From Fedora Project Wiki
Open For Ideas! - This page contains some ideas from last year. This does not mean that they are valid for this year too. We are in the process of cleaning up the page.

Find an idea you like? Want to propose your own? See the GSoC Getting Started Guide.


Students Welcome

If you are a student looking forward to participate the GSoC 2016 with Fedora, please feel free to browse the idea list which is still growing. Do not hesitate to contact the mentors or contributors as indicated in this page for any related clarification. You also should find some like-minded people on the #fedora-summer-coding IRC channel.

If you are new to the Fedora Project, the following material will help you to get started. Additionally, please register in the Fedora Account System (FAS) if you are willing to continue with the Fedora Project. For getting quick help, #fedora-devel can be used for getting help with programming problems.

  1. The Four Foundations of Fedora
  2. Official GSoC Resources
  3. Fedora Documentation
  4. IRC
  5. Development


Supporting Mentors

The following contributors are available to provide general help and support for the GSoC 2016 program (existing contributors, feel free to add yourselves and your wiki page). If a specific project mentor is busy, you can contact one of the people below for short-term help on your project or task.

  1. Remy DeCausemaker
  2. Kushal Das
  3. Haïkel Guémar
  4. Josh Berkus
  5. Luke Macken

Fedora Atomic Mentors

The following mentors are specifically available for projects related to Fedora Atomic:

  1. Giuseppe Scriviano
  2. Colin Walters
  3. Giuseppe Scrivano
  4. Matthew Barnes


Idea list for GSoC 2016

Implement Tinykdump

Status: Proposed - draft

Summary of idea: Tinykdump is a minimal daemon to capture kernel-based crash dumping (kdump) memory image to usb storage. Compared to the traditional kdump solution, it is, 

* more reliable and scalable
* has smaller memory foot-print
* more friendly to kernel developers

More information here: https://fedorahosted.org/tinykdump/

Knowledge prerequisite: Python, kernel programming (desired)

Skill level: intermediate (programming)

Contacts: CAI Qian

Mentor(s): CAI Qian

Notes: Rough roadmap:

  • Implement tinykdump daemon to be included in Fedora.
  • Submit kernel patches for reserving kdump memory at run-time for community review and inclusion.
  • Currently, pstore only log kernel messages for panic and Oops. Patches are needed to support logging of kdump kernel and initramfs console output.

Idea list for Fedora Community Operations and Infrastructure

Fedora Infrastructure Web Application Development: Community Operations (CommOps)

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Community Operations (CommOps) #fedora-commops CommOps Wiki Remy DeCausemaker (decause) Corey 'Linux-modder' Sheldon The rise of DevOps has been swift. Sysadmins are increasingly instrumenting and integrating automated systems to stand up and maintain their infrastructure. This same approach can be taken to support community infrastructure in a distributed and automated fashion, that doesn't force people to choose between using their precious volunteer time to "build things" or "build communities that build things." The community operations team works across numerous technologies, and interest areas in Fedora, including Messaging, Storytelling, Fedora Badges, Fedora Hubs, Wiki, Culture, Metrics, Voting, and other miscellaneous topics. It is important to note that CommOps team members are generalists, and the strengths and interests of individual applicants will determine the precise nature of your work. Enthusiasm for FOSS culture and community organization, and effective communication skills are most important. Specific deliverables can include automated metrics gathering, real-time messaging integration with Fedora hubs, and other big-data analysis and visualization. Tools are primarily written in python, and utilize libraries such as fedmsg, numpy, pandas, pygals, flask, sqlalchemy. We also leverage other web technologies like HTML5 and Javascript, and frameworks such as bootstrap and handlebars to deliver these metrics.

Your internship with this project could also involve any or all of the following:

  • Web testing and bug reporting / triaging
  • Content development and syndication
  • Writing for the web and print
  • Collaboration with Fedora Council and Leadership on Project Objectives and Initiatives
  • Volunteer Coordination and Organizing
  • Campaign development and implementation
  • Advocacy and Messaging

Required:

  • Effective Communication Skills; written and verbal, synchronous and asynchronous.
  • Passion for Free/Open Source Software and Free Culture
  • Self-directed and Curious nature
  • Experience writing for the web (Content only is ok, HTML/CSS even better)
  • Experience publishing and/or syndicating content via Social Media
  • Experience working in teams, or community organizing
  • Basic Web development/design skills

Bonus Skills:

  • Basic multimedia development skills
  • Sysadmin/Devops skills
  • programming/scripting skills

Fedora Infrastructure Web Application Development: Fedora Hubs

Fedora Infrastructure Web Application Development: Fedora Hubs #fedora-hubs

Fedora has been in the process of creating a new web presence for all of the Fedora users, subprojects, and communities. We also plan to integrate some of the features of this system with the prototype of the Fedora Developer Portal, which is targeted at helping general developers use Fedora. While the Hubs project itself is aimed at Fedora contributor circles, the reusable features will allow the Portal to use this work to speak to general developers who may not have an interest in working in the Fedora community, but want to connect with community members for advice, best practices, or to generate interest in their upstream project.

