Google's Summer Of Code is upon us again. The Perl community has had some problems in years past with lack of organization, and the SOC mentors seem determined to not let that happen this year. Eric Wilhelm posts:

TPF needs volunteers to make summer of code happen this year. It sounds like the administrators got stretched too thin in 2005 and 2006, and we really didn't have ourselves together in 2007. So, I'm proposing a departmental structure under a TPF umbrella, which will localize the cat-herding effects within various large projects (so far, parrot and Catalyst appear to be on board with this.) I would like to demonstrate that we have our act together this year, so we need to get a solid pool of administrative volunteers and mentors together before the 8th.

Eric says that they need a backup administrator, to minimize the reliance on a single person; department heads for p5p, "modules", etc; suggestions about department structure, and plenty of mentors.

What does a mentor do?

  • Act as a point-of-accountability for Google
    • keep tabs on your student
    • prod the student for updates
    • fill-out midterm and completion evaluation forms
  • Take the student under your wing
    • get them participating on mailing lists, IRC
    • make sure they know where to go for help and resources
    • answer questions about the bugs in the social machine
  • Represent the community
  • Get a t-shirt

If you'd like to help, or have ideas, contribute at one of these three pages: