Blogs by Aryan

Open Forms is now 0.4.0 - and the GUI Builder is here

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 20:51:00 GMT

Open Forms is now 0.4.0 - and the GUI Builder is here

A quick recap for the newcomers

Ever been to a conference where you set up a booth or tried to collect quick feedback and experienced the joy of:

Captive portal logout
Timeouts
Flaky Wi-Fi drivers on Linux devices
Poor bandwidth or dead zones

This is exactly what happened while setting up a booth at GUADEC. The Wi-Fi on the Linux tablet worked, we logged into the captive portal, the chip failed, Wi-Fi gone. Restart. Repeat.

We eventually worked around it with a phone hotspot, but that locked the phone to the booth. A one-off inconvenience? Maybe. But at any conference, summit, or community event, at least one of these happens reliably.

So I looked for a native, offline form collection tool. Nothing existed without a web dependency. So I built one.

Open Forms is a native GNOME app that collects form inputs locally, stores responses in CSV, works completely offline, and never touches an external service. Your data stays on your device. Full stop.

What's new in 0.4.0 - the GUI Form Builder

The original version shipped with one acknowledged limitation: you had to write JSON configs by hand to define your forms.

Now, I know what you're thinking. "Writing JSON to set up a form? That's totally normal and not at all a terrible first impression for non-technical users." And you'd be completely wrong, to me it was normal and then my sis had this to say "who even thought JSON for such a basic thing is a good idea, who'd even write one" which was true. I knew it and hence it was always on the roadmap to fix, which 0.4.0 finally fixes.

Open Forms now ships a full visual form builder.

Design a form entirely from the UI - add fields, set labels, reorder things, tweak options, and hit Save. That's it. The builder writes a standard JSON config to disk, same schema as always, so nothing downstream changes.

It also works as an editor. Open an existing config, click Edit, and the whole form loads up ready to tweak. Save goes back to the original file. No more JSON editing required.

Libadwaita is genuinely great

The builder needed to work well on both a regular desktop and a Linux phone without me maintaining two separate layouts or sprinkling breakpoints everywhere. Libadwaita just... handles that.

The result is that Open Forms feels native on GNOME and equally at home on a Linux phone, and I genuinely didn't have to think hard about either. That's the kind of toolkit win that's hard to overstate when you're building something solo over weekends.

The JSON schema is unchanged

If you already have configs, they work exactly as before. The builder is purely additive, it reads and writes the same format. If you like editing JSON directly, nothing stops you. I'm not going to judge, but my sister might.

Also thanks to Felipe and all others who gave great ideas about increasing maintainability. JSON might become a technical debt in future, and I appreciate the insights about the same. Let's see how it goes.

Install

Snap Store

snap install open-forms

Flatpak / Build from source

See the GitHub repository for build instructions. There is also a Flatpak release available.

What's next

A11y improvements
Maybe and just maybe an optional sync feature
Hosting on Flathub - if you've been through that process and have advice, please reach out

Open Forms is still a small, focused project doing one thing. If you've ever dealt with Wi-Fi pain while collecting data at an event, give it a try. Bug reports, feature requests, and feedback are all very welcome.

And if you find it useful - a star on GitHub goes a long way for a solo project. 🙂

Open Forms on GitHub

Introducing Open Forms

Sun, 21 Dec 2025 00:00:51 GMT

Introducing Open Forms!

The problem

Ever been to a conference where you set up a booth or attempt to get quick feedback by running around the ground and felt the awesome feeling of -

Captive portal logout
Timeouts
Flaky Wi-Fi drivers on Linux devices
Poor bandwidth or dead zones
Do I need to continue?

While setting up the Ubuntu booth, we saw an issue: The Wifi on the Linux tablet was not working.

After lots of effort, it started to work, but as soon as we log into the captive portal, the chip fails, and no Wi-Fi is detected. And the solution? A trusty old restart, just for the cycle to repeat. (Just to be clear, the wifi was great, but it didn't like that device)

We eventually fixed that by providing a hotspot from mobile, but that locked the phone to the booth, or else it would disconnect.

Now, it may seem a one-off inconvenience, but at any conference, summit, or event, this pattern can be seen where one of the issues listed listed above occurs repeatedly.

So, I thought, there might be something to fix this. But no project existed without being reliant on Web :(

The solution

So, I built one, a native, local first, open source and non-answer-peeking form application.

With Open Forms, your data stays on your device, works without a network, and never depends on external services. This makes it reliable in chaotic, un-reliable, or privacy first environments.

Just provide it a JSON config (Yes, I know, trying to provide a GUI for it instead), select the CSV location and start collecting form inputs.

No waiting for WiFi, no unnecessary battery drains, no timeouts, just simple open forms.

The application is pretty new (built over the weekend) and supports -

Taking input via Entry, Checkbox, Radio, Date, Spinner (Int range)
Outputs submissions to a CSV
Can mark fields to be required before submissions
Add images, headings, and CSS styling
Multi-tabbed to open more than one form at a time.

Planned features

Creating form configs directly from the GUI
A11y improvements (Yes, Federico, I swear I will improve that)
Hosting on Flathub (would love guidance regarding it)

But, any software can be guided properly only by its users! So, If you’ve ever run into Wi-Fi issues while collecting data at events, I’d love for you to try Open Forms and share feedback, feature requests, bug reports, or even complaints.

The repository is at - Open Forms GitHub The latest release is packaged as a flatpak.

