[Coin-discuss] Google Summer of Code 2008 started, mentoring organization application due 3rd March

[Sebastian Nowozin]

Hello everybody,

just now the Google SoC 2008 was officially opened, with the official
website being hosted at
  http://code.google.com/soc/2008/

As there was some positive feedback to my last email to this list,
this is now the chance and time of a COIN senior member to step up and
organize the application as mentoring organization.  Also if this is
happening, it would be great to have suggestions by COIN developers
for possible SoC student projects they would mentor (read the official
page for payment information for students and mentors).  Other
open-source projects like ffmpeg, Mono and Gnome do this by using a
wiki page where project suggestions can be entered ("ideas page").

About the mentoring organization aplication, from the FAQ at
   http://code.google.com/soc/2008/faqs.html#0.1_applying
I copy a description of how the mentoring organization application
should look like:

"In addition to anything else your organization would like to submit
as an application, Google will be asking (at least) the following
questions as part of the application process:

   1. Describe your organization.
   2. Why is your organization applying to participate in GSoC 2008?
What do you hope to gain by participating?
   3. Did your organization participate in past GSoCs? If so, please
summarize your involvement and the successes and challenges of your
participation.
   4. If your organization has not previously participated in GSoC,
have you applied in the past? If so, for what year(s)?
   5. Who will your organization administrator be? Please include
Google Account information.
   6. What license(s) does your project use?
   7. What is the URL for your ideas page?
   8. What is the main development mailing list or forum for your organization?
   9. What is the main IRC channel for your organization?
  10. Does your organization have an application template you would
like to see students use? If so, please provide it now.
  11. Who will be your backup organization administrator? Please
include Google Account information.
  12. Who will your mentors be? Please include Google Account information.
  13. What criteria did you use to select these individuals as
mentors? Please be as specific as possible.
  14. What is your plan for dealing with disappearing students?
  15. What is your plan for dealing with disappearing mentors?
  16. What steps will you take to encourage students to interact with
your project's community before, during and after the program?
  17. What will you do to ensure that your accepted students stick
with the project after GSoC concludes?"

I hope COIN take part in this, thanks for considering,
Sebastian