Hello -- I have some interesting news involving the gEDA Project. Via Ales, the gEDA project was approached by the Linux Fund, who are interested in possibly arranging financial support for further development of gEDA tools! The Linux Fund is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping Free Software projects get any resources they might need to help push them along. Here's the project website:
http://www.linuxfund.org/ The Linux Fund typically sponsors a single developer to work on a project within the context of a written contract and a fixed budget. The contract is written to include a "statement of work" (SOW) with milestones to meet, which is typical for consulting contracts. The developer chosen is generally one of the core developers of a project, who has already demonstrated familiarity with the codebase, has made CVS commits in the past, and has done consulting work in the past. One area for improvement identified by the Linux Fund was our layout editor, PCB. We had a long conversation about the gEDA project's goals with the LF representative, and we agreed that upgrading PCB would provide the greatest impact to the gEDA Project in terms of helping our user community, and making the gEDA Suite more attractive to potential new users. Therefore, we all agreed to move forward in the following way: 1. We would craft a preliminary SOW and put it in a public place for review by the gEDA community. I have written that SOW, and put it on the gEDA wiki here: http://geda.seul.org/wiki/geda:pcb_funding_sow 2. Both the gEDA community and the Linux Fund would review and comment on the SOW. 3. If the Linux Fund likes it, they may opt to fund the project defined in the SOW. Then, any developer who wants to work on the project can contact the Linux Fund and apply to do the work. Note that the LF generally wants to fund a developer who is already associated with the project, knows the codebase, and has a history of CVS commits which prove his eligability [1]. 4. The Linux Fund and the gEDA Project will work together to select the best qualified developer from among those who apply. If you meet the above criteria, and you want to work on this project, then *please* apply! 5. The selected developer will negotiate terms and consulting rates with the LF, and then sign a contract with them to do the work. Then he'll get to work! Therefore, please take a look at the SOW which I have put on the wiki, and offer your comments and suggestions. Since it's on the wiki, feel free to edit it as you see fit. If you don't have a wiki account, go ahead and post your thoughts to geda-dev. Finally, if you're a developer who wants to do the work, contact me privately (sdb (AT) cloud9 (DOT) net) and I will put you in touch with the LF guy. Cheers, Stuart [1] FWIW, I am not on the list of developers to do this work. My role is to help organize this project, write the SOW, and then get out of the way. _______________________________________________ geda-dev mailing list [email protected] http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-dev
