Updated!

I am very happy to announce that an invitation from Google arrived today asking if Drupal would like to participate in Summer of Code 2006. Drupal's involvement in SoC 2005 was a smashing success bringing code, money and fresh faces to the Drupal project. Being given the opportunity to repeat and build upon last year's experience is a dream.

This year I would like to see more discussion beforehand on the types of projects that would be most beneficial to Drupal for students to work on. We learned last year that about half of the applicants will latch onto ideas that we provide and half will propose exciting ideas that we never thought of. Use this thread to discuss potential projects and I'll organize and pursue the most promising ideas on separate pages later when students begin applying. See below for instructions

Last year also showed that there is never too much support from mentors. I'm not joking when I say I would like to see two mentors per student. Please contact me directly if you would like to be a mentor.

Now is the time to start reaching out to college students who might be considering getting involved in open source development and encouraging them to apply to SoC, and specifically to the Drupal project. Students are encouraged to plan their applications carefully and really invest time and energy into preparing them. The competition will be fierce and an application must really stand out to catch our attention. The rewards, however, are great. Some of the students from last year are now working full time as Drupal programmers and consultants.

Here's a big round of applause and many thanks to Google in advance! Let's make SoC 2006 another important milestone for the Drupal project.

How you can help

There is now a book page for Summer of Code 2006. If you have a project proposal, please take the time to write a detailed description of your project and as much technical specification as you are able to. Post this as a child page to the SoC 2006 page. Leave it in moderation, I'll review and publish it.

This is *not* a free-for-all feature request invitation; these have to be projects that are practical, realistic and interesting for a college student coming to Drupal for the first time. Furthermore, they must have clearly defined deliverables. It must be stated in black and white what the final goal is, and what the terms of success are.

[edit. I have made this page readonly and eventually, comments will be removed and what's worthy will be moved to the book. chx]