mirror of
				https://github.com/zulip/zulip.git
				synced 2025-11-03 21:43:21 +00:00 
			
		
		
		
	docs: Move GSoC ideas to contributing/, and index.
This better fits the organization of our files; I would have fixed this last year, but it's not easy to update the links from Google's site.
This commit is contained in:
		@@ -1,593 +0,0 @@
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```eval_rst
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:orphan:
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```
 | 
			
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		||||
# Google Summer of Code
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
## About us
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
[Zulip](https://zulip.com) is a powerful, open source team chat
 | 
			
		||||
application. Zulip has a web app, a cross-platform mobile app for iOS
 | 
			
		||||
and Android, a cross-platform desktop app, and over 100 native
 | 
			
		||||
integrations, all open source.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip has gained a considerable amount of traction since it was
 | 
			
		||||
[released as open source software][oss-release] in late 2015, with
 | 
			
		||||
code contributions from [over 700 people](https://zulip.com/team)
 | 
			
		||||
from all around the world.  Thousands of people use Zulip every single
 | 
			
		||||
day, and your work on Zulip will have impact on the daily experiences
 | 
			
		||||
of a large and rapidly growing number of people.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
[oss-release]: https://blogs.dropbox.com/tech/2015/09/open-sourcing-zulip-a-dropbox-hack-week-project/
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
As an organization, we value high-quality, responsive mentorship and
 | 
			
		||||
making sure our product quality is extremely high -- you can expect to
 | 
			
		||||
experience disciplined code reviews by highly experienced
 | 
			
		||||
engineers.  Since Zulip is a team chat product, your GSoC experience
 | 
			
		||||
with the Zulip project will be highly interactive.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
As part of that commitment, Zulip has over 160,000 words of
 | 
			
		||||
[documentation for
 | 
			
		||||
developers](../index.html#welcome-to-the-zulip-documentation), much of
 | 
			
		||||
it designed to explain not just how Zulip works, but why Zulip works
 | 
			
		||||
the way that it does.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
### Our history with Google Open Source Programs
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip has been a GSoC mentoring organization since 2016, and we aim
 | 
			
		||||
for 15-20 GSoC students each summer.  We have some of the highest
 | 
			
		||||
standards of any GSoC organization; successful applications generally
 | 
			
		||||
have dozens of commits integrated into Zulip or other open source
 | 
			
		||||
projects by the time we review their application.  See [our
 | 
			
		||||
contributing guide](../overview/contributing.md) for details on
 | 
			
		||||
getting involved with GSoC.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip participated in GSoC 2016 and mentored three successful students
 | 
			
		||||
officially (plus 4 more who did their proposed projects unofficially).
 | 
			
		||||
We had 14 (+3) students in 2017, 10 (+3) students in 2018, 17 (+1) in
 | 
			
		||||
2019, and 18 in 2020.  We've also mentored five Outreachy interns and
 | 
			
		||||
hundreds of Google Code-In participants (several of who are major
 | 
			
		||||
contributors to the project today).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
While GSoC switched to a shorter coding period in 2021, we expect to
 | 
			
		||||
run a program that's very similar to past years in terms of how we
 | 
			
		||||
select and mentor students during the Spring (though with an
 | 
			
		||||
appropriately reduced expectation for students' time commitment during
 | 
			
		||||
the summer).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
### Expectations for GSoC students
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
[Our guide for having a great summer with Zulip](../contributing/summer-with-zulip.md)
 | 
			
		||||
is focused on what one should know once doing a summer project with
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip.  But it has a lot of useful advice on how we expect students to
 | 
			
		||||
interact, above and beyond what is discussed in Google's materials.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
[What makes a great Zulip contributor](../overview/contributing.html#what-makes-a-great-zulip-contributor)
 | 
			
		||||
also has some helpful information on what we look for during the application
 | 
			
		||||
process.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We also recommend reviewing
 | 
			
		||||
[the official GSoC resources](https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/resources/)
 | 
			
		||||
-- especially
 | 
			
		||||
[the student manual](https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/resources/manual).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Finally, keep your eye on
 | 
			
		||||
[the GSoC timeline](https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/timeline). The
 | 
			
		||||
student application deadline is April 13, 2021.  However, as is
 | 
			
		||||
discussed in detail later in this document, we recommend against
 | 
			
		||||
working on a proposal until 2 weeks before the deadline.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
## Getting started
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We have an easy-to-setup development environment, and a library of
 | 
			
