Journey to GSoC

I am really excited that my Google Summer of Code proposal with Debian for the project “Debian Continuous Integration improvements” has been accepted. Through this blog, I am here to share about my Pre-GSoC journey.

I knew about GSoC since my first year of college but had this misconception that only great coders get selected for GSoC which did not let me apply to the program until my 3rd year of engineering. I applied this year not because I thought I have turned into one but because I actually wanted to give a fair try to this before the time I become ineligible to participate.

Finding Project

Scrolling through the list of GSoC 2021 organizations, I was checking out projects of organizations I am familiar with. Debian is one of the huge Open Source communities that has always inspired developers around the world to contribute to Open Source. So as I checked through Debian projects, I got excited to find the “Debian Continuous Integration improvements” project (referred to as debci in this post) related to web development and more concerned with backend work which is something I am very much interested in.

I joined the community, and as directed by the application tasks of the project I set up the debci on my machine and started with an issue labeled as a newcomer. Soon I was able to submit my first Merge Request and it was reviewed by Antonio Terceiro, the mentor of my GSoC Project. With his further guidance, I was able to turn MR into an acceptable patch, and voila it got merged! That really did boost my morale to contribute further to the project.

Student Application Period

At the suggestion of the mentor, during the Student Application Period, I worked on more open issues which were helping me understand the codebase better and in turn the deliverables of the project for my proposal. For my every doubt, I first tried to tackle it myself, and if still not able to find a solution I turn to mentors who did their best to answer my queries and this is how I completed my proposal and got it reviewed by Antonio before finally submitting it on 13th April. I still cannot express that feeling of satisfaction I achieved on submitting the proposal. I finally successfully applied for GSoC.

After Proposal Submission

I did not stop my contribution after the Student Application period ended and kept on working on more issues which helped me stay in touch with the project and also because I was enjoying it a lot. I had already made up my mind to contribute more in Open Source as I learned and enjoyed plenty during this process.

Day of Results

On 17th May, I got my acceptance mail at around 11:30 pm at night and I remember screaming and waking everybody up in my home to announce the news to them. It was truly the happiest moment for me.

Moment of Truth

I would admit that I got involved with GSoC because of the reputation associated with it but things I learned during this pre GSoC period have made me realize the fun and learning opportunities associated with working opensource and I am here to stay for sure.

I plan to write more blogs regarding my project and keep you guys updated about my work. Stay tuned!