GSoC 2013

GSoC 2013

[Daimrod]

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Hello,

The GNU project asks to each project participating to the GSoC under its
umbrella how many slots they require. Since Aurélien Aptel and Xue Fuqio
have said they were working with other organizations I think my project
(to work on Emacs XWidgets) is the only one remaining but I wanted to be
sure that only one slot was required.

Regards,

-- 
Daimrod/Greg

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Re: GSoC 2013

[Glenn Morris]

Daimrod wrote:

> The GNU project asks to each project participating to the GSoC under its
> umbrella how many slots they require. Since Aurélien Aptel and Xue Fuqio
> have said they were working with other organizations I think my project
> (to work on Emacs XWidgets) is the only one remaining but I wanted to be
> sure that only one slot was required.

I think that's right, but unless you need to let them know right away,
I'd wait a couple of days to see if anyone else comments.

Re: GSoC 2013

[joakim]

Glenn Morris <rgm@gnu.org> writes:

> Daimrod wrote:
>
>> The GNU project asks to each project participating to the GSoC under its
>> umbrella how many slots they require. Since Aurélien Aptel and Xue Fuqio
>> have said they were working with other organizations I think my project
>> (to work on Emacs XWidgets) is the only one remaining but I wanted to be
>> sure that only one slot was required.
>
> I think that's right, but unless you need to let them know right away,
> I'd wait a couple of days to see if anyone else comments.

Apparently we need to say immediately how many slots we require. 

-- 
Joakim Verona

Re: GSoC 2013

[Glenn Morris]

joakim@verona.se wrote:

> Apparently we need to say immediately how many slots we require. 

Well, I only have the information that's been on this mailing list, and
AFAICS the answer is indeed "one".

Re: GSoC 2013

[Daimrod]

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Glenn Morris <rgm@gnu.org> writes:

> Daimrod wrote:
>
>> The GNU project asks to each project participating to the GSoC under its
>> umbrella how many slots they require. Since Aurélien Aptel and Xue Fuqio
>> have said they were working with other organizations I think my project
>> (to work on Emacs XWidgets) is the only one remaining but I wanted to be
>> sure that only one slot was required.
>
> I think that's right, but unless you need to let them know right away,
> I'd wait a couple of days to see if anyone else comments.

The deadline is the 6 May, so we can still wait a little bit.

Regards,

-- 
Daimrod/Greg

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Re: GSoC 2013

[Xue Fuqiao]

On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 2:18 AM, Glenn Morris <rgm@gnu.org> wrote:
> joakim@verona.se wrote:
>
>> Apparently we need to say immediately how many slots we require.
>
> Well, I only have the information that's been on this mailing list, and
> AFAICS the answer is indeed "one".

Well, Stefan just applied to be mentor for GNU, and we are talking about
the VC project now.

--
Best regards, Xue Fuqiao.
http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/

Re: GSoC 2013

[Daimrod]

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Xue Fuqiao <xfq.free@gmail.com> writes:

> On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 2:18 AM, Glenn Morris <rgm@gnu.org> wrote:
>> joakim@verona.se wrote:
>>
>>> Apparently we need to say immediately how many slots we require.
>>
>> Well, I only have the information that's been on this mailing list, and
>> AFAICS the answer is indeed "one".
>
> Well, Stefan just applied to be mentor for GNU, and we are talking about
> the VC project now.

Could you tell us rapidly if you need a slot? I had missed a mail in
which they say they want an answer before today.

-- 
Daimrod/Greg

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Re: GSoC 2013

[Xue Fuqiao]

On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 5:19 PM, Daimrod <daimrod@gmail.com> wrote:
> Xue Fuqiao <xfq.free@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 2:18 AM, Glenn Morris <rgm@gnu.org> wrote:
>>> joakim@verona.se wrote:
>>>
>>>> Apparently we need to say immediately how many slots we require.
>>>
>>> Well, I only have the information that's been on this mailing list, and
>>> AFAICS the answer is indeed "one".
>>
>> Well, Stefan just applied to be mentor for GNU, and we are talking about
>> the VC project now.
>
> Could you tell us rapidly if you need a slot? I had missed a mail in
> which they say they want an answer before today.

ok, I need a slot.  Thanks.

