google summer of code oss keynote

Google Summer of Code, Open Source, and EducationCarol Smith, Open Source Programs Manager

● Me● Why do people participate in open

source software development?● University Education Now● Google Summer of Code● What you can do to help

Agenda

● Who Am I?●

Who am I?

● Undergraduate university degree in journalism

●

Who am I?

● Program Manager with Google●

Who am I?

● Open Source Programs Office●

Who am I?

● Outreach and Student Programs●

● I'm also really interested in open source software and why people do it.

●

Open Source Software Development


Journalist Daniel Pink,"Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us" discusses the science behind this. [1]


Pink has analyzed research on different regions of the world and on different

kinds of work people can do.


What motivations will produce the best results for different types of work?


Offer a tiered payment structure for different kinds of work to MIT students

and examine the results.


Spatial puzzles, throwing a ball through a hoop, memorizing strings of digits,

solving word puzzles, etc.


Those who do the best at the task get a large cash prize, those who do ok get a

medium reward, and those who do poorly only get a small monetary

reward.


For tasks that are manual or algorithmic, this incentive structure

works fine.


BUT


For tasks that are complicated (when it requires conceptual thinking) the

motivator of "do better at something to get more money" doesn't work.


Conceptual thinking...doesn't that sound a lot like coding?


So what is it that motivates people to produce better results for conceptual,

complicated work?


AutonomyMasteryPurpose


Autonomy is our desire to work independently on a task and to feel

ownership of it.


Mastery is our urge to get better at things.


Purpose is a sense of making a contribution to a cause.


If you pay people enough that they're not worried about paying their bills and

feeding themselves, they work to do the things that enrich them and they

enjoy.


Open source software development lines up really well with these

motivations.


Open source software lets people work independently.


Open source software gives people the ability to get better at coding.


Open source software gives people a sense of place and purpose.


And so...


People are even willing to work for free on open source software because it

enriches their lives!

I'm also really interested in university education.

Universities Now

I believe a universities are where students get lessons in finding things that enrich them for the rest of their

lives.

Universities Now

Universities are where we give students the ability to work independently and

feel ownership of their work.

Universities Now

Universities are where we give students a sense of accomplishment and mastery

of their work.

Universities Now

Universities are where we give students lessons about how to be contributing

members of society.

Universities Now

Doesn't that sound a lot like what motivates people to participate in open

source software?

Universities Now

Doesn't that sound a lot like what motivates people to produce better

results for the work they do?

Universities Now

Doesn't that sound a lot like what makes people more enriched human

beings?

Universities Now

Don't you think we should be exposing computer science students to open

source software in their universities?

Universities Now


Indeed, shouldn't all university students be participating in open source

software?

...But by and large we aren't teaching them about using or developing open

source software in their university education.

Universities Now

Universities Now

A quick poll

Only two universities in Tunisia are exposing their students to open source software as part of their education. [2]

Universities Now

Only 15 universities listed on teachingopensource.org as having

educational programs in open source. [3]

Universities Now

My point is...

Universities Now

Some students are getting introduced to open source software in their

university.

Universities Now

BUT

Universities Now

We could be doing a lot better.

Universities Now

Enter Google Summer of Code...

Google Summer of Code is an online, international program designed to

encourage university student participation in open source software

development.

Enter Google Summer of Code...


Roughly half of the students who participated in Google Summer of Code this year (2012) listed something other than "computer science" as their major.


Roughly a third of the students who participated in Google Summer of Code this year (2012) were pursuing either a

masters or PhD degree.

What are the goals of the program?


Inspire students to begin participating in open source development.


Provide students the opportunity to do work related to their academic pursuits

during the summer.


Give students more exposure to real-world software development scenarios

(e.g. distributed development, software licensing questions, revision control, mailing list etiquette, etc.)


Get more open source code created and released for the benefit of all.


Help open source projects identify and bring in new developers and

committers.

How is the program structured?


Free and open source software projects apply to participate as mentoring

organizations.


Accepted mentoring organizations publish an "ideas page" of projects

they'd like to have student developers work on.


Students submit proposals to the mentoring organizations for those projects they'd like to work on.


Mentoring organizations choose which students they'd like to accept.


Accepted students spend the program term being mentored by their

organizations, working with the community, and coding on their

project.


The students are given two evaluations during the term and paid a stipend for

passing each evaluation.


Students submit their completed code publicly at the end of the program for

the use and benefit of all.

A proposal

A proposal

Start a Summer of Code-like of your own in your university or organization!

A proposal

Encourage your university to teach open source as part of the computer science curriculum if it's not already.

A proposal

Encourage your university to get all of its students involved in open source

software development even if they are not in the computer science

department.

A proposal

Talk to other universities or organizations about doing the same.

A proposal

teachingopensource.org

A call to action

Help us get more students involved in open source software.

A call to action

It will improve the quality of computer science education.

A call to action

It will improve the quality of university education overall.

A call to action

It will improve the quality of software in the world.

A call to action

It will make our students better job candidates for the workforce.

A call to action

It will make our students happier people.

References

[1] "Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us", 2009, Daniel Pink

References

[2] Imed Hammouda, Tampere University of Technology, Finland

References

[3] http://teachingopensource.org/index.php/Educational_programs_that_teach_Ope

n_Source

References

[4]Using Open Source Software in Computer Science Courses", 2006, Rajendra K. Raj and Fereydoun Kazemian, Frontiers in Education

Conference, 36th Annual

Thank you.

Questions?

[email protected]