On Fri, Feb 20, 2015 at 5:06 AM, Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > Jeff King <peff@xxxxxxxx> writes: >> I think these might be getting a little larger than "micro". > > The ~/.git-credential-cache may be a bit harder, but the case of > ~/.git-credentials should follow the same pattern as files for which > this is already done. So, doing it by mimicking existing code shouldn't > be too hard. > > But maybe that's me being optimistic ;-). As a person who did a significant number of GSoC 2014 micro-project reviews (as well as many actual GSoC reviews), I probably ought to weigh in and say that this may be too optimistic. In fact, most of the GSoC 2015 micro-project suggestions[1] seem far too large and involved. For 2014, most of the GSoC micro-projects were extremely simple, of the form "replace starts_with() with skip_prefix()", yet most applicants still required three or four (or more) attempts to get it right (and some never did), even with extremely detailed hand-holding reviews at each step. (And, such reviews are quite time-consuming. I was allocating six to eight hours each day to those reviews, yet I couldn't keep up with all the submissions.) Although quite simple, many of the 2014 micro-projects[2] (particularly from Michael Haggerty) had a bit of a twist (or trick question) thrown in, requiring a tad more thought and effort than mere mechanical search-and-replace. That was useful because it helped identify potentially acceptable candidates more easily, however, that added twist was probably a good upper limit on difficulty for micro-projects. Another important aspect of 2014's micro-projects was that they could be accomplished with only very localized knowledge: that is, a student could read the logic of the one function being touched and learn enough to be successful. The micro-projects did not require global knowledge of Git internals or hours of research. The attitude in 2014 was that it was important for students to get a taste of what it is like working on the Git project and what would be expected of them as submitters, and for GSoC administrators and mentors to get a feel for the applicants by how they interacted with reviewers. By going through the review process on a project with high engineering standards, it also was hope that students would learn and benefit from the experience even if not selected. Extremely simple micro-projects (possibly with a twist) in the style of 2014's were more than sufficient to satisfy these goals, and were more than enough to consume significant reviewer time. The suggested 2015's micro-projects seem far in excess. [1]: http://git.github.io/SoC-2015-Microprojects.html [2]: http://git.github.io/SoC-2014-Microprojects.html -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html