Dear students,

welcome to the GIMP and GEGL part of Google Summer of Code 2008!

We are very happy and excited about your projects, so let's make sure that you do know all that's needed for making them successful.

The two most important steps are related to the source code:

Getting the most up-to-date source code ---------------------------------------

GIMP and GEGL source code is managed in a Subversion (SVN) repository provided by the GNOME project. You can access it with a web browser at http://svn.gnome.org and use the viewcv feature to have a look, but in order to get whole modules you will need to use the Subversion client svn.

Getting the GIMP and GEGL trunk source code via anonymous SVN access is then as easy as

svn co http://svn.gnome.org/svn/gimp/trunk gimp

and

svn co http://svn.gnome.org/svn/gegl/trunk gegl

You should make sure that you can build GIMP and GEGL from this source code - it requires a few more tools than building from a release package.

Getting write access to the repository --------------------------------------

When you are working on your project, you will have to be able to commit your code to the Subversion repository from time to time (do not worry about breaking anything, you will be able to work on your own branch of the source code).

You will need an account for the GNOME repository, though.

The procedure to get an account is outlined here:

http://live.gnome.org/NewAccounts

and it links to the request form at

https://mango.gnome.org/new_account.php

Full name and permanent email are obvious. The username has to be connected to your real name in some way, e.g. like mine:

schumaml SCHUMAcher MichaeL

For the SSH key, follow the procedure described in http://sysadmin.gnome.org/users/security.html

Mention that you are a Summer of Code student working on a GIMP or GEGL project in the comment field, and choose the 'Access to Subversion' option from the Abilities. The GNOME project that can vouch for you is GIMP or GEGL, select it from the drop-down box near the bottom of the form.

Once you got write access, the URLs for the source code access change. For example, you'll get GIMP with

svn co svn+ssh://[login@]svn.gnome.org/svn/gimp/trunk gimp

With a real login name, this would be

svn co svn+ssh://schumaml@svn.gnome.org/svn/gimp/trunk gimp

Getting help in case of problems --------------------------------

All of you have already been on our IRC channels, #gimp and #gegl on irc.gimp.org. So I won't have to tell you that this is the fastest way to get help if you're stuck.

You won't have to wait for your mentor to appear there, almost everyone should be able to help you with general questions. Only if you need to get into details of your project, then your mentor might be the only one who can help.

For topics which do require longer texts (e.g. containing code), the developer mailing lists are better suited.

http://www.gimp.org/mail_lists.html

Stay in contact with your mentor --------------------------------

Make sure that your mentor does know what you're doing on the project. Tell him about the planned steps and agree on how to proceed with the project.

Next Summer of Code steps -------------------------

We're currently in the Community Bonding Period, which runs until May 26.

Nothing prevents you from starting to code early, but maybe you want to take some more time to get familiar with all of the "how to create a patch, how to add some code, how do I not break anything else... :)"

Regards, Michael