--
Best regards, Xue Fuqiao.
http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/

Re: GSoC 2013

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Xue Fuqiao writes:

 > ok, I need a slot.  Thanks.

Which student are you proposing to mentor?

Re: GSoC 2013

[Daimrod]

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"Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> writes:

> Xue Fuqiao writes:
>
>  > ok, I need a slot.  Thanks.
>
> Which student are you proposing to mentor?

IIUC Xue is the student and Stefan his mentor.

-- 
Daimrod/Greg

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Re: GSoC 2013

[Daimrod]

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Xue Fuqiao <xfq.free@gmail.com> writes:

> On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 5:19 PM, Daimrod <daimrod@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Xue Fuqiao <xfq.free@gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 2:18 AM, Glenn Morris <rgm@gnu.org> wrote:
>>>> joakim@verona.se wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Apparently we need to say immediately how many slots we require.
>>>>
>>>> Well, I only have the information that's been on this mailing list, and
>>>> AFAICS the answer is indeed "one".
>>>
>>> Well, Stefan just applied to be mentor for GNU, and we are talking about
>>> the VC project now.
>>
>> Could you tell us rapidly if you need a slot? I had missed a mail in
>> which they say they want an answer before today.
>
> ok, I need a slot.  Thanks.

Ok, can Stefan or Joakim asks for 2 slots on summer-of-code@gnu.org? (2
essential slots and 2 desired slots)

I think it's better if it's a mentor who makes the request and not a
student.

-- 
Daimrod/Greg

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Re: GSoC 2013

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Daimrod writes:
 > "Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> writes:
 > 
 > > Xue Fuqiao writes:
 > >
 > >  > ok, I need a slot.  Thanks.
 > >
 > > Which student are you proposing to mentor?
 > 
 > IIUC Xue is the student and Stefan his mentor.

Yeah, that was my point.  I don't know what Stefan is saying off list,
but clearly it's too little, too late.  It's really bad form to have
the student participating in the slot request process on a public
list, don't you think?

Note I don't blame Fuqiao.  Although I don't know his work in detail,
he seems to be precisely the kind of student that GSoC wants to
support, engaged in Emacs development and likely to continue.  But
that Emacs is so disorganized as a GSoC subproject that he could
actually come to the point of posting such a thing speaks volumes
about Emacs (as a GSoC subproject).

Re: GSoC 2013

[chad]

On 05 May 2013, at 08:48, "Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> wrote:
> It's really bad form to have
> the student participating in the slot request process on a public
> list, don't you think?

Not really, no. It's only a potential problem with the politics of
who or what gets chosen when resources are tight. "2 essential of
2 slots" is not such a situation, there's no `vote' over which
student projects get mentored, and even if there were, I seriously
doubt anyone would vote against Stefan mentoring a project to improve
vc. This is `bad form' only in a theoretical alternate universe.

> Note I don't blame Fuqiao.  Although I don't know his work in detail,
> he seems to be precisely the kind of student that GSoC wants to
> support, engaged in Emacs development and likely to continue.  But
> that Emacs is so disorganized as a GSoC subproject that he could
> actually come to the point of posting such a thing speaks volumes
> about Emacs (as a GSoC subproject).

Meh. GSoC is not a school, even though they borrow the terminology
`student' and `mentor'. They're looking to support motivated
mentor-ees with initiative. That seems like exactly what happened
here.

Every year around the GSoC deadline there's some form of complaint
that there wasn't enough or the right kind of process around getting
GSoC students and mentors for Emacs, and that it's a shame that the
potential was wasted. GSoC is an effort to help get potential hackers
hacking, not to outsource programming needs to cheap labor. Anyone
who actually wants to see Emacs get more involved in GSoC needs to
start putting in organizational effort (creating process, identifying
projects, recruiting students, recruiting mentors, etc) *before*,
not *at* the deadline.