		||||
tasks that are great for first-time contributors. Use
 | 
			
		||||
[our first-time Zulip developer guide](../overview/contributing.html#your-first-codebase-contribution)
 | 
			
		||||
to get your Zulip development environment set up and to find your first issue. If you have any
 | 
			
		||||
trouble, please speak up in
 | 
			
		||||
[#GSoC](https://chat.zulip.org/#narrow/stream/14-GSoC) on
 | 
			
		||||
[the Zulip development community server](../contributing/chat-zulip-org.md)
 | 
			
		||||
(use your name as the topic).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
## Application tips, and how to be a strong candidate
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
You'll be following
 | 
			
		||||
[GSoC's application process instructions](https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/). And
 | 
			
		||||
we'll be asking you to make at least one successful pull request
 | 
			
		||||
before the application deadline, to help us assess you as a developer.
 | 
			
		||||
Students who we accept generally have 5 or more pull requests merged
 | 
			
		||||
or nearly merged (usually including at least a couple that are
 | 
			
		||||
significant, e.g. having 100+ lines of changes or that shows you have
 | 
			
		||||
done significant debugging).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Getting started earlier is better, so you have more time to learn,
 | 
			
		||||
make contributions, and make a good proposal.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Your application should include the following:
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
* Details on any experience you have related to the technologies that
 | 
			
		||||
  Zulip has, or related to our product approach.
 | 
			
		||||
* Links to materials to help us evaluate your level of experience and
 | 
			
		||||
  how you work, such as personal projects of yours, including any
 | 
			
		||||
  existing open source or open culture contributions you've made and
 | 
			
		||||
  any bug reports you've submitted to open source projects.
 | 
			
		||||
* Some notes on what you are hoping to get out of your twelve-week project.
 | 
			
		||||
* A description of the project you'd like to do, and why you're
 | 
			
		||||
  excited about it.
 | 
			
		||||
* Some notes on why you're excited about working on Zulip.
 | 
			
		||||
* A link to the initial contribution(s) you did.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We expect applicants to either have experience with the technologies
 | 
			
		||||
relevant to their project or have strong general programming
 | 
			
		||||
experience.  We also expect applicants to be excited about learning
 | 
			
		||||
how to do disciplined, professional software engineering, where they
 | 
			
		||||
can demonstrate through reasoning and automated tests that their code
 | 
			
		||||
is correct.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
While only one contribution is required to be considered for the
 | 
			
		||||
program, we find that the strongest applicants make multiple
 | 
			
		||||
contributions throughout the application process, including after the
 | 
			
		||||
application deadline.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We are more interested in candidates if we see them submitting good
 | 
			
		||||
contributions to Zulip projects, helping other applicants on GitHub
 | 
			
		||||
and on
 | 
			
		||||
[chat.zulip.org](../contributing/chat-zulip-org.md),
 | 
			
		||||
learning from our suggestions,
 | 
			
		||||
[trying to solve their own obstacles and then asking well-formed
 | 
			
		||||
questions](https://blogs.akamai.com/2013/10/you-must-try-and-then-you-must-ask.html),
 | 
			
		||||
and developing and sharing project ideas and project proposals that
 | 
			
		||||
are plausible and useful.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Also, you're going to find that people give you links to pages that
 | 
			
		||||
answer your questions. Here's how that often works:
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
1. you [try to solve your problem until you get stuck, including
 | 
			
		||||
looking through our code and our documentation, then start formulating
 | 
			
		||||
your request for
 | 
			
		||||
help](https://blogs.akamai.com/2013/10/you-must-try-and-then-you-must-ask.html)
 | 
			
		||||
1. you ask your question
 | 
			
		||||
1. someone directs you to a document
 | 
			
		||||
1. you go read that document, and try to use it to answer your question
 | 
			
		||||
1. you find you are confused about a new thing
 | 
			
		||||
1. you ask another question
 | 
			
		||||
1. now that you have demonstrated that you have the ability to read,
 | 
			
		||||
think, and learn new things, someone has a longer talk with you to
 | 
			
		||||
answer your new specific question
 | 
			
		||||
1. you and the other person collaborate to improve the document that you
 | 
			
		||||
read in step 3 :-)
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
This helps us make a balance between person-to-person discussion and
 | 
			
		||||
documentation that everyone can read, so we save time answering common
 | 
			
		||||
questions but also get everyone the personal help they need. This will
 | 
			
		||||
help you understand the rhythm of help we provide in the developers'
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip livechat -- including why we prefer to give you help in public
 | 
			
