Google Summer of Code 2023

FreeCAD started participating to the Google student coding program (GSoC) in 2016. We participated through a combined effort of many CAx projects, under the BRL-CAD umbrella. Beginning in 2023, we are applying as our own organization.

How it works

 * The student writes a project proposal for FreeCAD.
 * Sometimes their project idea caters to something that the open source organization suggests and sometimes it's an idea entirely of the student's conception.
 * Proposals are reviewed, evaluated, and ranked by the open source organization's mentors.
 * Google allocates a certain number of slots to each participating organization
 * That, in turn, determines how many student developers work with that organization.

If you want to get involved have a look at the GSoC Checklist. Whether you're applying or accepted, we've itemized everything you need to do in this list. We're here to help you become new open source developers, so don't be shy if you have any questions.

We are proposing a number of project ideas here. But you are in no way forced to follow our ideas. You can propose anything you would like to work on, that you thing would be an interesting project.

The Selection Process
GSoC is about getting people involved and contributing to open source over the long-term. As such, we heavily weight our application selection process towards students that are interested in remaining involved in FreeCAD and open source software development long after GSoC has ended. GSoC is not a job. If you think this is just a summer job, then GSoC is probably not for you. It's only like a job in terms of planning your time commitment over the summer.

Additionally, submissions are graded based on perception of the submitter's abilities to complete the task within the program timeframe, general consensus on the technical approach being proposed, and overall interest in having such modifications made to FreeCAD. Particular notice is made of students that are responsive to questions and readily interactive in the IRC channel or on the forum. Communication is a great thing.

Just about every GSoC organization receives considerably more project proposals than can be accepted. Every application gets read multiple times and reviewed in detail. Of those applications, only a small subset are selected so keep in mind that the selection process is rather competitive and difficult.

Whether or not you are accepted, contributing to open source outside of GSoC is one of the main goals of the program and is the best way to be noticed and get your proposal accepted. Keep that in mind. Thanks for your interest and we look forward to working with new FreeCAD developers!

Implementation Ideas
There are several sources for project ideas. The table below lists existing project ideas already documented on our wiki. FreeCAD also previously participated in an umbrella organization for GSoC, and there are FreeCAD project ideas available in their GSoC repo. Additionally, there is a forum thread calling for additional ideas which may be the basis of a project.

The ideas listed here or in the OpenCAx repo have a high chance of being accepted as project proposal. Note that for students with an established involvement in FreeCAD who have already contributed code, ideas in their own line of work are also welcome. Feel free to contact us on IRC, the forum or the mailing list for further discussions about the listed projects.

The topic's priority shows you how important the work on the ideas is for the mentors, and hence choosing a high priority topic will give you an advantage if there are more applications than slots for FreeCAD.