This is the fourth and final post in our series introducing NumFOCUS GSoC students to the community. (first post, second post, third post)

We’re pleased to introduce our GSoC students working on Astropy, SunPy, and SymPy

Manan Agarwal

College/University: Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani

Major/Concentration: B.E. Computer Science and M.Sc Physics

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: Jaipur, Rajasthan, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

I have been fascinated by our universe and the science used to understand it since I was very young. I have always passionately followed any advancements in the field of astronomy and I am currently the Secretary of the Astronomy Club of my college. As an amateur astronomer, I feel that tools for astronomy enthusiasts on the internet are severely lacking in quality and helpfulness. I want to help fix this issue and my GSoC project with Astropy fits perfectly.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

I have been developing websites, apps extensively for the past two years but have never got the chance to contribute to such a big platform. I wanted to polish my skills and learn more. Also an amateur astronomer, I feel that tools and their documentation for astronomy enthusiasts are severely lacking in quality and helpfulness. I want to contribute to improving facilities for amateurs and professionals through Astropy.

How did you get involved in open source software?

This is my first time contributing to an open source software. I got involved when I bumped into some really interesting projects while I was exploring different organisations for GSoC.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

I am expecting a good introduction to open source projects, learning how to handle large code bases and building new connection with the mentors and fellow GSoCers

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

This may come out as very immature, but frankly, I have still not figured out which path to take after leaving college. But I am certain that it will either be in the field of Computer Science or research in Physics (preferably Astronomy or Quantum Physics). And as GSoC with AstroPy involves both astronomy and computer science, it is a really good opportunity for me to get a taste of both the fields.

Sushobhana Patra

CASA CRTF Region File Handling

Link to Project Description

Link to Project Blog

College/University: Dr B.R Ambedkar National Institute Of Technology

Major/Concentration: Computer Science And Technology

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

I liked the idea of working on software solutions to scientific problems.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

The project idea seemed very interesting to me. Also, the regions package is very new so had a lot of areas for improvements where I could be a help. The mentors were also very responsive to my project proposal. These all factors made me believe that I could contribute as well learn a lot under this project.

How did you get involved in open source software?

Yes, this is first time contributing to an open source project. I initially started by solving a few issues in the astropy core. The reviewers were very responsive to my pull requests so I ended up sticking to this organization for my GSoC proposal.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

Good bonding with the mentors and community. Enriching learning experience in the domain (astronomy) and in software development as well. Picking up efficient coding styles and practices. Mastering the python language.

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

My goal is to become a generalist software developer and problem solver. I see GSoC as an opportunity to network with like-minded people sharing the same passion and interest . This work experience may express my capabilities , interest and perseverance in problem solving as well as programming and will be a huge plus in my resume.

Vishnunarayan K I

College/University: Indian Institute of Technology, Indore

Major/Concentration: Computer Science

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: Thrissur, Kerala, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

I wanted to do a python for this GSoC, that’s how I ended up with openastronomy. In openastronomy, SunPy caught my eye. It had a semi mature code base and an awesome community. My all doubts and questions were answered almost immediately. I felt what open source really means. This is what I wanted to achieve with GSoC and SunPy provided that.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

Even though I had been coding for some time, I had never really worked with a large code base. My project is to transition all code in SunPy which uses python datetime module to astropy time module. As you can imagine, this touches almost every part of the SunPy code base.

How did you get involved in open source software?

I was introduced into open source by my seniors in college. Once I got a taste of what open source and FOSS really is, I immediately ditched windows and became a FOSS warrior.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

What I want is just experience. I want to feel and understand how real big projects are maintained. I am sure this will help me when I have to maintain one myself.

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

I am in my first year of college, so I don’t have any concrete career goals. That said, I dream myself having a job where I can contribute to the open source all I want.

Ashish Kumar Gaurav

College/University: Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur

Major/Concentration: Mathematics

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: Deoghar, Jharkhand, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

My interest in mathematics and programming , along with experiences of previous GSoC students in this organisation.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

Rubi is a great idea. It frees CAS from different algorithms. If implemented properly, rule based mathematics can improve the capabilities.

How did you get involved in open source software?

I started contribution from hacktober fest. After that I started contributing to sympy

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

* A great learning experience
* Improving my programming capabilities
* A good community bonding

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

Research in Artificial Intelligence. GSoC will help me to become a better programmer. Also, it gives an experience to work with a community and a large code base.

