Tcl GSoC Projects
matthew....@gmail.com
Google has announced the student proposals which have been accepted.
Following are brief descriptions of the 9 Tcl projects that will take
place this summer. Student projects will be worked on roughly 40
hours/week between May 26th and August 18th.
From now until May 26th we will be working with the students to help
them get acquainted with the Tcl community. To that end, the students
will be posting email introducing themselves and I encourage you to
help make them feel welcome, help them get grounded in our code base
and styles of doing things, etc.
Also, of course, don't hesitate to send them suggestions, requests,
(constructive) criticism on their projects. I will post later with
information on how you can track their progress over the summer.
Best,
Matt
Tcl/Tk 2008 Google Summer of Code Coordinator
Project Descriptions
Loading Shared Libraries from Memory and/or Tcl Channels
Student: Daniel Hans
Mentor: Andreas Kupries
The main objective of this project is to provide an enhanced mechanism
of loading shared libraries from Tcl Virtual Filesystems by Tcl
programs.
---
Tcl FUSE Language Binding
Student: Alexandros Stergiakis
Mentor: Stephen Huntley
The goal of this project is to produce a fully-functional Tcl language
binding to FUSE virtual filesystem kernel module, making it possible
to create FUSE filesystems using Tcl. It will ensure the binding works
on all or most operating systems supported by FUSE, and provide
detailed document the result.
---
TclDTrace
Student: Remigiusz Modrzejewski
Mentor: Daniel A. Steffen
The main objective of this project is designing and implementing a Tcl
binding to the libdtrace API. This would allow all of gathering user
input, compiling, running and processing the results of D scripts
inside Tcl.
---
Audio Input and Output Library and Extension
Student: Mohamed Abderaouf Bencheraiet
Mentor: Youness El Alaoui
This project will consist in merging libao's interface (http://
xiph.org/ao) with libao2's drivers (http://mplayerhq.hu) and make it
into a single, standalone library, as well as creating an audio input
equivalent and writing a Tcl extension to wrap the library, thus
providing the Tcl community with a new, more powerful audio input and
audio output library. This will allow the creation of new real-time
audio processing Tcl applications.
---
Tcl/Tk Printing Support
Student: Blicharski Krzysztof
Mentor: Clif Flynt
I would like to take up the "printing support" project. As I consulted
with the mentor, it consists of four major parts:
1) Convert the contents of the Tcl/Tk application to a printable
format. This may be Postscript, PDF, Gif, or printer commands.
2) Transmit the intermediate format data to a printer, interacting
with whatever facilities are offered by the operating system.
3) Code layer interfaces for application developers. This could
include adding print subcommands to all Tk widgets, or a print
subsystem capable of understanding the contents of all widgets.
4) User layer interface that a developer can include in an pplication
to give users access to printing.
---
Update Tk Test System Student: Ania Pawelczyk
Mentor: Jeff Hobbes
The tcltest package provides several utility commands useful in the
construction of test suites for code instrumented to be run by
evaluation of Tcl commands. Notably the built-in commands of the Tcl
library itself are tested by a test suite using the tcltest package.
The Tk test system still uses primarily tcltest v1, and would benefit
from an update to tcltest v2 and a full reexamination of out-dated
tests. The test suite should gain independence from the system's
settings that test is made on. This all leads to improvement of
testing capabilities.
---
Graph Manipulations
Student: Alejandro Eduardo Cruz Paz
Mentor: Steve Landers
The tcllib package provides functionality for creating and
manipulating graph data structures in Tcl/Tk. Although the package is
fairly flexible (e.g. allows attaching arbitrary attributes to graphs,
arcs, and nodes), there are a number of useful functions that could be
added such as finding connected components, determine (shortest) path
between two nodes, etc.
---
A Business Rule Management System based on the high-level object
oriented scripting language XOTcl
Student: Franz Wirl
Mentor: Gustaf Neumann
High level object oriented scripting languages like XOTcl can be
perfectly used to implement Charles Forgy's Rete algorithm. An
algorithm that has been developed and tested to match between more
than a thousand patterns and objects. Implementing this fast algorithm
into/with XOTcl will provide a fast and dynamic Rete library in XOTcl.
An object oriented implementation allows a natural expression of
rules. Object oriented interfaces to the algorithm improve its
flexibility and allows usage in many different domains.
---
AOLserver-GD Integration
Student: Matthew Gagen
Mentor: Matthew Burke
The goal of this project would be to get the latest version of nsgd
working with AOLserver 4.x, further rationalize its API, allow sharing
of graphics among server threads, build graphing and sparkline
packages using this module and use of autoconf to improve the build
process. Further, I will investigate the use of SWIG in order to more
easily track improvements in GD.
Ron Fox
for taking time to work with students on these projects. I also want to
especially thank Matthew Burke who was the point man on much of the
process/procedural stuff that was needed to get Tcl projects considered
for Google's Summer of Code 2008.
For all the other contributors who I did not thank, my apologies let
me know at Tcl2008 and the drink of you choice shall be yours.
Ron.