Summer of Code org application is in

["Justin C. Sherrill" <justin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I completed the application for Google Summer of Code 2010 for DragonFly. 
Here's hoping we get in again!  I'm pretty optimistic we will; if you're a
student, start planning now.  You can't be _too_ ready.

The text for this year's application is below.  It is similar to last
years, which I don't remember if I posted...  If anyone has suggestions, I
can make modifications until the 12th.

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

Organization Name:

DragonFly BSD

Description:

DragonFly BSD, originally branched from FreeBSD on 2003, is working on a
new approach to SMP and other kernel systems to enable an open source
Single System Image operating system.  Along the way, we've been picking
up improvements from other BSDs and generally streamlining the underlying
30-year-old BSD code base, with a preference towards making systems less
complex and easier to maintain.

Home page:

http://www.dragonflybsd.org

Main Organization License:

New and Simplified BSD Licenses

Why is your organization applying to participate in GSoC 2010? What do you
hope to gain by participating?

We've found two benefits from Summer of
Code participation.  One is the
attention, where Summer of Code work
spreads out from the student and mentor
activity to other users and developers
for DragonFly.  It increases the
activity level of the overall project,
to a greater amount than just the direct
participants.

The other advantage is that it serves as
a starting point for new projects.
Major subsystems in DragonFly have been
created as part of Summer of Code
projects, and more people see this and
new projects tend to get started because
the idea of starting a new project gets
into people's heads.

Did your organization participate in past GSoCs? If so, please summarize
your involvement and the successes and challenges of your participation.

We participated in the 2008 and 2009
Summer of Code projects.  We had a few
failures, each of which can be
attributed to the students biting off
more than they could chew.  Those
students are still active with DragonFly.

A number of the projects have become
major parts of DragonFly - the LiveDVD
project, the port to 64-bit, C99/POSIX
conformance, and a dynamic device file
system, among others.

If your organization participated in past GSoCs, please let us know the
ratio of students passing to students allocated, e.g. 2006: 3/6 for 3 out
of 6 students passed in 2006.

5/7 in 2008.  4/5 in 2009.

Deadline problems seem to be the
reoccurring problem; I plan (if the
project is accepted) to be much more
vigorous in early schedule planning and
checkpoints, in an effort to stave off
this problem.

If your organization has not previously participated in GSoC, have you
applied in the past? If so, for what year(s)?

Not applicable.

What is the URL for your ideas page?

http://www.dragonflybsd.org/docs/developer/gsoc2010/

What is the main development mailing list for your organization? This
question will be shown to students who would like to get more information
about applying to your organization for GSoC 2010. If your organization
uses more than one list, please make sure to include a description of the
list so students know which to use.

kernel@dragonflybsd.org

(signup information here:
http://www.dragonflybsd.org/mailinglists/)

What is the main IRC channel for your organization?

#dragonflybsd on EFNet

Does your organization have an application template you would like to see
students use? If so, please provide it now. Please note that it is a very
good idea to ask students to provide you with their contact information as
part of your template. Their contact details will not be shared with you
automatically via the GSoC 2010 site.

Name:
Email:
Phone number (include country and area
code):
Project title:

Description of project goals, including
details of how the delivered code will
operate

Project timeline broken down by week,
with details on when each feature
described in
the project goals will be available.

Week 1:
Week 2:
Week 3:
Week 4:
Week 5:
Week 6:
Week 7:
Week 8:
Week 9:
Week 10:

What additional resources as hardware or
software will be needed for this project?

Please include or provide links to prior
code related to this area of work.

We also have a set of standards for the
students to follow located on the website:
http://www.dragonflybsd.org/docs/developer/gsoc2010student/

What criteria did you use to select the individuals who will act as
mentors for your organization? Please be as specific as possible:

Someone who has been interacting with
the DragonFly community for an extended
period.  This person must have
previously participated in technical
discussion, and be interested in the
direction the project's taking (as
opposed to participating to argue it's
all wrong.)  They also have to be
sympathetic to dealing with others.

This is very often the same
characteristic that leads to someone
being given commit access, so an easy
shortcut would be to say "usually, but
not always, committers."

What is your plan for dealing with disappearing students?

Maintain frequent contact so that a
disappearing contributor can be detected
as early as possible.

When a contributor does go AWOL, try to
contact them via email, though common
acquaintances, or if another project
member is geographically close enough,
in person.

Once we get in contact, find out what's
up.  If the project is
salvageable, shape a new schedule and go
forward.  If the contributor disappears
before the halfway point for the
session, it's an automatic fail, since
it's very unlikely the work can recover
at that point.


What is your plan for dealing with disappearing mentors?

Pre-emptively: maintain frequent contact with mentors to know when they've
disappeared, and contact with the students in case the mentor ceases to
interact with them. The students need to be ready to "escalate" as soon as
possible.

If it does happen: recruit assistance from existing mentors until a new
mentor from the existing developers can be found and put into place.

Once a new mentor is in place, re-evaluate the student's work schedule and
progress in light of the (inevitable) lost time and ability of the new
mentor to catch up, and establish goals based on that.

We had exactly this happen in 2008, on one of the most complex projects;
however, the project was still successful doing the above steps.

What steps will you take to encourage students to interact with your
project's community before, during and after the program?

Pre-SoC, postings on the mailing list
and the DragonFly Digest are there to
notify people of DragonFly's (intended)
participation in the project.  Ideas are
posted on the website, and suggestions
have been discussed on the DragonFly
mailing lists.

During the program, frequent
communication between mentor and
student, between student and SoC
coordinator, and with other DragonFly
users and developers on both the mailing
lists and on IRC is expected.  Students
are asked to provide reports to the
mailing list or by updating a wiki page
to show status outside of the plain code.

After the project: more of the same.
While there won't be the structure of
the Summer of Code project,
communication about the work being done
should continue to draw in the former
contributor, especially if we make clear
the value of the completed project to
the people involved with DragonFly.


What will you do to ensure that your accepted students stick with the
project after GSoC concludes?

The goal is to invest students in the
feedback they get, so that
interacting with the group becomes a
habit that isn't directly supported by
the Summer of Code project.  We reward
contributors by celebrating the work
they did, and (whenever feasible)
bringing it permanently into DragonFly.


Is there anything else you would like to tell the Google Summer of Code
program administration team? :

The fresh blood? air? thoughts? this has
been bringing to DragonFly on a yearly
basis is wonderfully refreshing.

Backup Admin (Link ID):

matthias