Ravi charan

College/University: Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad

Major/Concentration: Information Technology

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

I was introduced to programming in the freshman year of my college and my clean interest in math from the childhood helped me get acquainted with programming easily. My primary motivation was to work on a Python/mathematics based project during the summer vacation. While, I was going through the organisations list, I came across Sympy and I found the ideas list pretty intriguing, which is when I started to contribute to the organisation.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

I wanted to try my hands on a mathematics based project and I chose to submit a proposal for Sympy. I was looking into the ideas list and decided to submit a proposal for improving the Group Theory part of the combinatorics sub module in the library, as I had a fair understanding of abstract algebra and group theory by then. Also, woking on a pure math based project would help me add up to my experience in that field.

How did you get involved in open source software?

This is not the first time I tried my hands on open source software. I have already been an active member of the open source community at my university, for over a year now.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

Hope to learn a lot of new things. Working with an organisation for 12 weeks would definitely help me learn how to produce a quality code that could be put into production and also a lot of new things about rules and procedures of an open source organisation.

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

I would be pursuing masters after my under-graduation and working on a pure mathematics based project could, hopefully, add up to my research experience. Even if I choose to work for the industry after my undergrad, the GSoC programme would be a of a great benefit as it would help me build a good resumé.

Akash Vaish

Improving Probability and Random Processes

Link to Project Description

Link to Project Blog

College/University: BITS Pilani, Goa Campus

Major/Concentration: Maths and Computer Science

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: Faridabad, Haryana, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

Being a student of math and computer science, SymPy provides a chance to contribute to both my areas of study.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

I find probability and statistics to be one of the most interesting areas of mathematics, and working on the statistics module in SymPy seemed like a very exciting opportunity.

How did you get involved in open source software?

This is my first time contributing to an open source software. I came across SymPy while searching for a Python/C/C++ based project, where I could apply and improve upon my knowledge of scientific computing.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

I hope to be able to complete my GSoC project to the satisfaction of my mentors, org admins and the users. While doing so, I hope to develop a better understanding of dealing with comparatively larger code bases as well as improve my understanding of probability spaces and random processes.

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

Though I am not very clear about my long term goals, I hope to pursue research in data sciences. This GSoC project will hopefully provide me some experience with scientific computing.

Sidhant Nagpal

Transforms, Convolution & Linear Recurrence Evaluation

Link to Project Description

Link to Project Blog

College/University: Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology, Delhi

Major/Concentration: Computer Science

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: New Delhi, Delhi, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

SymPy, which is a project under the NumFOCUS umbrella, was closely related to my interests in Mathematics and Algorithms. The ability to contribute to a scientific computation library having immense applications, was another driving reason. The opportunity to work with experienced developers and a helpful community made it all the more meaningful.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

Taking advantage of the symbolic capabilities of the SymPy library, I wanted to propose a module implementing discrete transforms and convolution.
This provides an excellent opportunity not only in data science, but also in digital signal processing. Furthermore, it also has applications in optimizing algorithmic approaches for recurrences.

How did you get involved in open source software?

Having a good background in Algorithms and Programming, I wanted to work on a Mathematical Project, when I found SymPy. This was the first organization that I started contributing to, after understanding the development workflow.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

To be able to do impactful work, interact and learn from organization mentors, and help new contributors.

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

My short-term goals would be to contribute, collaborate and network with the Open Source community. GSoC has given me an opportunity to devote considerable time for this, apart from helping me gain valuable experience.

Yathartha Anirudh Joshi

College/University: BTKIT, Dwarahat

Major/Concentration: Computer Science and Engineering

Degree Program: Bachelors

Hometown: New Delhi, Delhi, India

How many times have you participated in Google Summer of Code? This is my first time participating in GSoC

What motivated you to apply for GSoC with NumFOCUS?

I have been programming for quite some time and wanted to get into software development. I thought applying for GSoC would definitely boost this task. I like python and mathematics and when I got to know that a Computer Algebra System is written in pure python, I really got fascinated. I made my mind to work with this software for its development.

Why did you choose your specific project topic?

My project titled `Completing Solvers: Solveset` deals with improving one of the powerful feature of Sympy, solving equations. `sovleset` module was created as an alternative to the existing `solve` due to its limitations. To complete it and make it fully functional I chose this project as it will greatly enhance equation solving capability of Sympy.

How did you get involved in open source software?

Initially I had little knowledge about open source, but then I heard about contributing to open source by my friends. I searched about it, looked into every detail of how things work. I started developing interest and wanted to start contributing in open source software. I looked for organisations and found Sympy. Sympy being my first open source organisation.

What are you expecting out of your GSoC experience?

1) It will boost my knowledge about the software development.
2) Increase efficiency in programming and of course mathematics.
3) Through GSoC I will get to know about other developers and therefore strengthen the community.

What are your career goals, and how do you see the GSoC program moving you towards them?

I plan to pursue my career as a software developer and continue to contribute more and more to open source community and working with Sympy will definitely strengthen the base.