FreeBSD in the Google Code-In contest

STUDENTS: This page is for internal organisation of FreeBSD's projects in GCIN 2011. For information about how to get started with the FreeBSD tasks, please see GoogleCodeIn/GettingStarted

Google Code-In is a contest targeted to pre-university students. Its purpose is to engage young people in an Open Source world as well as to promote computer engineering among high-school students.

Just like the Google Summer of Code, the Google Code-In expects projects to publish list of proposed ideas. Participants can pick the task or tasks which they're interested in and, later, solve them. Google sponsors attractive prices for most active participants.

Code-In, unlike Summer of Code, isn't only targetted to writing programs. It is about software engineering in general. To cite the Project's web page:

The tasks are grouped into the following categories:

Code: Tasks related to writing or refactoring code
Documentation: Tasks related to creating/editing documents
Outreach: Tasks related to community management and outreach/marketing
Quality Assurance: Tasks related to testing and ensuring code is of high quality
Research: Tasks related to studying a problem and recommending solutions
Training: Tasks related to helping others learn more
Translation: Tasks related to localization
User Interface: Tasks related to user experience research or user interface design and interaction

To find more about the Google Code-In contest: http://code.google.com/intl/pl/opensource/gci

Below is the list of ideas. Putting an idea to the list automatically makes you a mentor of such idea.

Please note that the purpose of Google Code-In is to attract more FreeBSD usage among our youngest group of users. We expect Code-In's mentors to actively mentor and help participants with their problems over the duration of the contest.

WARNING! Google Code-In is not GSoC. It requires different kind of mentoring. You must spend more time with young people. You may expect them to know very little about Open Source (or maybe literally nothing). You must understand, that teenagers may be unfamiliar with rules of communication and coordination in FreeBSD (Google page says it's common for teenagers to use all CAPS while communicating with you etc..) Google expects faster turnaround time (<= 36 hours) in GCIN than in GSoC for mentor's support. You're expected to give a hand where necessary, always; you have to be very patient too. Good relationship with applicants is crucial to get them to use FreeBSD after Google Code-In is finished.

Think twice before becoming Google Code-In mentor for FreeBSD, please!

Proposing FreeBSD tasks for the Google Code-In

Tasks must have a title, difficulty level, expected time limit for the task, description and a mentor assigned to the task.

To cite Google Code-In Rules, point 6a: http://www.google-melange.com/gci/document/show/gci_program/google/gci2011/rules

Each Task will identify the problem, explain some general background
information, set the time limit for the Task, the degree of difficulty
of the task, and define the requirements that an Entry for that Task must
meet in order to be designated as a Completed Entry. Each task is assigned
a degree of difficulty by the organization posting the task.  Tasks deemed
“easy” are worth 1 point, tasks deemed “medium” are worth 2 points, and
tasks deemed “hard” are worth 4 points.

Information for the FreeBSD Google Code-In mentors

This page is very important. Please read and understand it: http://code.google.com/p/google-code-in/wiki/GCIAdminMentorInformation

Lists of tasks for particular years

FreeBSD Google Code-In idea list of 2011

CategoryHistorical