Google Summer of Code 2011 announced at LCA

Google Summer of Code 2011 was announced during the linux.conf.au (LCA) in Brisbane, despite recent floods affecting the area, as the open source community gathered for the event. Carol Smith from the Google Open Source Programs Office introduced the program, which is in its seventh year and aims to engage college and university students worldwide in open source software development. Google Summer of Code offers stipends to students for writing code for various open source projects, guided by mentoring organizations from across the globe. Over the past six years, the program has seen participation from 4,500 students across 85 countries, and this year, Google plans to increase the number of accepted student applications and mentoring organizations by 25%. The initiative is designed to help students tackle academic challenges during their summer break while contributing to open source projects, and interested students and organizations are encouraged to visit the Google Summer of Code 2011 website for more information.