[GSoC-general] Consideration for potential volunteer/ non-paid internship

[Terri Oda]

On 2018-04-10 11:47 AM, Rakesh Naga chinta wrote:
> I have not applied this year for GSOC 18 as I may not be available for 
> the whole program as a "full time student". Hence, I thought of applying 
> this year to your organization as a part time unofficial 
> intern/volunteer where I can contribute and work on a potential project 
> along with the other students being in my own personal interest.


Here's the thing about open source software: most of us are just random 
volunteers.  Outside of GSoC, there is nothing special you need to do to 
"sign up" you just show up and start doing things.  Projects have bug 
lists and wishlists of stuff to do.  If people like what you're doing, 
they'll use it, and if they don't sometimes they'll be able to help you 
transform it into stuff that's more generally useful.

You don't need to apply, just find a project that interests you and 
start writing some code (or docs, or draw logos, or do usability testing 
or whatever).  Work with people as peers and strive to do good work. :) 
I don't know that aiming for organizations doing gsoc is an ideal 
strategy, since you might do just as well working with an organization 
that isn't quite is busy, but really just find a group that interests 
you so you'll stick with it.

We've got an article on picking a good organization to work with here:
http://python-gsoc.org/faq.html#choosing

And we've got some suggestions on where to get started here:
http://python-gsoc.org/#gettingstarted

But basically, just start fixing bugs and doing stuff and see how it 
goes.  You've got this. :)

  Terri