		||||
mailing lists and Zulip streams, instead of in one-on-one private
 | 
			
		||||
messages or email. We prefer to hear from you and respond to you in
 | 
			
		||||
public places so more people have a chance to answer the question, and
 | 
			
		||||
to see and benefit from the answer. [More about that in this blog
 | 
			
		||||
post.](https://www.harihareswara.net/sumana/2016/10/12/0)
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
## Mentors
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip has dozens of longtime contributors who sign up to mentoring
 | 
			
		||||
projects.  We usually decide who will mentor which projects based in
 | 
			
		||||
part on who is a good fit for the needs of each student as well as
 | 
			
		||||
technical expertise as well as who has available time during the
 | 
			
		||||
summer.  You can reach us via
 | 
			
		||||
[#GSoC](https://chat.zulip.org/#narrow/stream/14-GSoC) on [the Zulip
 | 
			
		||||
development community server](../contributing/chat-zulip-org.md),
 | 
			
		||||
(compose a new stream message with your name as the topic).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip operates under group mentorship.  That means you should
 | 
			
		||||
generally post in public streams on chat.zulip.org, not send private
 | 
			
		||||
messages, for assistance.  Our preferred approach is to just post in
 | 
			
		||||
an appropriate public stream on chat.zulip.org and someone will help
 | 
			
		||||
you.  We list the Zulip contributors who are experts for various
 | 
			
		||||
projects by name below; they will likely be able to provide you with
 | 
			
		||||
the best feedback on your proposal (feel free to @-mention them in
 | 
			
		||||
your Zulip post). In practice, this allows project leadership to
 | 
			
		||||
be involved in mentoring all students.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
However, the first and most important thing to do for building a
 | 
			
		||||
strong application is to show your skills by contributing to a large
 | 
			
		||||
open source project like Zulip, to show that you can work effectively
 | 
			
		||||
in a large codebase (it doesn't matter what part of Zulip, and we're
 | 
			
		||||
happy to consider work in other open source projects).  The quality of
 | 
			
		||||
your best work is more important to us than the quantity; so be sure
 | 
			
		||||
to test your work before submitting it for review and follow our
 | 
			
		||||
coding guidelines (and don't worry if you make mistakes in your first
 | 
			
		||||
few contributions!  Everyone makes mistakes getting started.  Just
 | 
			
		||||
make sure you don't make the same mistakes next time).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Once you have several PRs merged (or at least one significant PR
 | 
			
		||||
merged), you can start discussing with the Zulip development community
 | 
			
		||||
the project you'd like to do, and developing a specific project plan.
 | 
			
		||||
We recommend discussing what you're thinking in public streams on
 | 
			
		||||
chat.zulip.org, so it's easy to get quick feedback from whoever is
 | 
			
		||||
online.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
## Project ideas
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
**Note**: This project ideas list has not been updated for the 2020
 | 
			
		||||
season, so many of the specific projects discussed here may have been
 | 
			
		||||
completed.  They still provide a useful sense of the range of areas
 | 
			
		||||
where active work on Zulip is happening.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
These are the seeds of ideas; you will need to do research on the
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip codebase, read issues on GitHub, and talk with developers to put
 | 
			
		||||
together a complete project proposal.  It's also fine for you to come
 | 
			
		||||
up with your own project ideas.  As you'll see below, you can put
 | 
			
		||||
together a great project around one of the
 | 
			
		||||
[area labels](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels) on GitHub; each
 | 
			
		||||
has a cluster of problems in one part of the Zulip project that we'd
 | 
			
		||||
love to improve.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We don't believe in labeling projects by difficulty (e.g. a project
 | 
			
		||||
that involves writing a lot of documentation will be hard for some
 | 
			
		||||
great programmers, and a UI design project might be hard for a great
 | 
			
		||||
backend programmer, while a great writer might have trouble doing
 | 
			
		||||
performance work).  To help you find a great project, we list the
 | 
			
		||||
skills needed, and try to emphasize where strong skills with
 | 
			
		||||
particular tools are likely to be important for a given project.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
For all of our projects, an important skill to develop is a good
 | 
			
		||||
command of Git; read [our Git Guide](../git/overview.md) in full to
 | 
			
		||||
learn how to use it well.  Of particular importance is mastering using
 | 
			
		||||
Git rebase so that you can construct commits that are clearly correct
 | 
			
		||||
and explain why they are correct. We highly recommend investing in
 | 
			
		||||
learning a [graphical Git client](../git/setup.md) and learning to
 | 
			
		||||
write good commit structures and messages; this is more important than
 | 
			
		||||
any other single skill for contributing to a large open source
 | 
			
		||||
project like Zulip.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We will never reject a strong student because their project idea was
 | 
			
