Re: [9fans] request for more GSoC project suggestions

["Federico G. Benavento" <benavento@gmail.com>]

hola,

I think we usually ask for drivers because that's what keeps some
of us away of using Plan 9 natively or in new hardware, but I
also get Charles point, soo..

I'd really like to see p9p for windows and/or 9vx for windows as well.
for the first, I heard somewhere that a german fellow even got acme
going, but I don't know where that work is, for the latter there is also
a port stalled.

As for applications for Plan 9, the ones we need (read to cope with
the rest of the world) are too big for a soc project, so even if I don't
like gcc, a port would help on this matter.

right now, one can get by running old linux binaries and linuxemu+
equis, so improving linuxemu is also a project I'm interested.

just my opinion

On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 12:16 PM, Charles Forsyth <forsyth@terzarima.net> wrote:
> There are GSoC project suggestions at http://gsoc.cat-v.org/ideas/
> but I think more are needed, and that it would be especially good
> to have a further set of useful but simpler and smaller projects.
>
> Projects need to be non-trivial for GSoC, but shouldn't
> be hard enough that many of us would shun them (or indeed, have shunned them).
> Based on my experience several years ago,
> I'd also look for projects that are modular, so that the set of deliverables can be extended
> or reduced depending how things go. That worked well for the
> projects I was involved with.
>
> The problem with ports of the system or device driver writing, in my experience,
> is that satisfying though they are, and as necessary
> as they might be, they are typically quite hard to
> supervise, and will usually be fairly difficult for relative novices.
> There is quite a bit to learn for most students just to
> get started and be productive in the programming environment,
> although 9vx does make that much easier.
> Application-level projects are typically easier to
> supervise because they don't need specialised equipment,
> and many more people on this list and elsewhere can help
> with plausible advice, and also help debug when students are stuck. (Advice will
> sometimes be contradictory, but that's not a bad lesson to learn, too.)
> It's quite hard to help when special hardware or kernel-level debugging is involved.
> Because quite a bit in Plan 9 (or Inferno/9vx/p9p etc) is done at
> user-level that is done at kernel-level in other systems, that shouldn't
> narrow the scope much.  I wrote "application-level" not just "user-level"
> earlier because I thought it would be good to have some
> interesting applications of the system.  Of course, I don't mean
> to preclude system-level things when students are especially keen
> on that (as indeed I was during my school and university years).
>
> I don't know where the best place to suggest or discuss them would be,
> but I thought this list would reach nearly everyone interested.
>
>



-- 
Federico G. Benavento