5Qs: David Bain and Google Summer of Code
David Bain, lecturer and multimedia specialisation coordinator at CARIMAC, recently participated in the Google Summer of Code programme during which he worked on improving aspects of the open source content management system, Plone. Bain, who has an avid interest in the open source technology, talks to Intercom about his summer project with Google.
Q. What did your Google Summer of Code project involve?
A. Firstly, Plone is designed to make it easier to manage websites that have structured content such as, a website that lists courses, instructors and testimonials or a website that organises and presents documents for a conference. Most importantly, Plone is free software --similar to Mozilla Firefox. This means that it is free to use.
For GSoC 2010 I worked on a project called Themeeditor. Themeeditor was started by another developer, David Glick, and the goal of the project was to develop a tool that simplifies the process of customizing the look of a Plone website.
Q. What’s the status of Themeeditor now?
A. Themeeditor is now considered alpha quality software, meaning it isn't production ready. I'd like to see it through its beta and into full production.
Q. Is there a link between the GSoC and what you teach at CARIMAC?
A. At CARIMAC I teach individuals who will work in the areas of web design, video editing and related fields. I don't get to teach programming and web application development, I have to hold myself back sometimes because we don't train programmers at CARIMAC. But I don't think creating a theme for Plone or similar systems should require programming skills. Theme creation should be more about design skills. The goal of Themeeditor is to make aspects of system customisation and development more accessible to my students and other web designers.
Q. What would you say was the key learning outcome from this project?
A. I got a better understanding of the community software development process. I constantly interact with persons who "don't get it". They ask “Why would anyone develop valuable software and then give it away?”. Experiences like this help me to better answer that question.
Q. What’s next?
A. As a result of this project, I've started working on a tutorial/workshop on how to use Themeeditor to customise a Plone site. I will be presenting this at the annual Plone conference to be held in Bristol at the end of October. Hopefully I'll also get to present on this in Jamaica when I get back. I'd like to also deliver a presentation to Jamaican programmers who may be interested in participating in the GSoC in future years. I think it's a good experience and the stipend doesn't hurt
