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Behind the Scenes With a Google Summer of Code Student

The dust has settled and all of the Google Summer of Code 2009 (GSoC) students are getting back into the swing of school and jobs, but the experience they gained from participating in the project will last a lifetime. It's a great opportunity for aspiring developers to pair up with a mentor in the community to help them learn the ropes and understand what FOSS development is all about.

All told, when the three-month long project ended, more than 85% of the students passed their final evaluations. I caught up with one of this year's student participants, Johan Hilding, to learn what his experience was like and what he thinks about this popular program offered by Google.

Hilding spent the summer working on the Mifos Initiative, a management information sysytem (MIS) designed and funded by the Grameen Foundation to help microfinance institutions to better serve the world's poor. This was Hilding's first experience with GSOC and now that it's over, he'll return to school at Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan in Sweden.

"I wanted to contribute to an open-source project, seeing how I I've been using very much open source software for many years," says Hilding. "I also felt that I wanted to learn something new this summer, not just writing code like I've done in class."

"I learned a lot about testing from my mentor -- seeing how my project focused on writing tests this wasn't very surprising -- but I also gained insight into project management, especially with regard to long-distance communication and working together with people in different time zones," he continues.

Hilding says he was surprised at how helpful and kind everyone was every step of the way during his tenure with GSoC. "Whenever there was a problem the response time was short and the answers helpful."

What advice would Hilding give to someone considering joining next year's Summer of Code? "There's no need to be afraid of not being good enough, your mentor and the community will support you and help out in all kinds of ways," he says. "Just do it!"

• google
• summer of code
• gsoc

by James DSouza on Oct. 01, 2009

This needs to be made available world-wide, and more companies need to sponsor initiatives of this nature.

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