Several of the principal app developers in the Fedora Engineering team will be working together with you on this project during the Outreachy term. You'll participate directly with team members daily on core features of Hubs as well as integration with the Portal. This is a great opportunity both for regular mentorship and for being deeply involved in an exciting and fast-moving project with the Fedora team.

Working on this project could involve any of the following:

  • Adding new features to the web frontend
  • Adding new capabilities to the backend
  • Writing and deploying new widgets
  • Triaging and processing new widget ideas submitted by the community at large.
  • Implementing existing (and thoroughly detailed) mockups from previous UI/UX interns and team members.

Skills:

  • HTML/Javascript/CSS
  • Basic Python a plus
  • Bonus: Experience with Bootstrap, jinja templates, Fedmsg, datanommer/grepper, or other fedora infrastructure projects a HUGE plus.

When applying to this project, it may be useful to review the designers' blogs about the projects' design here:

Fedora Developer Portal

Fedora Hubs

A video overview of the Hubs project is available here: http://blog.linuxgrrl.com/2015/07/01/fedora-hubs-update/

Fedora Infrastructure Web Application Development: Pagure

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Pagure #fedora-apps Pagure project Pierre-Yves Chibon (pingou) Pagure is a forge written in python and offering the possibility of self-hosting projects while still using the now well-know fork and pull-request contribution model. While being similar to other forge such as GitHub or GitLab it is also pretty different for example it does not namespace projects under usernames with the idea that projects should not belong to a single person but to a community.

Your internship with this project could also involve any or all of the following:

  • Web testing and bug reporting / triaging
  • Content development and syndication
  • Writing for the web and print
  • Participating in the effort to make of pagure the official front-end to Fedora's packages git repositories (currently being the read-only cgit)
  • Implementing private projects in pagure
  • Figuring out pagure can be a front-end for Fedora's git repo now that they are namespaced (to offer more than just rpms, for example docker containers)

Required:

  • Effective Communication Skills; written and verbal, synchronous and asynchronous.
  • Passion for Free/Open Source Software and Free Culture
  • Self-directed and Curious nature
  • Experience with Flask, javascript and HTML
  • Experience with git
  • Sysadmin/Devops skills

Bonus Skills:

  • Previous experience with Pagure
  • Experience with developing APIs and CLIs using it

Idea list for Fedora Atomic GSoC 2016

This idea list comes from the Project Atomic website. The most up-to-date version is there.


Next-generation Super Privileged Container

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description


Difficulty: Advanced

Required skills:

  • C programming
  • Python programming
  • Docker and/or runC experience

Bonus Skills:

  • Golang programming
  • SELinux knowledge

Expected outcomes

  • Implement ability for user to install flannel, etcd, and other bootstrap containers and manage them easily
  • New super-priv containers are accepted into planned design of Atomic Host
  • Learn how container security works
  • Learn advanced SELinux hackery
  • Learn how to manage container dependances

Atomic Host package layering

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description

Required:

  • C programming
  • Fedora or other Linux

Bonus Skills:

  • Knowledge of RPM packaging
  • Experience working in Linux distributions

Libraries and Software:

  • rpm-ostree, libhif

Difficulty Level:

  • Advanced

Expected outcomes

  • Ability to layer debugging, bootstrap, and other packages
  • Learn how OStree images work
  • Learn packaging security practices and theory

Bootstrap with gpgcheck in kickstart

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description


Required:

  • Ability to use kickstart images
  • Experience with virt helpful
  • Fedora or other Linux Experience

Libraries and Software:

  • kickstart
  • gpg
  • virt
  • RPM-OStree

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • Ability to kickstart atomic images with full gpg support working
  • Improved software supply chain hygiene for project atomic
  • Learning how secure provisioning works
  • Learning how to get code merged upstream

Improve ability to monitor running/canceled transactions

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description
  • Improve ability to monitor running/canceled transactions: The rpm-ostree client termination doesn't block the command execution on the rpm-ostreed. This will cause new rpm-ostree clients to fail immediately because there is a transaction in progress. Change rpm-ostree to be notified of the status of the current transaction and possibly attach to it.

