The PostgreSQL Project participates in Google Code-In (GCI) 2018. This is a program which allows pre-university students to pick up tasks defined by the partnering open source projects, learn about these projects, and also win a prize (certificates, t-shirts, hoodies, but also a trip to Google HQ).
Every project creates a number different tasks, some technical, some design based, some about updating documentation, or validating bugs. Whatever is useful in order to get to know the project better. Students can select tasks and submit their work. Mentors from the project then evaluate the work, and either approve it or send it back to the student because more work is needed.
Now we are halfway into this year’s competition, it’s time to run the numbers.
The PostgreSQL Project so far created 81 different tasks for this year’s Code-In. At any given time, between 10 and 25 students are working on tasks (called Instances), and a total of over 220 tasks were picked up by ~120 students. Around 120 tasks were completed and approved, but also ~90 abandoned. Would be nice to know why students give up on tasks, but there is no direct feedback available. Interestingly enough, the top picks from students are both technical and art tasks:
- Building PostgreSQL from Source
- Design a Logo for a Conference
- Design a PostgreSQL T-Shirt
- Design PostgreSQL Website “Buttons”
- Create “Business Cards” for Local PostgreSQL User Groups
- Create a SQL-Themed Sticker/Button Design
- Create a Banner for the Official PostgreSQL Twitter Page
The results so far are great, and because the work is submitted under an Open Source license, it can be used by the project in the future. We’ve seen some very interesting design ideas for t-shirts or logos, as example. The “Building PostgreSQL from Source” task resulted in several patches which aim to improve the documentation and installation instructions.
The contest goes on until December 12, 2018. Final winners are announced by January 7th, 2019.