[SoC] GSoC official start! Useful tips

[Anne Ghisla]

Hello all, students and mentors!

Today GSoC starts officially, I hope you are ready to code - and I
suppose some of you already started :)

Here is the czech-list [0] for students, for a good SoC start:

== Version control system setup ==
Have you set up your preferred VCS (Version Control System) to start
coding?
Most of OSGeo projects use SVN - so make sure you have write access to
the relevant repository. If you don't have write access by now, ask your
mentor about how your project handles GSoC students access.

== Wiki Page ==
Do you have a page on the wiki of your project? If your project
participated in past SoCs, feel free to reuse the template of past
years' applications. The wiki page would ideally contain the link of
your application in Melange, a detailed timeline, and links to the
weekly reports you will send along the summer.

== Weekly email reports == 
These are the most important things to have ready by Friday, that is the
day you will send your first official report on this mailing list and,
if you need guidance from developers' community, also on the developers
mailing list of your project. This is valid for every weekly report, and
feel free to mail the developers list anytime you have a question that
can interest all. You are part of the community!
You are supposed to send the report email every week - even if you
didn't code because of exams, or holidays, or any other reason! Last
years, the most successful students were those who sent reports on time.
The aim of the SoC is to accept new developers in open source
communities, not to pay you to work alone in your room, so not
communicating is considered a reason for failing. So, students, please
write the reports, and mentors, remind your students about them.

The report should contain the title of the project in the subject, and
at least the answers these three questions:
1) What do I have completed this week?
2) What am I going to achieve for next week?
3) Is there any blocking issue?

You don't need to write a lot. The answers can be simply links to your
wiki page. In the archives of soc mailing list you can find all the
report emails of previous years, as source of inspiration. Those who
sent the first report in these days are pretty nice examples too! 

For any question or clarification, don't hesitate to contact me, Wolf or
Hamish.

best regards from GRASS Community Sprint in Prague, and happy coding to
all!

Anne Ghisla 
OSGeo SoC Admninistrator

[0] http://www.flickr.com/photos/annola/5750707541/
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