[lilypond.git] / Documentation / included / gsoc.itexi

@c -*- coding: utf-8; mode: texinfo; -*-
@c This file is part of community.itexi
@c It's been moved here to reduce maintenance burden on translators.  It's up
@c to translators the choice of translating this section of community.itexi or
@c not (as GSoC students are required to speak english, a translated page is
@c not needed).

@c Current proposals for Google Summer of Code
@macro gsocCurrent

@divClass{column-center-top}
@subheading What is Google Summer of Code?

@uref{https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/, GSoC} is a global program
that offers students stipends to write code for free software and open
source projects during the summer.  For three months students work to
complete a given task as part of the project's community and under the
guidance of experienced mentors.  The program is an excellent
opportunity for students to gain experience with real-world software
development and make a contribution that benefits everyone.  It brings
new contributors to LilyPond and enables students who are already
involved to become more involved.  LilyPond participates in GSoC as part
of the @uref{http://www.gnu.org/, GNU project}.

We have had GSoC participants in 2012, 2015 and 2016 and encourage
students to apply for the 2017 program.

If you are interested to apply for the program with LilyPond as a
project, please read the information below and don't hesitate to write
us on our developer mailing list (see @ref{Contact}).  The student
application window is March 20 to April 3, 2017, but we strongly
encourage you to get in touch with our community ahead of that.

@divEnd

@divClass{column-center-middle-color2 bigger-subsubheadings}
@subheading Project Ideas List

Below is a list of GSoC project ideas (last update: January 2017), but
if you have other ideas for a project you may complete within the three
months of the program you're welcome to make a suggestion on our
developer mailing list (see @ref{Contact}).  There are a number of areas
where LilyPond could be improved, and our development team is always
willing to help those who would like to tackle a project similar to
those listed below.  As mentor availability varies from project to
project and from year to year it is wise to get in touch with us as
early as possible.

A full list of all the current open issues can be found
@uref{http://sourceforge.net/p/testlilyissues/issues/, here}.


@subsubheading Improve internal chord structure

The internal representation of LilyPond chords is not powerful enough
to capture the nomenclature of jazz chords.  Currently the chord has
a root, a bass and an inversion.  It would be nice to be able to handle
stacked or polychords, minor/major, etc.  In order to do this, an
internal representation with the ability to capture the essence of
complex chords must be developed.  As a bonus, once the internal
representation is developed, the output formatting of chord names can
be improved.

@emph{Difficulty:} Easy/medium

@emph{Requirements:} Scheme (Guile), but the level necessary can be
easily learned

@emph{Recommended:} Chord theory and naming

@emph{Mentor:} Carl Sorensen


@subsubheading Adopt the SMuFL music font encoding standard

For several years now a new standard for music fonts has been around:
@uref{http://www.smufl.org/, SMuFL}, which is also discussed as becoming part of
a future W3C standard for music encoding.  As a FLOSS tool LilyPond should
adhere to such an open standard instead of using an isolated solution like it
does today.  Adopting SMuFL will help integrating LilyPond with the world of
music notation software and eventually give LilyPond users access to a wider
selection of notation fonts.

Making LilyPond compliant to SMuFL includes remapping of the glyphs that are
built from METAFONT sources, adjusting the glyphs' metrics to SMuFL's
specifications, and finally updating the way LilyPond looks up and positions the
glyphs.  As an optional part of this project LilyPond's font loading mechanism
could be modified to use notation fonts installed as system fonts instead of
inside the LilyPond installation.

@emph{Difficulty}: Easy/medium

@emph{Requirements}: C++ and willingness to get familiar with LilyPond
internals.

@emph{Recommended}: Interest and experience in working with font files.
A little bit of METAFONT.

@emph{Mentors}: Werner Lemberg, Abraham Lee


@subsubheading Adding variants of font glyphs

@divClass{keep-bullets}
@itemize

@item
Adding @q{on} and @q{between} staff-line variants.

@item
Shorter and narrower variants of some glyphs for example, accidentals.
Another, more specific example could be an ancient notation breve
notehead coming in two variants one with a small or big @q{hole} within
it.

@end itemize
@divEnd

@emph{Difficulty:} easy

@emph{Requirements:} MetaFont, C++, good eye for details

@emph{Recommended knowledge:} basic LilyPond knowledge

@emph{Mentor:} Werner Lemberg


@subsubheading Contemporary Notation

LilyPond is very good at creating non-standard notation.  Having to
@emph{code} every graphical element instead of simply @emph{drawing}
it may seem cumbersome but is in fact a strong asset.  New notational
functionality can be provided with consistent appearance, automatic
layout and a natural syntactic interface.