		||||
not a top priority, whereas we often reject students proposing
 | 
			
		||||
projects important to the project where we haven't seen compelling
 | 
			
		||||
work from the student.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
More important to us than specific deliverables in a project proposal
 | 
			
		||||
is a clear body of work to focus on; E.g. if we see a proposal with 8
 | 
			
		||||
markdown processor issues, we'll interpret this as a student excited
 | 
			
		||||
to work on the markdown processor for the summer, even if the specific
 | 
			
		||||
set of 8 issues may not be the right ones to invest in.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
### Focus areas
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
For 2021, we are particularly interested in GSoC students who have
 | 
			
		||||
strong skills at visual design, HTML/CSS, mobile development,
 | 
			
		||||
performance optimization, or Electron.  So if you're a student with
 | 
			
		||||
those skills and are looking for an organization to join, we'd love to
 | 
			
		||||
talk to you!
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
The Zulip project has a huge surface area, so even when we're focused
 | 
			
		||||
on something, a huge amount of essential work goes into other parts of
 | 
			
		||||
the project.  Every area of Zulip could benefit from the work of a
 | 
			
		||||
student with strong programming skills; so don't feel discouraged if
 | 
			
		||||
the areas mentioned above are not your main strength.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
As a data point, in Summer 2017, we had 4 students working on the
 | 
			
		||||
React Native mobile app (1 focused primarily on visual design), 1 on
 | 
			
		||||
the Electron desktop app, 2 on bots/integrations, 1 on webapp visual
 | 
			
		||||
design, 2 on our development tooling and automated testing
 | 
			
		||||
infrastructure, and the remaining 4 on various other parts of the
 | 
			
		||||
backend and core webapp.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
### Full stack and web frontend focused projects
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Code: [github.com/zulip/zulip -- Python, Django, JavaScript, and
 | 
			
		||||
CSS](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Fill in gaps in Zulip's library of native integrations.  We have
 | 
			
		||||
  about 100 integrations, but there are a handful of important
 | 
			
		||||
  integrations that are missing.  The
 | 
			
		||||
  [the integrations label on GitHub](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20integrations)
 | 
			
		||||
  lists some of the priorities here (many of which are great
 | 
			
		||||
  preparatory projects); once those are cleared, we'll likely have
 | 
			
		||||
  many more.  **Skills required**: Strong Python experience, will to
 | 
			
		||||
  do careful manual testing of third-party products.  Fluent English,
 | 
			
		||||
  usability sense and/or technical writing skills are all pluses.
 | 
			
		||||
  Expert: Eeshan Garg.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Fill in the gaps in Zulip's [REST API
 | 
			
		||||
  documentation](https://zulip.com/api), which is an important
 | 
			
		||||
  resource for any organization integrating with Zulip.  Zulip has a
 | 
			
		||||
  [nice framework](../documentation/api.md) for writing API
 | 
			
		||||
  documentation built by past GSoC students based on the OpenAPI
 | 
			
		||||
  standard with built-in automated tests of both the Python and curl
 | 
			
		||||
  examples, but there are a few dozen endpoints that are missing,
 | 
			
		||||
  several of which are quite important, and lots to do to improve the
 | 
			
		||||
  quality of our documentation.  See the [API docs area
 | 
			
		||||
  label][api-docs-area] for good starter projects and [this
 | 
			
		||||
  issue](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues/14100) for the current
 | 
			
		||||
  master TODO list.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
[api-docs-area]: https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues?q=is%3Aopen+is%3Aissue+label%3A%22area%3A+documentation+%28api+and+integrations%29%22
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Add important full-stack features for open source projects using Zulip,
 | 
			
		||||
  including [default stream
 | 
			
		||||
  groups](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues/13670), [Mute
 | 
			
		||||
  User](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues/168), and [public
 | 
			
		||||
  access](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues/13172).  Expert: Tim
 | 
			
		||||
  Abbott.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Make Zulip integrations easier for nontechnical users to set up.
 | 
			
