GSoC FAQ

This is the page for some of the frequently asked questions by the prospective participants of the Google Summer of Code 2010.

General Questions

Am I required to be local?

Q: If someone is selected as a student coder through the Summer of Code, will they need to be in the Boston area over the summer?

A: No, we are not asking anyone to move to Boston for the summer. While you are most welcome to come and work at the Berkman Center if you are selected for an internship, we will not force anyone accepting an internship to move.

Do I need to keep regular business hours?

Q: If I'm selected, can I work any time of the day that I want?

A: We are going to favor coders that are available for a significant amount of time Monday to Friday during [EST] business hours. We have found that synchronous communication is key to working together effectively. Consider this a requirement.

Can I have other jobs/internships/consulting gigs?

Q: I've got a consulting gig, an internship and another job lined up. Cool?

A: No. We want your full attention for the summer - it's a real job, with a real commitment from both sides.

Non Berkman geeks

Q: Is this limited to Harvard and/or Berkman coders?

A: This is open to any and all that would like to apply.

Project Priorities

Q: Are some projects a higher priority than others? If so, what are they?

A: No. It depends on the strength of the applicants and the strength of the applications. We are most interested in finding the right candidates.

Preferred Languages/Frameworks

Q: What are they?

A: We prefer that the language and framework for a proposal match the language or framework an existing project is written in. For projects that are orthogonal to an existing code base, we prefer Ruby, PHP, or Perl. We prefer MVC frameworks or micro-frameworks, so for Ruby it'd be Rails or Sinatra, for PHP it'd be Symfony2. Perl would be Catalyst or Dancer. There is some flexibility in frameworks but less in languages. We are not interested in proprietary languages at all, nor in .NET (even under Mono). We also prefer jQuery.