KDE Celebrates 2012 Google Summer of Code Success

KDE has again taken part in Google Summer of Code (GSoC) as its biggest participating organization. Fifty-nine out of mind-boggling sixty projects have been completed successfully. Lots of new things have been learned, lots of code has been written and there's been plenty of fun. GSoC is over but the code has not gone away and the work is not finished. Over the next months, many of the students will continue to be part of KDE, integrate the code for future releases, improve it, maintain it, become more part of KDE. For now, however, pencils are down and we congratulate the students. It was a great summer and we enjoyed having you around!

Lots of variety


Improved shapes in Calligra

Many different KDE projects have been involved in Google Summer of Code 2012, including core libraries (kdelibs), accessibility, education, games, graphics, multimedia and PIM. Prominent KDE projects that are shipped independently from the KDE combined releases have also taken part, such as Amarok, the music player; Calligra, the office suite; Choqok, the microblogging client; Gluon, the game engine and KDevelop, the IDE.

The projects undertaken by students varied from under-the-hood code tweaking to reimplementing parts of the software using new technologies like QtQuick and QML to improve the user interfaces. Not every success will be noticed by our users immediately. Some of the projects focused on performance optimization; some will only prove fruitful in the future. Of course, to our developers and mentors every project and every effort was dear and precious!

Lessons learned and friends gained

The Google Summer of Code provides many valuable lessons, not only for the students—who get to learn from some of the world's leading free software developers—but also for the mentors who learn useful skills in training the next generation of KDE contributors.


Work in KStars

Rishab Arora, who worked on improving KStars, enjoyed "the chance to work with amazing people from all over the world" and learned that "just because you cannot see something, doesn't mean it isn't important - clarity and readability are as important as working code". Samikshan Bairagya also worked on KStars and "got to learn the awesome concept of model-view and learned a lot about programming conventions and UI designing".

For Matěj Laitl, working on Amarok provided the opportunity to "finally work on open-source full-time during the summer without having to take less fun jobs on proprietary software". Fellow Amarok contributor, Phalgun Guduthur, sees the experience as "a platform to start contributing to open source projects that people use", noting that "it's satisfying to be part of something that is used by so many people around the world".

"The fact that you could learn about so many different things so quickly and so easily and get to interact with so many people" was the best thing for Pankaj Bhambhani, working on Facebook integration in Choqok. These thoughts were echoed by Francisco Fernandes, who worked on Krita, "the community interaction and the learning is the most valuable experiences"

There was praise, not only for the quality of mentors, but also the quality of software: " I learned how great Krita actually is," said Shivaraman Aiyer.

Thank you, great working with you. Don't be strangers!

Thank you to Google for this opportunity. Congratulations to our students again for their success; we invite you to stay with us. Keep hacking on KDE, keep learning and consider participating again in Google Summer of Code next year, as students or even as mentors, helping others get as much as possible out of the experience!

Let's help more students like Claudio Desideri to say: "I broke my limits".

More information

There is more about the 2012 Google Summer of Code at the KDE Community Wiki, including brief descriptions and more information about the projects.