		||||
  This includes adding a backend permissions system for managing bot
 | 
			
		||||
  permissions (and implementing the enforcement logic), adding an
 | 
			
		||||
  OAuth system for presenting those controls to users, as well as
 | 
			
		||||
  making the /integrations page UI have buttons to create a bot,
 | 
			
		||||
  rather than sending users to the administration page.  **Skills
 | 
			
		||||
  recommended**: Strong Python/Django; JavaScript, CSS, and design
 | 
			
		||||
  sense helpful.  Understanding of implementing OAuth providers,
 | 
			
		||||
  e.g. having built a prototype with
 | 
			
		||||
  [the Django OAuth toolkit](https://django-oauth-toolkit.readthedocs.io/en/latest/)
 | 
			
		||||
  would be great to demonstrate as part of an application.  The
 | 
			
		||||
  [Zulip integration writing guide](../documentation/integrations.md)
 | 
			
		||||
  and
 | 
			
		||||
  [integration documentation](https://zulip.com/integrations/)
 | 
			
		||||
  are useful materials for learning about how things currently work,
 | 
			
		||||
  and
 | 
			
		||||
  [the integrations label on GitHub](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20integrations)
 | 
			
		||||
  has a bunch of good starter issues to demonstrate your skills if
 | 
			
		||||
  you're interested in this area.  Expert: Eeshan Garg.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Build a meta-integration that converts the Slack incoming webhook
 | 
			
		||||
  API to post messages into Zulip. Zulip has several dozen native
 | 
			
		||||
  integrations (https://zulip.com/integrations/), but Slack has a
 | 
			
		||||
  ton more.  We should build an interface to make all of Slack’s
 | 
			
		||||
  numerous third-party integrations work with Zulip as well, by
 | 
			
		||||
  basically building a Zulip incoming webhook interface that accepts
 | 
			
		||||
  the Slack API (if you just put in a Zulip server URL as your "Slack
 | 
			
		||||
  server").  **Skills required**: Strong Python experience; experience
 | 
			
		||||
  with the Slack API a plus.  Work should include documenting the
 | 
			
		||||
  system and advertising it.  Expert: Tim Abbott.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Visual and user experience design work on the core Zulip web UI.
 | 
			
		||||
  We're particularly excited about students who are interested in
 | 
			
		||||
  making our CSS clean and readable as part of working on the UI.
 | 
			
		||||
  **Skills required**: Design, HTML and CSS skills; JavaScript and
 | 
			
		||||
  illustration experience are helpful.  A great application would
 | 
			
		||||
  include PRs making small, clean improvements to the Zulip UI
 | 
			
		||||
  (whether logged-in or logged-out pages).  Expert: Tim Abbott.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Build support for outgoing webhooks and slash commands into Zulip to
 | 
			
		||||
  improve its chat-ops capabilities.  There's an existing
 | 
			
		||||
  [pull request](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/pull/1393) with a lot
 | 
			
		||||
  of work on the outgoing webhooks piece of this feature that would
 | 
			
		||||
  need to be cleaned up and finished, and then we need to build support for slash
 | 
			
		||||
  commands, some example integrations, and a full set of
 | 
			
		||||
  documentation and tests.  Recommended reading includes Slack's
 | 
			
		||||
  documentation for these features, the Zulip message sending code
 | 
			
		||||
  path, and the linked pull request. **Skills required**: Strong
 | 
			
		||||
  Python/Django skills.  Expert: Steve Howell.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Build a system for managing Zulip bots entirely on the web.
 | 
			
		||||
  Right now, there's a somewhat cumbersome process where you download
 | 
			
		||||
  the API bindings, create a bot with an API key, put it in
 | 
			
		||||
  configuration files, etc.  We'd like to move to a model where a bot
 | 
			
		||||
  could easily progress from being a quick prototype to being a third-party extension to
 | 
			
		||||
  being built into Zulip.  And then for built-in bots, one should be able to click a few
 | 
			
		||||
  buttons of configuration on the web to set them up and include them in
 | 
			
		||||
  your organization.  We've developed a number of example bots
 | 
			
		||||
  at `contrib_bots/` in the main Zulip repository that can be used for
 | 
			
		||||
  testing; the design document for the deployment part of this vision
 | 
			
		||||
  (likely part 1) is
 | 
			
		||||
  [here](../subsystems/custom-apps.md).
 | 
			
		||||
  **Skills recommended**: Python and JavaScript/CSS, plus devops
 | 
			
		||||
  skills (Linux deployment, Docker, Puppet etc.) are all useful here.
 | 
			
		||||
  Experience writing tools using various popular APIs is helpful for
 | 
			
		||||
  being able to make good choices.  Experts: Steve Howell.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Improve the UI and visual design of the existing Zulip settings and
 | 
			
