[OSGeo-Announce] Announcing GSoC 2023 with OSGeo | Instructions and What's New with 2023!

[Victoria Rautenbach]

News item by Ashish Kumar and Rajat Shinde
Published at https://www.osgeo.org/foundation-news/announcing-gsoc-2023-with-osgeo-instructions-and-whats-new-with-2023/



Dear All,

Wishing you a happy New Year and hope you are doing well.

(Disclaimer: It's a long email so please read patiently.)

After the successful wrap-up of GSoC 2022, with 6 (out of 7) projects
successfully completed and the contributors presenting their work in
FOSS4G 2022, we are ready for GSoC 2023 [1] with OSGeo.

If you are a contributor interested in contributing to the geospatial
open source with OSGeo as an umbrella organization, then this is high
time to connect with the projects of your interest and interact with
the project community.

GSoC 2023 comes with GSoC 2022's structural changes, so we recommend
you follow the official announcement (link [3] below) in detail.
Citing below the significant changes for quick reference:

1. Starting in 2022, the program was open to all newcomers to open
source, no longer focusing solely on university students. From 2023
onwards, the program is being expanded to be open to all the students
who are 18 years and older AND to beginners in open source
development, who might not be university students but are 18 years and
older. With folks worldwide changing careers, returning to the
workforce, and learning on their own (outside of academic programs) we
see an opportunity to reach a plethora of excited individuals who want
to learn more about open source and be a part of our amazing GSoC
communities.

2. Similar to GSoC 2022, the contributors will be able to choose from
multiple-size projects ~175 hours (medium) and 350 hours (large). We
understand not everyone can spend 30 hours a week on a coding project
for 12 weeks but they would like to be a part of these communities
with the help of mentors.

3. We are keeping the increased flexibility around the timing of
projects similar to 2022. There is an option to extend the standard
12-week coding time frame to a maximum of 22 weeks, or to reduce it to
10 weeks, so the project length can be between 10-22 weeks, not a
fixed 12 weeks for everyone. This is to allow folks who may realize
that spreading the work over say, 16 weeks, is a more realistic goal
with their current life situation. Or for contributors who have life
happen in the middle of the program and they can’t work on their
projects for a few weeks, but they can come back to it after a month
to finish it. Similar to GSoC 2022, this would make it easier for GSoC
Contributors and mentors to be able to navigate together when
obstacles occur and the GSoC Contributor can successfully complete
their project.

Also, we strongly suggest going through the following links to get an
overall understanding of the program:

[1]. GSoC 2023 Timeline -
https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/timeline
[2]. GSoC Contributors/Student guide -
https://google.github.io/gsocguides/student/
[3]. Official Announcement of GSoC 2023 on Google Open source Blog -
https://opensource.googleblog.com/2022/11/get-ready-for-google-summer-of-code-2023.html
[4]. OSGeo Project Ideas for GSoC 2023 -
https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Google_Summer_of_Code_2023_Ideas (Keep
checking this frequently, as the Ideas List is a Work-In-Progress)
[5]. Link to FOSS4G 2021 video presentation explaining the entire
process for contributing to OSGeo with GSoC -
https://youtu.be/Flr1tcrcAvE

Please note that this is a heads-up for the contributors to get
started with the interaction, and the official process will commence
post OSGeo's acceptance (not application) as an organization to the
GSoC (Org. application starts - Jan 23rd, 2023; List of accepted
mentoring organizations published - Feb 22nd, 2023).

Please feel free to reach us at gsoc-admin (AT) osgeo (DOT) org for
further queries and we excitingly look forward to welcoming you to our
amazing OSGeo community.

PS: A call for project proposals to the OSGeo projects, community
projects, and guest projects with instructions on preparing the
project ideas page has been already announced
(https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/soc/2023-January/004974.html).
Please send us the URL for your project's GSoC ideas Wiki page if you
haven't done yet.

Stay safe!
Kind regards,
OSGeo GSoC Administration Team