Within the @uref{https://github.com/openlilylib/oll-core, openLilyLib}
library system the student will create a fundamental infrastructure
and building blocks to make creating contemporary notation easier.
Additionally (at least) @emph{one} concrete package is developed to
cover specific contemporary notation, such as for example the style
of a given composer, extended playing techniques for a specific
instrument or a certain category of effects.

@emph{Difficulty:} medium

@emph{Requirements:} Scheme (interaction with LilyPond internals),
contemporary notation techniques

@emph{Recommended:} sense of building hierarchical frameworks

@emph{Mentors:} @emph{NN,} Urs Liska


@subsubheading Rewrite LibreOffice LilyPond Extension with Python

The @uref{http://ooolilypond.sourceforge.net/, OOoLilyPond} extension
made it possible to conveniently include LilyPond score snippets in
OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice Writer, Draw and Impress documents while
keeping source and image together.  After many years without development
an initial effort has started to make the extension compatible again
with current versions of LibreOffice and LilyPond.

However, as the LibreOffice ecosystem has changed substantially it is
now possible to rewrite the extension with Python and PyQt.  This will
not only be more powerful in general but will allow the integration of
functionality from @uref{http://frescobaldi.org, Frescobaldi}, such as
for example syntax highlighting, entry helpers, score wizards or musical
transformations.

@emph{Difficulty:} easy/medium

@emph{Requirements:} Python, PyQt, LilyPond basics, LibreOffice
extension basics

@emph{Recommended knowledge:} Familiarity with Frescobaldi code based
or willingness to learn during bonding period

@emph{Mentor(s):} Joram Berger, Urs Liska, (Thorsten Behrens/LibreOffice)


@subsubheading Automated testing and documentation for openLilyLib

@uref{https://github.com/openlilylib, openLilyLib} is an extension
framework for LilyPond code providing a “snippets” repository and a
suite of integrated packages such as for example page layout tools or
scholarly annotations.  It is very powerful and promising, but to really
get off the ground two features are missing: automated testing and
documentation generation.

Automated testing is necessary to ensure modifications to functionality
don't break other functions within the library.  There is already some
Automated Testing of the “snippets” repository with Github's Travis
server, but this has to be reconsidered and extended to cover the
standalone packages too.

In order to be usable for a wider range of LilyPond users on a “consumer
level” openLilyLib needs proper documentation.  This documentation has
to be generated from the sources, so a system is needed that requires
package authors to document the input files and provide additional usage
examples, from which documentation is generated.  Ideally but not
necessarily this is implemented as a Git hook, i.e. automatically upon
each update to the repository.  We don't prescribe the tools and
approaches to be used, but the most widely used language in the LilyPond
domain is Python, so there would be some bias towards that.
Alternatively a Scheme solution could be fine so generating the
documentation would actually be triggered by “compiling” a certain
LilyPond input file.  In general it is advisable to make use of proven
concepts and tools from other languages.

The eventual output of the documentation should be a static HTML site
that can be viewed locally and/or uploaded to a website.  But it would
be beneficial if the tool would first generate an intermediate
representation (e.g. a JSON file with additional media files) from which
a Single Page Application could retrieve content for display on
openLilyLib's @uref{https://openlilylib.org, website}.  Development of
such a SPA @emph{can} be part of the GSoC project, but is optional.

@emph{Difficulty:} medium

@emph{Requirements:} Python or Scheme, static website generator(s) or
(Node.js based) dynamic web application technology. Continuous
Integration (can be learned during the bonding period)

@emph{Mentors:} Urs Liska, Matteo Ceccarello


@subsubheading MusicXML

Improving MusicXML import and export functions:

File interchange between LilyPond and other applications using MusicXML
is still a difficult matter.  To import MusicXML it has to be converted
manually by the @code{musicxml2ly} script.  Export @emph{to} MusicXML is
only available as a rudimentary feature inside Frescobaldi.  In order to
provide natural interchange between LilyPond and MusicXML based
applications there's the need of actual import functionality and a
dedicated export backend.

Importing XML shall provide file, line and column to add origin
attributes to generated objects.  That way point and click can be
made available in Frescobaldi or other supported IDEs.

Exporting XML shall be realized with an exporter class like the MIDI
export.  This may be based on the work already done in
@uref{https://github.com/DavidGarfinkle/Lilypond_MusicXMLexport, GSoC 2015}
by David Garfinkle.  It should be checked if it is possible to use
another XML library than the one provided by guile-2 in order to have
this feature available in current LilyPond (which is based on guile-1.8).

@emph{Difficulty:} medium

@emph{Requirements:} MusicXML, Python, Scheme, basic LilyPond knowledge

@emph{Recommended:} Familiarity with other scorewriters (for cross-testing)

@emph{Mentor:} Jan-Peter Voigt

@divEnd


@divClass{column-center-middle-color2}
@subheading Information for Applicants/Participants

In order to have a satisfying experience with GSoC applicants are
strongly advised to thoroughly read the following recommendations.  Some
of these are relevant for the application process, others for the time
within the project.