		||||
  administration pages.  Last summer, a student built a nice framework
 | 
			
		||||
  for many common elements (e.g. checkboxes, dropdowns, etc.) and
 | 
			
		||||
  migrated the codebase to use it, but the tables settings screens
 | 
			
		||||
  with tables are inconsistent, only one of them has a convenient
 | 
			
		||||
  sorting feature, etc.  You can get a great sense of what needs to be
 | 
			
		||||
  done by playing with the settings/administration/streams overlays in
 | 
			
		||||
  a development environment.  You can get experience working on the
 | 
			
		||||
  subsystem by working on some of
 | 
			
		||||
  [our open settings/admin issues](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20admin).
 | 
			
		||||
  **Skills recommended**: JavaScript, HTML, CSS, and an eye for visual
 | 
			
		||||
  design.  Expert: Shubham Dhama.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Optimize web frontend performance and scalability.  Zulip is already
 | 
			
		||||
  one of the faster webapps out there, but there are a bunch of ideas
 | 
			
		||||
  for how to make it substantially faster.  This is likely a
 | 
			
		||||
  particularly challenging project to do well, since there are a lot
 | 
			
		||||
  of subtle interactions to understand.  **Skill recommended**: Strong
 | 
			
		||||
  debugging, communication, and code reading skills are most important
 | 
			
		||||
  here.  JavaScript experience; some Python/Django experience, some
 | 
			
		||||
  skill with CSS, ideally experience using the Chrome Timeline
 | 
			
		||||
  profiling tools (but you can pick this up as you go).  Expert: Steve
 | 
			
		||||
  Howell.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Build out the administration pages for Zulip to let admins set a
 | 
			
		||||
  retention policy for when old messages should be deleted, audit
 | 
			
		||||
  data, etc. ...  the sorts of things needed for Zulip to be used at
 | 
			
		||||
  larger organizations.  We get constant requests for these kinds of
 | 
			
		||||
  features from Zulip users.  The Zulip bug tracker has plentiful open
 | 
			
		||||
  issues( [settings
 | 
			
		||||
  (admin/org)](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20settings%20%28admin%2Forg%29),
 | 
			
		||||
  [settings
 | 
			
		||||
  UI](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20settings%20UI),
 | 
			
		||||
  [settings
 | 
			
		||||
  (user)](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20settings%20%28user%29),
 | 
			
		||||
  [stream
 | 
			
		||||
  settings](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20stream%20settings)
 | 
			
		||||
  ) in the space of improving the Zulip administrative UI.  Many are
 | 
			
		||||
  little bite-size fixes in those pages, which are great for getting a
 | 
			
		||||
  feel for things, but a solid project here would be implementing 5-10
 | 
			
		||||
  of the major missing features as full-stack development projects.
 | 
			
		||||
  The first part of this project will be refactoring the admin UI
 | 
			
		||||
  interfaces to require writing less semi-duplicate code for each
 | 
			
		||||
  feature. **Skills recommended**: A good mix of Python/Django and
 | 
			
		||||
  HTML/CSS/JavaScript skill is ideal.  The system for adding new
 | 
			
		||||
  features is [well documented](../tutorials/new-feature-tutorial.md).
 | 
			
		||||
  Expert: Shubham Dhama.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Rebuild the Zulip web UI using a modern reactive layer like vue.js.
 | 
			
		||||
  Strategically, we'd start with self-contained, messy pieces (like the
 | 
			
		||||
presence layer), then move on to more complex pieces (like the
 | 
			
		||||
subscriptions page), and finally attach the main UI.  Definitely worth
 | 
			
		||||
reading the vue.js documentation and reading
 | 
			
		||||
[how Zulip's real-time sync works](../subsystems/events-system.md).
 | 
			
		||||
**Skills recommended**: Strong JavaScript experience, good
 | 
			
		||||
communication skills and an eye for detail.  We think this would be an
 | 
			
		||||
awesome project, but rewrite projects often introduce lots of bugs, so
 | 
			
		||||
we're interested in particularly careful candidates who have the
 | 
			
		||||
discipline to redo a small component at a time and carefully test for
 | 
			
		||||
regressions.  Good ways to demonstrate qualification for this are
 | 
			
		||||
finding and reporting bugs using
 | 
			
		||||
[Zulip's manual UI testing guide](../testing/manual-testing.md)
 | 
			
		||||
and doing
 | 
			
		||||
[refactoring projects](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20refactoring).
 | 
			
