[Google Summer of Code 2024] A Call for Mentors
We are happy to announce that Jenkins is preparing to participate in its eighth (8th) year in Google Summer of Code (GSoC).
What is Google Summer of Code?
Google Summer of Code (GSoC) is a global, online mentoring program focused on introducing new contributors to open-source software development. GSoC contributors work on a 10-22 weeks-long programming project with the guidance of mentors from their respective open source organizations. During GSoC, accepted contributors are paired with mentors from participating open-source organizations of their choice, gaining exposure to real-world software development techniques. These GSoC contributors will get to learn from experienced open-source developers while writing code for real-world projects! A small stipend is provided as an incentive to support their open-source contributions. Refer to the GSoC contributor eligibility documentation for more details.
Why might you consider being a Jenkins in GSoC mentor?
Mentor interaction is a vital part of GSoC. Mentoring is a great opportunity to improve your management and people (or general “soft”) skills while giving back to the community. In return for mentoring, a GSoC contributor works on your project full-time for 10-22 weeks. Think about the projects that you’ve always wanted to do but never had the time to complete. GSoC is a fantastic program and the Jenkins project is looking forward to participating in it again in 2024, potentially with your participation!
What does mentoring involve?
Potential mentors are invited to read the information for mentors. Note that being a GSoC mentor does not require expert knowledge of Jenkins. Mentors do not work alone. We make sure that every project has at least two mentors. GSoC org admins will be there to help to find technical advisers, so you can study together with your GSoC contributor. Mentoring takes about 5 to 8 hours of work per week (more at the start, less at the end). Mentors provide guidance, coaching, and sometimes a bit of cheerleading. They review GSoC contributor proposals, pull-requests, and contributor presentations at the evaluation phase. They fill in the Google-provided final evaluations at the end of the coding period.
So you want to be a mentor but don’t have a project idea? We can help with that!
GSoC project ideas are coding projects that potential GSoC contributors are expected to accomplish in about 10-22 weeks. The coding projects can be new features, plugins, test frameworks, infrastructure, graphical interface, etc. If you don’t have a specific project idea, please consider being a mentor for one of these project ideas. If you have a specific project in mind, please send us your project ideas before the beginning of February, so they can get a proper review by the GSoC committee and by the community. Of course, we would love it if you were the mentor for your project idea.
How to submit a project idea
Create a pull request with your idea in a .adoc file in the project ideas. It is not necessary to submit a Google Doc, but it will still work if you want to do that. Refer to the instructions on submitting ideas which include an .adoc template and some examples.
Need more inspiration?
Case in point, the Plugin Health Score. A GSoC project idea that started in the summer of 2022, and was implemented in the summer of 2023 for millions of Jenkins users to benefit from!
We look forward to welcoming new mentors for GSoC 2024!
For any questions, you can find the GSoC Org Admins, mentors and participants on the GSoC SIG Gitter chat.
About the authors
