [20:43] some of them are possible mentors and they are contributing code/effort whenever they get time. [20:44] so during gsoc, we are looking for more community members So I hope everyone is already (mentally) part of the community [20:45] yes  Yes  yes! [20:46] This is our main expectation for GSoC Sure is +1 Now lets move to the process  ok [20:47] students can propose(officially) their projects from 15th onwards ok projects can either be one selected from the proposed ideas (	 http://wiki.smc.org.in/GSoC/2016/Project_ideas )   [20:48] or something that the student proposes (which is not listed in the	 ideas page) #smc-project [20:50] if you are proposing a new project, it should be our organizations domain(indic language computing in our case). or something that a	 community member can mentor channel #smc-project [20:51] once we have the proposals in hand, we will evaluate those proposals the criteria for evaluation will be different for different projects but mainly, we will be looking for the following points  [20:52] 1. is the student technically capable to complete the project? 2. is s/he showing the community spirit? [20:54] 3. is s/he able to communicate properly to the community(mentor) wrt the project (implementations,hurdles,new ideas etc)  [20:55] 1. will be clear from the proposals and other code-level interactions (small bug-fixes, and other communications) [20:56] after the evaluation, we will be shortlisting the candidates. and we will prioritize the projects. (I'll tell you why)  [20:57] and after this process we will request the number of slots to google [20:58] ie if we find 5 proposals as good enough. we will ask for 5 slots but it is upto google to allot the slots  [20:59] they will have a pre-fixed budget and all, and based on that, they'll allocate the slots. if we request for 5 slots, we will get <=5 slots. and if the slots are < 5  [21:00] we will select the students based on the priority list ^ hope this is clear to everyone  [21:01] any doubts ?  no All fine What bug-fixes should I do to prove myself to the community? [21:02] spechide, I'll come to that point channel #smc-project ok   Client Quit  [21:03] Before that, lets see what we are expecting from a student FIne ok  Yes.I want to work in android project, indic-keyboard. What all fixes sould be done? #smc-project 1. while communicating with the community (either through irc or the	 mailing list), you should follow the basic etiquette   [21:04] this will be a good read on that - http://www.catb.org/esr/faqs/smart-questions.html  [21:05] spechide, puneet_. Keep in mind that figuring out which bugs are important, which bugs are fixable all by oneself also proves a	    point. seconds Please don't expect spoon feeding from us. It is completely fine to ask for help. but that should be your last option. [21:07] sorry when you are stuck, use a search engine to find if a solution is	 already available for your problem  sorry you don't have to apologize now, we know that most of you are new to	 this kind of a community culture   [21:08] so I suggest reading the above document (the link that I pasted	 above) and after trying everything (searching online, searching through the	 mailing list archives) if you are still stuck, feel free to ask in	  irc or the  mailing list   [21:09] someone will help you. [21:10] also this is one place where you can show the community spirit. talking about community culture. Imagine it is Gandhi Jayanthi and some people are cleaning up a road in your place. You just go	    in there, see what's happening, and help in whatever ways you can. [21:11] If you see someone asking for help, and if you know how to help, you should jump in and help them please provide link for irc log, so that latecomer can catch up	  the discussion here :-) tachyons, will do   [21:12] for example,  you might have spent hours to get the codebase running. and after	  that when you see someone complaining about some errors that block	  them from running the code,  [21:13]    connection you know how you passed that hurdle, so you should help them  this is how a community works. according to the hacker culture, no	  problem should be solved twice, so share your knowledge with others,	  help them when they are stuck, this is how we progress   [21:14] (IIIT people can sit together in their labs!)  that reminds me of this --	  http://www.catb.org/esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html   [21:15] try to read this when you get time :) hehe  :P :P  ok :D [21:16] ok ;) one more thing you should keep in mind is that all of us have our dayjob and other responsibilities. we all are	 volunteering here in our free time (or the time that we find specifically for this purpose)  [21:17] I'm not from IIIT : so if you don't see any response from a mentor, chances are high	  that person might be busy with something else  so please give them some time to respond. and if he is not	  responding even after a considerable amount of time, it is	  completely fine to remind him   [21:18] but please respect their time and schedule   [21:19] also please don't send personal mails to the mentors.  all of our mentors are there in the student mailing list. if you	  send mails to that list the respective mentor will see it.  info: #smc-project and #silpa are both logged and monitored by	     most of the mentors. So, everyone is reading your questions.								        [21:20] they might have created filters to handle the mails to avoid	  distraction. so if they get 50 mails per day from wannabe gsoc	  aspirants, they will be in trouble   [21:21] so please use the mailing list. there is one more advantage in using the mailing list Also it will make things more transparent. ^ yes  [21:22] and more than one student will have the same doubts. if we discuss those in the mailing list, other can benefit from that too that is also part of the community culture any doubts ? [21:23] No no  understood :) [21:24]  if we need to ask about a particular project, should we ask on their	  respective irc channel?  :) puneet_, if it is a general question, you should ask in the mailing list  ok [21:25] puneet_, if it is an urgent thing, you should use both mailing list and the irc puneet_, if it is a small thing (if you are stuck while compiling	 etc) you can ask in irc and for libindic related purposes use #silpa channel  [21:26] and for varnam related purposes use #varnamproject channel for all other purposes use this channel IRC = good for quick one-line communication. Email = good for long, thoughtful communication. As you participate, it becomes intuitive which channel is good for what. #smc-project [21:28] and please don't initiate one-to-one chat in the irc without asking first. [21:29] start by reading the documentation and the code of the project that you are interested to contribute  [21:30] then try to get it running in your local machine, if the documentation is out of date, you'll understand that during this process. if that is the case, contribute by updating the documentation (README/install instructions etc.)  [21:31] then check the issue list. and try to fix the existing issues. selecting the issues are totally upto you. that will depend on your skillset and your interest  [21:32] but please check with the developer before trying to fix them. because,sometimes the issues list might be outdated [21:33] I think I already explained how to be in touch with the mentors and the community  [21:34] there are 4 mailing list that might interest you. 1. smc-discuss - the main smc mailing list (there will be	 conversations in malayalam in this mailing list ) 2. silpa-discuss - for libindic   [21:35] 3. maling list of varnamproject 4. students mailing list - for gsoc and other mentoring purposes you can find the links from the smc website and gsoc page in the wiki  [21:36] ok?  yes these are the main things I wanted to convey. hope I was able to communicate those well.  yeah :) [21:37] please ask any questions if you have. (and feel free to answer the questions that you know :D ) Ok   ok  hello, wasn't there in the beginning so I just read the chat and	   now I am caught up stultus, log of the channels ?  [21:38] I'll post the log as soon as the meeting is officially over <Apollyon> @stultus thanks for the briefing Alright :) and the meeting is over if there are no questions. <Apollyon> okay :D so, any questions? here is the logs - http://paste.debian.net/413919/ <Apollyon> I have a couple of doubts log* asdofindia, please send the link to the lists  [21:39] asdofindia, and handle the doubts :D Apollyon? [21:40] <Apollyon> Is it possible to know priorities ? I have heard that some other orgs are giving priorities and I am new to this org and that is why I am asking I was wondering why nobody asked that. I had the same doubt :) [21:41] <Apollyon> Completely understand if you guys are no reveling them We will hold a meeting of mentors and see if we can come out with	     a list of priority *before* the student application window. <Apollyon> Oh it would be great if you guys do :D  [21:42] <Apollyon> would help us in making a better proposal ourselves But it would be wise to choose a project that suits you best	     rather than choose the top priority.  [21:43] Try to participate in a project that you feel you can do. Not the one      that have "high" priority. �05stultus�: Priorities <Apollyon> true.  �05stultus�: 1. If  student A's seems to be more capable than	  student B - his project will get more priority  [21:44] Also, we might have to change the priority based on the strength	     of application.  �05stultus�: ^ that What is grambot? *curious* grambot is a bot that communicates telepathically with people who are afk [21:45] What if multiple students are interested in the same project?... �05stultus�: I think this is already explained in the process session [21:46] asdofindia: how does grambot work? can you share the source code? "if it open and consumable to the general public" [21:47] yes. whoever is best for a project will get that project. <Apollyon> Also, How many seats are you expecting this year ? [21:48] we weren't selected last year. Google decides the number of seats, ultimately. [21:49] <SREENADH> Hi, I went through the project ideas listed and would like to know regarding the projects under unconfirmed mentor section as am	  interested in one of it :) <Apollyon> Yeah I noticed. That was why I asked if there was some kind of	   estimate that you guys are given  [21:50] �05stultus�: We will confirm the mentors within a day or two								        [21:51] you can see the details of past years at	     http://wiki.smc.org.in/GSoC and we had 5 projects last time. So, around that number is a reasonable expectation. �05stultus�: But feel free to discuss the idea in the mailing list �05stultus�: That reminds me to link this years pages in that page								        [21:52] <Apollyon> Okay nice  [21:55] <Apollyon> 5 seems like a good number SREENADH: be assured you will find a mentor if you are serious	     about any of those ideas. Also, keep in mind that, you can work on the project even if you are	  not selected for GSoC   [21:56]    timeout: 252 seconds and the mentors will be happy to help everyone <SREENADH> Actually that idea is my major project for my BTech course and is successful wrt project completion. would love to contribute more :)								       [21:57] <SREENADH> glad to hear that :) and I think the most difficult idea among the listed one is the spellchecker. [21:58] <Apollyon> these projects do seem intersting and will definitely continue contributing even if I am not selected for the program :) I'm not telling this to demotivate anyone. but that idea is there	 from 2013 onwards  SREENADH: wonderful! Shall read more details in the list.  [21:59] ie we were not impressed on any of the proposals on that idea from	  2013 onwards.  so there will be enough details about that idea in the mailing list	  archives  also check the previous proposals (it will be there in the wiki) 								        [22:00] ^ if you are planning to take that idea To paraphrase a British PM, "when the project gets tough, only	     the tough coders get going"
 * Users on #smc-project: puneet_ jerin kaakku suraj spechide asdofindia gem
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 * asdofindia 's first GSoC too [20:34]
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 * tachyons reading [20:38]
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...a happy conversation followed.