		||||
Expert: Tommy Ip, Tim Abbott.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Work on [Zulip Terminal](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-terminal),
 | 
			
		||||
  the official terminal client for Zulip.  zulip-terminal is already a
 | 
			
		||||
  basic usable client, but it needs a lot of work to approach the
 | 
			
		||||
  webapp's quality level.  We would be happy to accept multiple strong
 | 
			
		||||
  students to work on this project.  **Skills required**: Python 3
 | 
			
		||||
  development skills, good communication and project management
 | 
			
		||||
  skills, good at reading code.  Experts: Aman Agrawal, Neil Pilgrim.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Write cool new features for Zulip.  Play around with the software,
 | 
			
		||||
  browse Zulip's issues for things that seem important, and suggest
 | 
			
		||||
  something you’d like to build!  A great project can combine 3-5
 | 
			
		||||
  significant features.  Experts: Depends on the features!
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Work on Zulip's development and testing infrastructure.  Zulip is a
 | 
			
		||||
  project that takes great pride in building great tools for
 | 
			
		||||
  development, but there's always more to do to make the experience
 | 
			
		||||
  delightful.  Significantly, a full 10% of Zulip's open issues are
 | 
			
		||||
  ideas for how to improve the project, and are
 | 
			
		||||
  [in](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20tooling)
 | 
			
		||||
  [these](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20testing-coverage)
 | 
			
		||||
  [four](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20testing-infrastructure)
 | 
			
		||||
  [labels](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/labels/area%3A%20provision)
 | 
			
		||||
  for tooling improvements.  A good place to start is
 | 
			
		||||
  [backend test coverage](https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues/7089).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
  This is a somewhat unusual project, in that it would likely consist
 | 
			
		||||
  of dozens of small improvements to the overall codebase, but this
 | 
			
		||||
  sort of work has a huge impact on the experience of other Zulip
 | 
			
		||||
  developers and thus the community as a whole (project leader Tim
 | 
			
		||||
  Abbott spends more time on the development experience than any other
 | 
			
		||||
  single area).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
  A possible specific larger project in this space is working on
 | 
			
		||||
  adding [mypy](../testing/mypy.md) stubs
 | 
			
		||||
  for Django in mypy to make our type checking more powerful.  Read
 | 
			
		||||
  [our mypy blog post](https://blog.zulip.org/2016/10/13/static-types-in-python-oh-mypy/)
 | 
			
		||||
  for details on how mypy works and is integrated into Zulip.  This
 | 
			
		||||
  specific project is ideal for a strong contributor interested in
 | 
			
		||||
  type systems.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
  **Skills required**: Python, some DevOps, and a passion for checking
 | 
			
		||||
  your work carefully.  A strong applicant for this will have
 | 
			
		||||
  completed several projects in these areas.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
  Experts: Tim Abbott (provision, testing), Steve Howell (tooling, testing).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Write more API client libraries in more languages, or improve the
 | 
			
		||||
  ones that already exist (in
 | 
			
		||||
  [python](https://github.com/zulip/python-zulip-api),
 | 
			
		||||
  [JavaScript](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-js),
 | 
			
		||||
  [PHP](https://packagist.org/packages/mrferos/zulip-php), and
 | 
			
		||||
  [Haskell](https://hackage.haskell.org/package/hzulip)).  **Skills
 | 
			
		||||
  required**: Experience with the target language and API design.
 | 
			
		||||
  Expert: Depends on language.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Develop [**@zulipbot**](https://github.com/zulip/zulipbot), the GitHub
 | 
			
		||||
workflow bot for the Zulip organization and its repositories. By utilizing the
 | 
			
		||||
[GitHub API](https://developer.github.com/v3/),
 | 
			
		||||
[**@zulipbot**](https://github.com/zulipbot) improves the experience of Zulip
 | 
			
		||||
contributors by managing the issues and pull requests in the Zulip repositories,
 | 
			
		||||
such as assigning issues to contributors and appropriately labeling issues with
 | 
			
		||||
their current status to help contributors gain a better understanding of which
 | 
			
		||||
issues are being worked on. Since the project is in its early stages of
 | 
			
		||||
development, there are a variety of possible tasks that can be done, including
 | 
			
		||||
adding new features, writing unit tests and creating a testing framework, and
 | 
			
		||||
writing documentation. **Skills required**: Node.js, ECMAScript 6, and API
 | 
			