2012 Google Summer of Code participants and their projects

Name   Project
A Janardhan Reddy   Video SlideShow generator for Digikam
Abhinav Badola   Video metadata support in Exiv2 library
Abhishek B S   Improve Formula Shape in Calligra
Alessandro Cosentino   Feed aggregator for ownCloud
Amandeep Singh   Focus tracking in KWin / KMagnifier
Anant Kamath   Implementing S.M.A.R.T. and improving ISO file management features in KDE
Ander Pijoan   OpenStreetMap vector rendering on Marble
Antonis Tsiapaliokas   Integrate Kwin with Plasmate SDK
Arthur Ribeiro   QML Plasmoid for Plasma NetworkManagement
Avnee Nathani   Port KDiamond game to Qt Quick
Bernhard Beschow   An OpenGL mode for Marble
Brijesh Patel   Improve saving of charts to OpenDocument in Calligra
Cezar Mocan   Natural Earth Vector Map in Marble
Claudio Desideri   Website design and implementation for GamingFreedom/Gluon
Cyril Oblikov   Asynchronous errors handling during file transfer
Davide Bettio   Port Plasma Calendar and other widgets to QML
Deepak Mittal   Inter-ownCloud Instance Collaboration
Dominic Lyons   Improve integration of Photivo into digiKam
Eli MacKenzie   Modularized, server-aware IRC protocol handling for Konversation
Felix Rohrbach   OCS specific JSON parser in Attica
Francisco Fernandes   A Sandpainting brush for Krita
Ganeshprasad T P   Bullet integration into Gluon
Giorgos Tsiapaliokas   Make Plasmate ready for release
Islam Wazery   Import Tool Revamp in digiKam
Jigar Raisinghani   Support for pivot tables in Calligra Sheets
Lasath Fernando   Message Filtering Plugin System
Lisa Vitolo   Solid API extension for partitioning and a Dolphin plugin to use it
Lucas Lira Gomes   Social Music - Tomahawk features in Amarok
Luís Gabriel Lima   QMLify Plasma widgets
Mahfuzur Rahman (Mamun)   Face Recognition for Digikam
Mailson D. Lira Menezes   Tile-based rendering in Okular page view
Martin Klapetek   Social feed
Martin Küttler   New interface for Cantor
Matěj Laitl   Statistics synchronization for pluggable devices and Last.fm in Amarok
Maximilian Löffler   Kate Scripting IDE plugin
Miha Čančula   Template system for KDevelop
Miquel Sabaté   Improve KDevelop Ruby Support
Nityam Vakil   Full support level 4 of the OpenFormula specification
Pankaj Bhambhani   Facebook integration for Choqok
Paul Mendez   Support for editing shape animations in Calligra Stage
Percy Camilo Triveño Aucahuasi   Replacement for KmPlot
Phalgun Guduthur   Semantic desktop collection in Amarok
Riccardo Iaconelli   Amarok will shine like new
Rishab Arora   Improving Data Storage, Logs and adding DSO catalogs to KStars
Roney Gomes   Porting games to a modern graphics framework
Samikshan Bairagya   Add "What's Interesting..." feature to KStars
Shivaraman Aiyer   Perspective drawing in Krita
Shreya Pandit   Introduction of context action-based layout and UI improvements in Gluon Creator
Shrikrishna Holla   Adding an Infinite Canvas / Wraparound mode for Krita
Sinny Kumari   Advanced features and enhancements for Plasma Media Center
Smit Mehta   UPnP / DLNA plugin for digiKam (as a kipi-plugin)
Smit Patel   Bibliography engine integration and UI to manage citations in Calligra Words
Vegard Øye   Improve Kate's vi Input Mode
Victor Dodon   Porting libkipi and kipi-plugin to KDE-XML GUI
Vinay S Rao   Implementing saving/loading Gluon Engine's game state
Viranch Mehta   Port KBreakout game to QtQuick
Vladislav Sitalo   Integration of CMU SPHINX into Simon
Yash Shah   Using computer vision to improve speech recognition in Simon
Zhengliang Feng   Integrate Spotify into Amarok
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Comments

Thanks for the great release. I guess no comments means everyone is pretty much happy :)

And which of the above projects are 'merged into master?'

by Phalgun (not verified)

My project which is a Nepomuk plugin for Amarok is merged into master. It will be shipped with the next release of Amarok.

You could give it a try using Amarok git.

by Islam Wazery (not verified)

My project—Import Tool Revamp in digiKam—is also merged into master and will be available in the next release of digiKam (3.0.0).

by Jer Jerf (not verified)

That's some great news!
However, could it be, indeed, clarified for all the projects, which of them have already been merged to master, and in which stage is the merger of the rest?

Smit Mehta: Port KBreakout game to QtQuick
Viranch Mehta: Port KBreakout game to QtQuick

Two students working on exactly the same does not sound right.

Smit Mehta: UPnP / DLNA plugin for digiKam (as a kipi-plugin)