<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Dear OSgeo Community and projects</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">I would like to express in this letter as a mission to encourage projects either well established OSGeo Projects, Incubating Projects, and with a stress emphasis to Community Projects that wish to become an OSGeo Project, to participate in GSoC.</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> You can find the announcement for the current year in [1] </div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">[1] <a href="https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2021-January/039210.html">https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2021-January/039210.html</a></div><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">I can only speak based on experience, that is, my experience with pgRouting on the GSoC program.</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> The way that pgRouting has grown in terms of code and in terms of developers has been mainly by participating in GSoC, to a point where we will soon apply to become an OSGeo Project. (hopefully this year).</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In 2015 it was my first participation as a mentor, but since 2011 we have been participating [2] with a grand total of 23 students. (to the best of my knowledge) <br><br>[2] <a href="https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/wiki/Google-Summer-of-Code">https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/wiki/Google-Summer-of-Code</a></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">What is the "P/G-ain"? There is no "Gain" without "Pain"<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">(I quote because those are relative terms)<br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">The "P/G-ain" as I see it:</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">The work as a mentor, year by year, does not become easier or harder, it is just a matter of routine (and maybe some family time). Basically my routine is Saturday morning (family is sleeping Saturday mornings) for at most 3 hours we have a GSoC meeting, depends on the case: with a student that is struggling the most or with all students for a common problem, or no meeting if everything is going smooth or family is awake :-)<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Students open a draft PR at the beginning of the week and merge their PR at the end of the week on a special repository [3] for GSoC work. So monitoring their work during the week really becomes with comments on their PR as in [4] which can be done by any mentor.<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">[3] <a href="https://github.com/pgRouting/GSoC-pgRouting">https://github.com/pgRouting/GSoC-pgRouting</a><br>[4] <a href="https://github.com/pgRouting/GSoC-pgRouting/pull/112">https://github.com/pgRouting/GSoC-pgRouting/pull/112</a><br><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">I think I spend more time with students during the bonding period (also Saturday meetings) where they learn how is the structure of our repository and what/where are the basics for adding more functionality to pgRouting.<br></div></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">The most difficult part we have as mentors is to choose the proposals to be accepted.<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">From the set of proposals, this year:<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">* Filter out proposals with Incomplete pgRouting application requirements [5] <br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">* Filter out proposals with incomplete OSGeo or GSoC requirements<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">* Give an evaluation number to the students<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">* Decide (based on number of mentors) how many proposals we can manage<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">* Send our evaluation & decision to the OSGeo-GSoC administrators, so they can follow the next step of the process with Google</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">[5] <a href="https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/wiki/GSoC-Ideas%3A-2021#pgrouting-application-requirements">https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/wiki/GSoC-Ideas%3A-2021#pgrouting-application-requirements</a><br></div></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">The detailed benefits<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">- In terms of code<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">- In terms of collaborators<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">- In monetary terms -> OSGeo<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In terms of Code<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In the time that I arrived at pgRouting, v2.0.0 was the latest, I could enumerate the routing related function signatures that it had back in those days, just because they are so few, but you can find them in [6]. That includes the internal functions that are used. Compare with what we are preparing for v3.2 [7]: 32 VS 289 signatures (internal & public), and most of the new functionality has been done by GSoC students.<br><br>[6] <a href="https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/blob/v2.6.3/sql/sigs/pgrouting--2.0.0.sig">https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/blob/v2.6.3/sql/sigs/pgrouting--2.0.0.sig</a><br>[7] <a href="https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/blob/develop/sql/sigs/pgrouting--3.2.sig">https://github.com/pgRouting/pgrouting/blob/develop/sql/sigs/pgrouting--3.2.sig</a><br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In terms of collaborators:<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Some students stay on the project after the GSoC, For example Rohith was active, not only as a developer, but also as a speaker in FOSS4G Dar Es Salaam. <br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Currently we have Ashish who is taking over the task of making releases.<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Rajat whom I meet personally in Hyderabad on FOSS4G Asia before he became a GSoC student, since last year he is one of the OSGeo-GSoC administrators, he is also now a GSoC mentor, member of the PSC in MapMint, and he is collaborating with the pgRouting workshop.<br><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In monetary terms -> OSGeo:<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Google deposits money per student that finalizes the program to OSGeo.<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In my mind, by doing mentor work we are making OSGeo get more income for the year's needs. I donated my time as a mentor, OSGeo got a donation in the form of $.</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">I see this money that OSGeo got from pgRouting students as a cooperation for the OSGeo community projects budget that OSGeo assigns every year and as a cooperation for the incubating expenses budget for the projects that are in incubation the year when OSGeo received the money, of the year or as a cooperation for other well established projects budget. (I did not understand myself so I am putting an example).<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Suppose that pgRouting had 3 students and suppose that OSGeo got a total of $1500 on year X.<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In my mind I think: For year X those $1500 are going to help on funding project Y on its incubation expenses or community project Z on outreach expenses to get more developers, or for OSGeo project W that has an unexpected expense, or something I didn't think about were it could be used.<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">This year, as I mentioned, we are participating again, and hopefully apply to incubator. <br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In my mind, the $ will help fund our own incubation expenses which we calculate is going to be more than what OSGeo will get from pgRouting participation on GSoC.</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">In my mind, we are cooperating by doing mentor work to get part of our own funding for incubation this year.</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Regards<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Vicky<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">pgRouting mentor on the OSGeo-GSoC program<br></div>-- <br><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><pre>Georepublic UG (haftungsbeschränkt)
Salzmannstraße 44,
81739 München, Germany
Vicky Vergara
Operations Research
eMail: vicky@<a href="http://georepublic.de" target="_blank">georepublic.de</a>
Web: <a href="https://georepublic.info" target="_blank">https://georepublic.info</a>
Tel: +49 (089) 4161 7698-1
Fax: +49 (089) 4161 7698-9
Commercial register: Amtsgericht München, HRB 181428
CEO: Daniel Kastl
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