ERPNext Summer of Code (ESoC)
I was looking for summer internships, after 2nd year, preferably remote ones. I got to know about Outreachy, but it was a little late for that, and though I contributed to Mozilla, the time left wasn’t enough for me to make any significant contributions.
In between of this, someone posted about ERPNext Summer of code in a facebook group - Flow|Empowering students. I looked throught the program, it was to follow a pattern pretty much similar to that of Google Summer of Code, just like Outreachy. Seemed perfect, and so I applied.
So here I am, interning this summer with ERPNext, under ERPNext Summer of Code program.
What is ERPNext?
ERPNext is a free and open-source integrated Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software developed by Frappé Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
What is ERPNext Summer of Code?
As I mentioned earlier, ESoC is a GSoC like 3 month long program by ERPNext foundation, where students/interns would work on independent projects, guided by mentors, and get a fixed amount of stipend on successfully completing their projects.
Currently, 19 students are part of ESoC, working in teams on 6 different projects: https://github.com/frappe/esoc-18/projects
Eligibilty & selection process
Eligibility: Students aged 18 years or above enrolled in or accepted into an accredited institution at time of registration.
Selection process: We filled a form on website, which asked for our basic details including GitHub Handles. We did not have to create project proposals, instead we had to select the projects we were interested in, in the form.
However, we got a chance to get more familiar with ERPNext and frappeJs before finalising the modules to work on.
Before the start
From April 23 to May 14, we had ‘Know your community Period’.
During this period we had several calls, starting with Kickoff Call where we got introduced to each other as well as the basic idea of what we’re going to do during this period. This was followed by several app demos and frappeJs tutorial calls.
Lastly, we had a team formation call, where we chose modules of our choice to work on and formed teams.
All these calls are available on ERPNext youtube channel.
Working Style
Working style is very flexible. While the coding period started on15th May, we were allowed to start working after our exams end.
Since the program is remote, there are no hard and set rules for working time too.
All our work is completely open source.
We keep having calls with our mentor 1 or 2 times a week, as per our needs, and once in a while have calls with all 16 interns and mentors.
One of the advantages apart from flexibility and mentorship here is learning to work with a team. We are 19 interns working on 6 modules. So, even in each module, we have 3 or 4 interns working in collaboration, each day. This is one advantage you do not get in GSoC or most of the other summer of code programs where you work independently.
My Project
I, along with Tarun Kumar and Nishchith Shetty am working on Email Module, mentored by Suraj Shetty. Our evaluation is due 15th June, I’ll share project specific work done till first evaluation in my next ESoC series blog! :)