		||||
experience. Expert: Cynthia Lin, Joshua Pan.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
### React Native mobile app
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Code:
 | 
			
		||||
[React Native mobile app](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-mobile).
 | 
			
		||||
Experts: Greg Price, Chris Bobbe, Ray Kraesig.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
The highest priority for the Zulip project overall is improving the
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip React Native mobile app.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Work on issues and polish for the app.  You can see the open issues
 | 
			
		||||
  [here](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-mobile/issues).  There are a
 | 
			
		||||
  few hundred open issues across the project, and likely many more
 | 
			
		||||
  problems that nobody has found yet; in the short term, it needs
 | 
			
		||||
  polish, bug finding/squashing, and debugging.  So browse the open
 | 
			
		||||
  issues, play with the app, and get involved!  Goals include parity
 | 
			
		||||
  with the webapp (in terms of what you can do), parity with Slack (in
 | 
			
		||||
  terms of the visuals), world-class scrolling and narrowing
 | 
			
		||||
  performance, and a great codebase.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
A good project proposal here will bundle together a few focus areas
 | 
			
		||||
that you want to make really great (e.g. the message composing,
 | 
			
		||||
editing, and reacting experience), that you can work on over the
 | 
			
		||||
summer.  We'd love to have multiple students working on this area if
 | 
			
		||||
we have enough strong applicants.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
**Skills required**: Strong programming experience, especially in
 | 
			
		||||
  reading the documentation of unfamiliar projects and communicating
 | 
			
		||||
  what you learned.  JavaScript and React experience are great pluses,
 | 
			
		||||
  as are iOS or Android development/design experience is useful as
 | 
			
		||||
  well.  You'll need to learn React Native as part of getting
 | 
			
		||||
  involved.  There's tons of good online tutorials, courses, etc.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
### Electron desktop app
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Code:
 | 
			
		||||
[Our cross-platform desktop app written in JavaScript on Electron](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-desktop).
 | 
			
		||||
Experts: Akash Nimare, Abhighyan Khaund
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
- Contribute to our [Electron-based desktop client
 | 
			
		||||
  application](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-desktop).  There's
 | 
			
		||||
  plenty of feature/UI work to do, but focus areas for us include
 | 
			
		||||
  things to (1) improve the release process for the app, using
 | 
			
		||||
  automated testing, TypeScript, etc. and (2) polish the UI.  Browse
 | 
			
		||||
  the open issues and get involved!
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
**Skills required**: JavaScript experience, Electron experience.  You
 | 
			
		||||
  can learn electron as part of your application!
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Good preparation for desktop app projects is to (1) try out the app
 | 
			
		||||
and see if you can find bugs or polish problems lacking open issues
 | 
			
		||||
and report them and (2) fix some polish issues in either the Electron
 | 
			
		||||
app or the Zulip web frontend (which is used by the electron app).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
## Circulating proposals (February-March)
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
If you're applying to GSoC, we'd like for you to publicly post a few
 | 
			
		||||
sections of your proposal -- the project summary, list of
 | 
			
		||||
deliverables, and timeline -- some place public on the Web, a week or
 | 
			
		||||
two before the application deadline. That way, the whole developer
 | 
			
		||||
community -- not just the mentors and administrators -- have a chance
 | 
			
		||||
to give you feedback and help you improve your proposal.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Where should you publish your draft?  We prefer Dropbox Paper or
 | 
			
		||||
Google Docs, since those platforms allow people to look at the text
 | 
			
		||||
without having to log in or download a particular app, and you can
 | 
			
		||||
update the draft as you improve your idea.  In either case, you should
 | 
			
		||||
post the draft for feedback in chat.zulip.org.
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
Rough is fine! The ideal first draft to get feedback from the
 | 
			
		||||
community on should include primarily (1) links to your contributions
 | 
			
		||||
to Zulip (or other projects) and (2) a paragraph or two explaining
 | 
			
		||||
what you plan to work on.  Your friends are likely better able to help
 | 
			
		||||
you improve the sections of your application explaining who you are,
 | 
			
		||||
and this helps the community focus feedback on the areas you can most
 | 
			
		||||
improve (e.g. either doing more contributions or adjusting the project
 | 
			
		||||
plan).
 | 
			
		||||
 | 
			
		||||
We hope to hear from you! And thanks for being interested in
 | 
			
		||||
Zulip. We're always happy to help volunteers get started contributing
 | 
			
		||||
to our open source project, whether or not they go through GSoC.
 | 
			
		||||
		Reference in New Issue
	
	Block a user