@itemize

@item
Read all applicable information on the program's website, particularly
the
@uref{https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/resources/manual,
students' manual}.  Make sure you fulfil all of Google's prerequisites
and are willing to join the program as a full-time commitment over the
coding period of three months.

@item
Please get in touch with us as soon as possible if you are interested in
applying with a project.  Mentor availability may change without notice,
project proposals may need fine-tuning, and many other reasons might
require us to reject or ignore an application that hasn't been discussed
before.

@item
We do not know in advance how many “slots” we will have available for
projects, so please be aware that you may find yourself in competition
with other applicants or not.  Interested or even enthusiastic response
from our mentors is no guarantee of eventually being accepted, and
@emph{not} being accepted does not necessarily indicate a negative
evaluation of your application.  If we have to decide between different
applicants there may be various aspects to consider.

@item
Integration in the LilyPond community is a fundamental part of GSoC, and
we expect our students to make substantial efforts to become community
members.  Within the @emph{bonding period} we expect you to write a blog
post about your project (either on @uref{http://lilypondblog.org, Scores
of Beauty} or on any other blog) and to be active on our mailing lists,
introducing yourself but also communicating about unrelated tasks.  This
goes beyond the mere setting up of a working environment and
familiarizing yourself with the relevant code, but we think it is
crucial for the GSoC project to be mutually satisfying.

@item
If you are accepted to the program you will have one mentor explicitly
assigned to your project.  With this mentor you will have to agree upon
a communication strategy, be it emails, chatrooms, issue trackers or
voice/video chats.  Regular communication is absolutely crucial for the
success of a GSoC project so you are stricly required to keep talking to
your mentor.  But keep in mind that your mentor has explicitly taken
over the responsibility for your project, and while unlike you he isn't
paid for this activity you are still entitled to get regular attention
from him.

@item
In order to get support from your mentor you have to give him a chance
to follow your progress and efforts.  Therefore it is important to
regularly commit your changes to the versioning repository you are
working on.  Don't hesitate making unfinished code available because you
are afraid of criticism, and don't suppress questions because you think
they might be considered stupid.  But ideally your code should at any
time be accompanied by compatible testing code.  Your mentor may not be
able to properly assess your code by only @emph{reading} it without the
opportunity to apply it in a real example.

@end itemize

There is a list of inactive projects in the @ref{Attic}.  We list
projects there that are still considered valuable but for which there
are currently no mentors available.

@divEnd
@end macro


@c Inactive proposals for Google Summer of Code
@macro gsocInactive
@subheading Inactive Google Summer of Code project suggestions

The following list describes GSoC projects that had been proposed
in recent years and which are still considered valuable but for
which we currently don't have mentors available.


@subsubheading Improve slurs and ties

The engraving quality of slurs and ties is often unsatisfactory. Ties
@q{broken} by clef or staff changes are not handled well.  The project
could include collecting and sorting examples of bad output, deciding on
the intended output and writing code to improve them.

@emph{Difficulty:} hard

@emph{Requirements:} C++, experience with writing heuristics

@emph{Recommended knowledge:} LilyPond knowledge, aesthetic sense


@subsubheading Grace notes

Fix problems with synchronization of grace notes.  Grace notes can
interfere with LilyPond's timing and cause odd effects, especially when
multiple staffs are used where some have grace notes and others don't.
This is one of the longest-standing and one of the more embarrassing
@uref{https://sourceforge.net/p/testlilyissues/issues/34/,bugs} in
LilyPond.

@emph{Difficulty:} medium

@emph{Requirements:} C++, MIDI

@emph{Recommended:} familiarity with LilyPond internals


@subsubheading Improve default beam positioning

For regular, cross-staff, broken and kneed beams.  Beaming should depend
on context and neighbor notes (see section 2.2 of
@uref{http://imslp.org/wiki/Repository_of_Music-Notation_Mistakes_%28Coulon%2C_Jean-Pierre%29,
this book}).  If possible also reduce beaming-computation time.

@emph{Difficulty:} medium

@emph{Requirements:} C++, experience with writing heuristics

@emph{Recommended knowledge:} aesthetic sense


@subsubheading Help improve compilation behavior

Automatic code analysis tools, like valgrind memory leak detection or
callgrind code profilers, provide valuable information about possible
flaws in our C++ code.  Cleaning up warnings would allow us to automate
the rejection of any patch which introduced extra warnings.

@emph{Difficulty:} medium

@emph{Requirements:} C++

@end macro