<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">2010/12/6 Fernando Perez <span dir="ltr"><<a href="http://fperez.net">fperez.net</a>@<a href="http://gmail.com">gmail.com</a>></span><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex;">
Dear Daniel,<br>
<div class="im"><br>
On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 3:19 AM, Daniel Cracan <<a href="mailto:danciac@gmail.com">danciac@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
</div><div class="im">> I am a student at a technical university, and I would be interested in coding<br>
> for the IPython project at gsoc this summer.<br>
><br>
> I thought it would be much better if I got to know a bit more about the<br>
> project, before applying for it at gsoc.<br>
><br>
> So if there is anyone willing to point me to the right direction I would<br>
> appreciate that very much.<br>
<br>
</div>I'm very sorry for the late reply, indeed as Erik indicated (thanks<br>
for chiming in!) it was just a matter of being very swamped with 'real<br>
life'. But I'm glad to have you here, and indeed we have now in<br>
ipython a lot of potential for new contributions. There's still real<br>
work to be done to 'land' the new zmq-based architecture in a fully<br>
stable release, but I hope we'll be able to make headway again into<br>
that soon. And that means the time is right to start thinking about<br>
gsoc projects.<br>
<br>
I'm going to list a few things that need doing, for some of these<br>
someone has already made a start but they aren't completed yet. But<br>
this is just so you get a sense of what's 'on the table'. The best<br>
contributions come always from matching a project's needs with the<br>
interest of the student, so feel free to pick something that is close<br>
to what *you* like and have skills for. We can then help get you<br>
started, so that by the time the gsoc rolls around, you have already<br>
some momentum going. In no particular order:<br>
<br>
- allowing the new Qt console to work in a single process. This may<br>
appear paradoxical (since we did all that work to be able to run in<br>
*two* processes), but there are scenarios where someone may want to<br>
embed an IPython rich widget inside an existing application that has a<br>
namespace to be interactively manipulated. Mayavi is a prime example<br>
that does that, and right now it would not be able to use our console,<br>
since the Qt widget expects to be a separate process.<br>
<br>
- continuing work on the html frontend that James Gao started:<br>
<a href="https://github.com/ipython/ipython/pull/179" target="_blank">https://github.com/ipython/ipython/pull/179</a>.<br>
<br>
I haven't talked to James recently, and he may be able to find time to<br>
push forward again, so obviously we'd first sync with him before<br>
proceeding. But I expect this to be a fair amount of long-term work,<br>
so even with James' foundation in place, there will be plenty more to<br>
do.<br>
<br>
- Allowing the html notebook and the Qt widget to use the matplotlib<br>
html5 backend, to get fully interactive windows inline. I don't know<br>
enough about Qt to be really sure if this is even possible, just an<br>
idea right now.<br>
<br>
- Develop a curses frontend. Wendell Smith discussed this a while ago<br>
and has some thoughts on the matter, but I don't know if he has made<br>
significant inroads; you may want to ping him first.<br>
<br>
- Work on the parallel parts: Min Ragan-Kelley has made phenomenal<br>
progress recently on this, but it's possible that despite his<br>
super-human abilities, he might still have more ideas than time to<br>
code them up. Now with the zmq support we have fairly ambitious plans<br>
for what can be done with ipython, so there will be plenty of work on<br>
this front.<br>
<br>
<br>
This is just a starter list, let us know if any of it sounds<br>
interesting/appealing to you and we'll direct you with a bit more<br>
precision then.<br>
<br>
Regards, and welcome to the project!<br>
<font color="#888888"><br>
f<br>
</font></blockquote></div><br>Hello Fernando,<br><br><br>I am sorry for this so late reply, but with the holidays and the exam period at the university I was not able to find some time for this.<br><br>Honestly, all of the possibilities that you pointed out, sound equally appealing to me, I hope that maybe you guys can prioritize them.<br>
<br>I think that I would be able to do a good job, of course with a help of a mentor, regardless of the task. I think of myself as a self-learner, so I just need to be pointed in the right direction.<br><br>So I guess, the question lies in finding a mentor.<br>
<br>Best wishes,<br>Daniel.<br clear="all"><br>