~Chad

P.S. Sorry for the rant.

Re: GSoC 2013

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

chad writes:

 > GSoC is an effort to help get potential hackers hacking, not to
 > outsource programming needs to cheap labor.

It's both, and more.  In particular, it's *not* a mentor-student
relationship, it's a project-student relationship, *represented* by
the mentor.

 > Anyone who actually wants to see Emacs get more involved in GSoC
 > needs to start putting in organizational effort (creating process,
 > identifying projects, recruiting students, recruiting mentors, etc)
 > *before*, not *at* the deadline.

Exactly my point.  Giving Emacs slots is just encouraging its bad
behavior.  There are a lot of well-behaved projects out there, some
with excellent students, who aren't going to get slots.  Emacs is most
likely going to get slots it doesn't deserve.  That sucks.

By the way, I've done all that.  Project identification wasn't very
good (but it was better than the whole GNU Project's ideas page, which
is just plain sad for an organization that preens like the leader of
the whole free software world, and of course Emacs doesn't even have
one), and we deserved to have our org rejected this year.[1]

So I know it's not that much effort that Emacs couldn't do it if it
wanted to.  Emacs just doesn't want to.


Footnotes: 
[1]  Google also has some non-quality criteria that we didn't score
high on -- we may very well not make it next year, either.

Re: GSoC 2013

[joakim]

"Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> writes:

> chad writes:
>
>  > GSoC is an effort to help get potential hackers hacking, not to
>  > outsource programming needs to cheap labor.
>
> It's both, and more.  In particular, it's *not* a mentor-student
> relationship, it's a project-student relationship, *represented* by
> the mentor.
>
>  > Anyone who actually wants to see Emacs get more involved in GSoC
>  > needs to start putting in organizational effort (creating process,
>  > identifying projects, recruiting students, recruiting mentors, etc)
>  > *before*, not *at* the deadline.
>
> Exactly my point.  Giving Emacs slots is just encouraging its bad
> behavior.  There are a lot of well-behaved projects out there, some
> with excellent students, who aren't going to get slots.  Emacs is most
> likely going to get slots it doesn't deserve.  That sucks.

Some of us are making a best effort. The effort doesnt show much on this
list because its not here its taking place.

IMO the project I intend to mentor is going well. Not because of me
because I my brain wasnt fitted with an administration module. Damirod
wrote the proposals etc, and he made a good job.

>
> By the way, I've done all that.  Project identification wasn't very
> good (but it was better than the whole GNU Project's ideas page, which
> is just plain sad for an organization that preens like the leader of
> the whole free software world, and of course Emacs doesn't even have
> one), and we deserved to have our org rejected this year.[1]
>
> So I know it's not that much effort that Emacs couldn't do it if it
> wanted to.  Emacs just doesn't want to.
>
>
> Footnotes: 
> [1]  Google also has some non-quality criteria that we didn't score
> high on -- we may very well not make it next year, either.
>
>

-- 
Joakim Verona

Re: GSoC 2013

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

joakim@verona.se writes:

 > Some of us are making a best effort.

Good for you.  But GSoC is based on orgs, not on individual mentors.

 > The effort doesnt show much on this list because its not here its
 > taking place.

I don't have a problem with that.[1]  I do have a problem with a
situation where students announce moments before the proposal deadline
that they need mentors, and at the last minute a pseudo-org is created.

 > Damirod wrote the proposals etc, and he made a good job.

?? I thought students write proposals?  Do you mean the ideas page?

When I looked at the GNU Project ideas page around the end of the org
application period, I couldn't find any details on Emacs projects (and
the page was pretty scanty overall).

Footnotes:
[1]  I admit I'm curious where it's taking place.  Everything I've
seen on the Google mentors' list indicates it's best practice to
organize the "GSoC (sub)org" (including admin, mentors, and their
backups) on the community's usual dev channels, and explicitly move
evaluation to a private, mentors-only channel.  Opinion is divided on
whether proposals should actually be discussed in public before the
due date.

