GSoC 2023 mentoring organization questionnaire

This is a draft of the application that the phpMyAdmin project will send to Google to apply as a mentoring organization. Applicants should most likely look at the applicant guide.

Why does your org want to participate in Google Summer of Code?

We got great contributions through GSoC in previous years and we want to continue improving our tool and bring new features to our users. We also want to attract new young developers to our team.

What would your org consider to be a successful GSoC program?

Our view is that there are many different metrics for "success" when participating in GSoC. We absolutely value adding new long-term contributors to the project, but GSoC is also the first introduction to the FOSS development community for many students and GSoC contributors. Success can be teaching them about how to interact with the community and the value of FOSS software projects. It's great when code gets merged, but it is not as important to use as engaging with new contributors and developing long-term interest in both our project and the Open Source community in general.

How will you keep mentors engaged with their GSoC contributors?

Each mentor is a longstanding member of the project and has had prior GSoC experience. Each one is qualified to engage with contributors independently, which mostly occurs via email on the developer discussion email list. Additionally, each contributor will be a part of the mailing list where the other mentors and developers monitor their progress and discuss their projects.

How will you help your GSoC contributors stay on schedule to complete their projects?

Each contributor is expected to submit a proposed schedule as part of their application process. This schedule lists deadlines and the contributors are expected to follow this schedule. Contributor progress is monitored through regular code submissions, and their code is usually merged in to the primary development branch as soon as possible. For some of our proposed projects, this will mean code is getting merged once or twice per week. With the remaining projects, contributors are expected to post their code often for their mentor to review, monitor progress, and watch for any problems or pitfalls.

How will you get your GSoC contributors involved in your community during GSoC?

Contributors are asked to introduce themselves on the mailing list as part of the application process, and the mailing list continues to be an important part of their involvement throughout the summer. The mailing list is the same one where most project discussion occurs, plus contributors are encouraged to participate in the regular developer meetings on IRC. Contributors are included in the community by nature; almost all of their communication is through the same means used by community and the way their code is quickly merged will help them integrate in to our community. We have introduced Gitter rooms where GSoC participants and even those students who were not selected often support each other in an ad-hoc manner.

Anything else we should know?

Is your organization part of any government?

No