<div>I am sure these stats are just some numbers which <b>do not</b> reflect the actual scenario any where closely. I completely agree with you on </div><div>"<i><span style>you're really competing against </span><span style>the other candidates which the org would consider accepting, not against </span><span style>the total number who applied.</span></i>"<div>
<br></div><div>In my opinion, the project one is applying to would/should be more(way more IMO) important because even if someone doesn't get selected, his interest should motivate him to contribute to the project he is really interested in.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Anyways, thanks for sharing the link on <b>NotesonStudentAllocations</b>, provides an insight into the allocation process.</div><div><br></div><div>Regards,</div><div>Rishabh.<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">
On Mon, Apr 9, 2012 at 5:30 PM, Olly Betts <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:olly@survex.com">olly@survex.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
On Sun, Apr 08, 2012 at 09:31:15PM +0530, Rishabh Mehrotra wrote:<br>
> Going by the stats, *just for fun*, comparing Xapian to the general GSoC<br>
<div class="im">> average, last year out of GSoC's overall 5651 proposals, 1115 were<br>
> selected, that is, 1 in 5. On the other hand, for Xapian, out of 42<br>
> proposals, 4 were selected: 1 in 10. [The stats doesn't involve students<br>
> submitting multiple proposals and other such details...]<br>
</div>> *Verdict:* Its tougher to get into Xapian!<br>
<br>
I realise you're not being totally serious, but I'd be cautious about<br>
trying to draw firm conclusions from the rather limited summary<br>
statistics available.<br>
<br>
On the #gsoc IRC channel, it's common to see prospective students divide<br>
the number of slots by the number of applicants (or even the number of<br>
applications) and conclude that the chances of acceptance are much lower<br>
than they really are. If they mention this on IRC, someone usually<br>
reassures them, but I bet a lot more are put off applying, which is a<br>
shame.<br>
<br>
Assuming you wrote an application good enough to get accepted at all<br>
(if you didn't, your chances are zero), you're really competing against<br>
the other candidates which the org would consider accepting, not against<br>
the total number who applied.<br>
<br>
If Xapian had enough mentors and slots, and ignoring that we would be<br>
unlikely to take more than one student for the same project idea (unless<br>
they take it in different directions), and also that some of those<br>
students may have been accepted by another org anyway, we'd probably<br>
have taken 10-15 of the applications from last year. Not sure yet for<br>
this year, but it's probably similar.<br>
<br>
But without knowing that information for other orgs, it's hard to know<br>
if it really is much tougher.<br>
<div class="im"><br>
> Also, this year some 6685 proposals were submitted to 180 organizations,<br>
</div>> averaging 37 proposals per organization. We have 41! *Verdict:* Xapian's<br>
> clearly avg+.<br>
<br>
Interesting...<br>
<br>
The umbrella orgs like KDE, the Python Software Foundation, GNU, etc<br>
actually represent a lot of individual projects, and because of this<br>
they usually get a lot more applications than the non-umbrella orgs, but<br>
that means you'd expect us to get less than the average.<br>
<br>
I know some topics are more popular - I bet more students want to work<br>
on games than accounting software. Perhaps search is fairly popular.<br>
Or perhaps there aren't many other search-related orgs taking part.<br>
<div class="im"><br>
> I am sure these stats don't matter at all and these comparisons don't mean<br>
</div>> anything, but still I feel happy whenever I see *"avg+"* : be it academic<br>
<div class="im">> performance(very rarely! ;) ) or anywhere else.<br>
<br>
</div>Indeed - the first cut at slot allocations is apparently based on the<br>
number of applications received, so applying to a popular org should not<br>
be a big worry:<br>
<br>
<a href="http://code.google.com/p/google-summer-of-code/wiki/NotesonStudentAllocations" target="_blank">http://code.google.com/p/google-summer-of-code/wiki/NotesonStudentAllocations</a><br>
<br>
Cheers,<br>
Olly<br>
</blockquote></div><br>
</div></div>