Re: GSoC 2013

[Daimrod]

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"Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> writes:

> joakim@verona.se writes:
>
>  > Some of us are making a best effort.
>
> Good for you.  But GSoC is based on orgs, not on individual mentors.
>
>  > The effort doesnt show much on this list because its not here its
>  > taking place.
>
> I don't have a problem with that.[1]  I do have a problem with a
> situation where students announce moments before the proposal deadline
> that they need mentors, and at the last minute a pseudo-org is created.
>
>  > Damirod wrote the proposals etc, and he made a good job.
>
> ?? I thought students write proposals?  Do you mean the ideas page?

I wrote both of them and I am a student.

> When I looked at the GNU Project ideas page around the end of the org
> application period, I couldn't find any details on Emacs projects (and
> the page was pretty scanty overall).

I have only added an entry for Emacs at the beginning of last week, I'm
sorry.

> Footnotes:
> [1]  I admit I'm curious where it's taking place.  Everything I've
> seen on the Google mentors' list indicates it's best practice to
> organize the "GSoC (sub)org" (including admin, mentors, and their
> backups) on the community's usual dev channels, and explicitly move
> evaluation to a private, mentors-only channel.  Opinion is divided on
> whether proposals should actually be discussed in public before the
> due date.

IMHO a project needs to be well organized when:
1. the project wants to be involved in the GSoC;
2. there is a lot of students;

From what I've seen, that's not the case for Emacs. As you've pointed
out, Emacs doesn't have an ideas page, and only two students have
expressed themselves after I've told I wanted to participate to the
GSoC. Besides, Emacs doesn't need to be a formal organization because it
is under the GNU umbrella.

-- 
Daimrod/Greg

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Re: GSoC 2013

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Daimrod writes:

 > From what I've seen, Emacs [doesn't need to do any of the things
 > that are required of suborgs in some other umbrella orgs].  As
 > you've pointed out, Emacs doesn't have an ideas page, and only two
 > students have expressed themselves after I've told I wanted to
 > participate to the GSoC. Besides, Emacs doesn't need to be a formal
 > organization because it is under the GNU umbrella.

I wonder what Carol and Cat would say.  But I won't ask.

Re: GSoC 2013

[Bastien]

"Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> writes:

> Daimrod writes:
>
>  > From what I've seen, Emacs [doesn't need to do any of the things
>  > that are required of suborgs in some other umbrella orgs].  As
>  > you've pointed out, Emacs doesn't have an ideas page, and only two
>  > students have expressed themselves after I've told I wanted to
>  > participate to the GSoC. Besides, Emacs doesn't need to be a formal
>  > organization because it is under the GNU umbrella.
>
> I wonder what Carol and Cat would say.  But I won't ask.

When you "refactor" what someone says, it would be fair to explicitely
say so, instead of just relying on the weak convention that [..] means
that *you* put what you want in the square brackets.

Also, I don't get the point of the whole thread: if you think Emacs
does not deserve to get one or more GSoC slots from the GNU project,
fine.  I doubt Google (aka "Carol and Cat") wants to assess the way
Orgs organize themselves to allocate slots.

-- 
 Bastien

Re: GSoC 2013

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Bastien writes:

 > When you "refactor" what someone says, it would be fair to explicitely
 > say so, instead of just relying on the weak convention that [..] means
 > that *you* put what you want in the square brackets.

On this list, I can always count on somebody else to point it out.

 > Also, I don't get the point of the whole thread:

I checked out the org selection post-mortem meeting.  Did you?  There
were plenty of orgs that obviously worked hard on their applications,
had their mentors and admins all set up, good ideas page, and they
were turned down, often with no obvious umbrella organization to turn
to (implying even more work with no guarantee of getting into GSoC).

By contrast, I just think it's shameful (for Emacs and GNU) that
students are quite obviously doing mentors' work on this list.