DISCLAIMER: THE IDEAS AND OPINIONS WRITTEN IN THE POST ARE SOLELY BASED ON MY OBSERVATIONS. ONE MAY OR MAY NOT AGREE WITH THE POINTS WRITTEN BELOW.


Because you are reading this, either you must be among those thousands who are/will be trying their best shot at Google Summer of Code for the first time (maybe second?) or were redirected here or you might be simply stalking my webpage. While you can find a plenty of do’s and dont’s over the internet, here’s a list of some tips and opinions that I think should’ve been in my mind while I applied, and was working, for GSoC’18 sometime back. It’s recommended to read other online available articles as well as I’ve not included those points here (my aim is not to mislead you in any sense). Note that the points are not carvings on a stone and so the situation may vary for you. What worked for me might not work for you and vice versa.

  • Choose an org which will directly affect your career prospects. I was good in C++ when I started and had a few interactions with GNU Octave (while giving my try to Andrew NG’s course). I knew very less or nothing about other free software. And so I started contributing to it.

    Octave is used by a very niche category of people presumably, faculty at colleges, scientists at CERN or students taking ML or some mathematical course, whereas tools like, say LibreOffice, is used by a greater community of people. So it’d be nicer to work on something which is relatable to more number of people. Examples of the organizations I feel that make the cut are Linux Foundation, Apache, GCC, Languages (Python, Ruby, ROR, etc.), Debian, Mozilla, VLC, etc. There are a lot of other orgs like these.

    As a result, although GSoC with GNU Octave looks good on my resume, I feel it would’ve been better if I worked with some organization that would be directly beneficial to me as far as career is concerned. During interviews, the interviewer generally does not bombard me with many questions over the project as he/she himself may not have used Octave in recent past. I stayed in my comfort zone and worked with C++, should’ve tried Java or JavaScript as they are in more demand than C++. See, you are in college and you have time, so learn as much new tech and tools as possible.

    This is in no way, a let down to other orgs. I respect all the maintainers and contributors as they are selflessly contributing to the projects.

  • While selecting the organization, there can be two types of orgs, one which gets more slots from Google (>= 8) and the other with lesser number (< 7). Both of them have their pros and cons.

    • For orgs with more slots: The orgs are more popular (generally). The competition will be probably higher than the other type of orgs as more number of students apply to such orgs. It’ll be better to start off early (Nov-Dec) in such orgs. If you do so, you have a fair chance of getting selected because you’ll be standing out by April, at the time of application.

    • For orgs with less slots: The orgs will be a bit less popular (not all!). Less competition. You can start and may get selected even if you start contributing after the list of orgs has been out in Feb. The downside is, due to less slots and if there’s a good enough competition, you may miss out your spot.

    At the end of the day, it’s more about your code quality and collaboration and less about the type of org that you apply to, for getting selected.

  • Make sure you select a project that has atleast one mentor with it. I was working on some project for quite some time and was pretty confident of getting selected but then even when three days were left for proposal submission, none of the maintainers bothered to own the project. I hurriedly filled out proposal for some another project in the last two days and got selected for that. I’ll partly attribute this to luck and partly to my hard work. Luck, because no other aspirant was working on the second project, hard work because the mentor of the new project knew me indirectly as I had been contributing in the org for past 4-5 months and had made my fair share of presence.

  • Trying to do GSoC and an internship simultaneously? I believe not a good idea. It highly depends on what work you get in both of your projects. Some people are lucky that they can carry out both projects concurrently, although you’ll need to manage time and prioritize. Others may need to put more hours to their projects. I’ll advocate not to mix the two (and F both of them), although last call is from your side. If you think you can manage, go ahead with both, if not or you have some other time of the year for internship, go for one.

  • If you are in your first or second year, it’ll hardly matter what org you choose because GSoC on a first/second year resume is really valuable to get good internships in your senior years or even at your level. The same applies for senior students as well but I feel it would be a cherry on cake for them if they choose a more popular tool or tech. The value of Google Summer of Code outweights that of the organization/project. Always keep in mind, Google Summer of Code != Google Internship.

  • Try not to be arrogant and I-know-it-all-and-I-dont-need-your-help kind of person. You’ll need help. You yourself will help. Be humble and respect everyone’s opinion. Most importantly, listen to what others are saying. They (maintainers, etc.) will almost all the times, be right as they know significantly more about the product/project than you. One of the best ways to be in constant notice is, helping other newbies like yourself over the mailing list and IRC. Use your resources wisely. You can approach any GSoCers you know and I guarantee almost 100% of the time, they’ll be happy to help you out unless you show derogatory behaviour.

  • Lastly, consider yourself selected. The point is not be over-confident but to understand that your peers are at the same level, a bit more or less, as you. Remember the 90/10 breakdown of mental/physical strength? The same applies here! The rule has done wonders for many lives, including me. Even if you don’t get selected, atleast you would’ve tried and that’s perfectly fine.

    FYI, 88.2% of the accepted students participated in their first GSoC in 2018. Moreover, 74.4% of the students were first time applicants (source). So there’s a high probability that you’ll be able to make it through.

Feel free to put your thoughts in the comments below. You may ping me whenever you need some help/suggestion. Thanks for your time!

If you’re by any chance interested to know about my GSoC work, click here.