Required:

  • C programming experience
  • Ability to create Virtual Machines (VMs) or have access to spare PC nearby for testing.
  • Fedora or other Linux Experience

Bonus Skills:

  • Experience with RPM packaging

Libraries and Software:

  • rpm-ostree

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • Ability for project to better understand transactions happening in the deamon
  • Ability for project to re-attach and get transaction status
  • Understand RPM-OSTree upgrade model and how tree transactions work
  • Learn how to work with upstreams

Support for end-of-life notification

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Josh Berkus (jberkus) Description

Required:

  • C programming experience
  • Fedora or other GNU/Linux Experience

Bonus Skills:

  • Advanced C programming experience
  • experience with RPM packaging

Libraries and Software:

  • rpm-ostree
  • atomic CLI

Difficulty Level:

  • Novice

Expected outcomes

  • rpm-ostree and atomic command output explaining when a version of an upgraded tree branch is end of life (EoL)
  • feature merged into future releases, and packaged for distribution
  • Learn how to work with upstreams and Linux distributions
  • Understand how EOL policies and lifecycles work

rpm-ostree operation history support

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Josh Berkus (jberkus) Description

Required:

  • C programming experience
  • Python Programming experience
  • Fedora or other GNU/Linux experience

Bonus Skills:

  • Advanced C programming experience
  • Advanced Python programming experience
  • Ability to work with Upstreams

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • Duplication of support for history in the atomic command, similar to "yum history"
  • Strong command history and output on the system, possibly in systemd journal

Support Metalink for OSTree

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description
  • Support metalink for OSTree: Add support for metalink files and support downloads from a list of mirrors and fetch objects from multiple sources.

Required:

  • C programming experience
  • Metalink experience
  • Experience working with RPM packaging

Bonus Skills:

  • Advanced C programming experience
  • Ability to work with Upstreams

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • Ability to use a list of mirrors for OSTree upgrade
  • Ability to fetch trees in parallel

Drop privileges for HTTP fetches

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
'Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description
  • Drop privileges for HTTP fetches: The HTTP fetcher code is running in the same process of OSTree. Move the HTTP fetcher code to another process with less privileges than the main process.

Required:

  • C programming experience
  • SELinux knowledge

Bonus Skills:

  • Advanced C programming experience
  • libsoup experience helpful
  • Advanced SELinux Experience
  • Ability to work with Upstreams

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • OSTree uses a different process for fetching data over HTTP
  • Main OSTree process communicates through Inter Process Communication (IPC) with fetcher process
  • Fetcher confined to write-only in a temporary file

Support kpatch

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description
  • Support kpatch: Support live update for the kernel without rebooting or restarting any processes.


Required:

  • C programming experience
  • Python programming experience
  • Basic knowledge of D-Bus

Bonus Skills:

  • Advanced C programming experience
  • Advanced Python programming experience
  • Advanced knowledge of D-Bus
  • Familiarity with kpatch

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • Partial live update feature integrated into Fedora Atomic Host
  • Learn to implement live kernel update
  • Learn to work with upstream project integration
  • Understand RPM-OSTree packaging and images

Automatic Atomic Host Updates

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Fedora Atomic #atomic ProjectAtomic.io Description
  • Automatic Updates: implement a service that automatically upgrades the system when a new image is available. If the system is not restarting correctly, the rollback to the previous working version.

Required:

  • C programming experience
  • Python programming experience
  • Basic knowledge of systemd
  • Ability to create and run VMs.

Bonus Skills:

  • Advanced C programming experience
  • Advanced Python programming experience
  • Familiarity with RPM packaging

Difficulty Level:

  • Intermediate

Expected outcomes

  • Automated updates integrated into Fedora Atomic Host
  • Learn how RPM-OStree packaging and images work
  • Develop ability to contribute to Atomic Host

Docs

Anerist

Project IRC Channel Web Page Mentor(s) Notes
Docs Project #fedora-docs [1] Zach Oglesby (zoglesby) Work on Anerist, the "documentation indifference engine". This projects goal is to replace the current docs build system, Publican, that has been outdated for many releases and is not as flexible as the Docs Project would like.

TODO: Write more info here!

Your internship with this project could also involve any or all of the following:

Required:

Bonus Skills:

Open Ideas From GSoC 2015

In addition to the above list of ideas, you may want to check out ideas from previous years and contact the mentors for those projects to see if they're still interested in mentoring someone this year.

Note: Do not submit a proposal for an idea from a previous year without contacting the mentor to ensure they will be available to mentor you. Without a mentor, proposals will be rejected.


Previous years:

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