So these Google
bounties look rather interesting. In particular, the global
memory analysis tool, improve
login time, and Gnome
architecture overview. Unfortunately, it looks like I’m
ineligible despite being a student because of the way it works (though
honestly, my fellowship’s requirements that “under normal
circumstances a fellow may not engage in work for renumeration during
the school term” and some other stuff (they attempt to explicitly
allow other work, but are trying to narrow down what kind and how much
and under what circumstances) would make it difficult to be
compatible, though I believe Novell’s bounties could fit if they
looked interesting–in part because of no necessary signup or time
period and in part because I can work on them during times other than
the “school term”). Also, it seems odd that the Bounty Contest Rules
page appears to be Novell specific and doesn’t mention the extra
requirements on the Google bounties (e.g. must be a student, must be
completed this summer, must signup by June 14th, etc)–making me
wonder if perhaps Google’s bounties might be obtainable under the same
rules as the ones for Novell, though I’m guessing it’s just an
oversight/mistake.
It seems that the global memory analysis tool bounty could be aided a
lot by
Soeren’s sysprof and the list of memory tools
here may provide ideas or getting started information.
But I’m really curious about the Gnome architecture overview, though.
In seems like
my guide could qualify (assuming I hadn’t yet written it and was
otherwise eligible for the program), though they probably want
something more like the
first section of chapter 5 of my guide being fleshed out (which I
had intended to do). But that seems curious in that I think the other
two sections of that chapter would be really helpful as well for the
audience they had. It additionally seems pretty odd because
Malcolm has already written something that appears to satisfy the
bounty criteria (though, I think Malcolm isn’t a student and thus
couldn’t qualify for the bounty…)–in fact, that was part of the
reason that chapter 5 of my guide was different; I didn’t want to
uselessly redo previous work. It really seems that this bounty is in
danger of repeating existing work…
Oh well, looks like my Gnome work continues to be for free. But, that
does have the advantage of incredible flexibility (e.g. who would make
a bounty for working on Bugzilla or on the bugsquad?) and has the
option to decrease the workload whenever I want or even drop it
temporarily when I feel overwhelmed or other matters start pressing.
🙂 And I look forward to seeing what cool stuff comes out of the
Google bounties and those who can participate.