Balancing Work and Open Source

Sat, 25 Oct 2025 23:00:00 GMT

Work pressure + Burnout == Low contributions?

Over the past few months, I’ve been struggling with a tough question. How do I balance my work commitments and personal life while still contributing to open source?

On the surface, it looks like a weird question. Like I really enjoy contributing and working with contributors, and when I was in college, I always thought... "Why do people ever step back? It is so fun!". It was the thing that brought a smile to my face and took off any "stress". But now that I have graduated, things have taken a turn.

It is now that when work pressure mounts, you use the little time you get to not focus on writing code and instead perform some kind of hobby, learn something new or spend time with family. Or, just endless video scroll and sleep.

This has led me to be on my lowest contributions streak and not able to work on all those cool things I imagined, like reworking the Pitivi timeline in Rust, finishing that one MR in GNOME Settings that is stuck for ages, or fixing some issues in GNOME Extensions website, or work on my own extension's feature request, or contributing to the committees I am a part of.

It’s reached a point where I’m genuinely unsure how to balance things anymore, and hence wanted to give all whom I might not have been able to reply to or have not seen me for a long time an update, that I'm there but just in a dilemma of how to return.

I believe I'm not the only one who faces this. After guiding my juniors for a long while on how to contribute and study at the same time and still manage time for other things, I now am at a road where I am in the same situation. So, if anyone has any insights on how they manage their time, or keep up the motivation and juggle between tasks, do let me know (akaushik [at] gnome [dot] org), I'd really appreciate any insights :)

One of them would probably be to take fewer things on my plate?

Perhaps this is just a new phase of learning? Not about code, but about balance.

GNOME Outreachy Dec 2025 Cohort

Sat, 06 Sep 2025 20:19:50 GMT

The GNOME Foundation is interested in participating in the December-March cohort of Outreachy and is looking for 1 intern.

If you are interested in mentoring AND have a project idea in mind, please visit the Internship project ideas repository and submit your proposal by 10th September 2025. All proposals are triaged by Allan Day, Matthias Clasen and Sri Ramkrishna before approval.

We are always on the lookout for project ideas that move the GNOME project forward

If you have any questions, please feel free e-mail soc-admins@gnome.org, which is a private mailing list with the GNOME internship coordinators or join our matrix channel at - #internships:gnome.org.

Looking forward to your proposals!

GUADEC 2025 Experience

Wed, 13 Aug 2025 20:00:00 GMT

Ciao a tutti!

In this blog, I'm pumped to share my experience attending GUADEC 2025 held in Brescia, Italy.

Let's start :)

During the conference, I presented multiple talks -

My main talk on GNOME Internships, Google Summer of Code, Outreachy

Lightning talk on Need for GUADEC and Regional events

Lightning talk on GNOME Extensions as the gateway ****

BoF on GNOME Foundation Internships - Unrecorded 😅

The main talk was on Day 1 of the conference, which was quite exciting. I had the pleasure of sharing my journey and insights on how to leverage FOSS internships like GSoC and Outreachy to build a successful career in open source.

Attending this conference was far from easy. Due to the tragic Air India flight incident, I had to scrap my original travel plans and book a last-minute alternative to Italy. It was stressful — both emotionally and financially, but I was determined to make it to GUADEC.

Another trouble was with Visa; I had to apply for a Schengen Visa, which was hectic to say the least. Submitting 150+ pages of documents and waking up the GNOME Foundation team at night (their time) just to get some random letters the VFS office (embassy delegates) wanted during the submission process was bliss. So sincere thanks to Steven (ED), Anisa, Kristi, Rosanna, Asmit and others for helping me out with this at the very last minute. You all are heroes!

I usually carry double the required documents just to be on the safe side, but this was just something else.

Anyway, let's proceed with the blog :D

The touchdown

Due to a lack of flights to Brescia, I had to take a flight to Milan and then travel by train to Brescia.

But, since this was my first conference after graduating the same month (yipeee), I fortunately was able to extend my trip for the first time ever.

This let me explore Italy, a dream come true. I visited Milan and the Monza circuit before heading to Brescia.

I have no clue about racing, but visiting the Monza circuit was a surreal experience. The history, the cars, and the atmosphere were just amazing.

The pre-conference party

After some nice struggles with public transport in Brescia (I loved it afterwards though), I decided to take a 20-minute walk to the venue of the pre-conference party.

I don't mind walking, but as I was waiting for the bus, initially, I got late and had to walk fast. The worst part? The bus that didn't allow me to board was constantly catching up to me for half the journey, boosting the frustration.

But well... I finally reached! Met some of my friends and had nice conversations with the organisers, attendees, speakers and some really engaging discussions with Mauro from Canonical.

After which, he consented to me kidnapping him for an Indian dinner. The place we got to was closed (I hate Google Maps), but fortunately, we found another Indian restaurant in very close proximity.

We had tons of exchanges about the future of Ubuntu, Canonical and GNOME. It was great to meet in person after GUADEC 2023.

The first day of the conference

The first day was quite good, got to attend the talks which I was looking forward to and was also able to help with the Ubuntu booth setup (well, not much but somewhat?).

After tackling some great wifi chip delights, we were able to get the anonymous forms up and running for the booth.

And then came my talk. Maria Majadas introduced me (she is awesome btw!), and after some setup tackling, I was able to present my talk on "Making a career out of FOSS Internships GSoC/Outreachy".

I had to rush a bit due to the time constraints, but I was able to cover most of the points I wanted to. So yay!

Afterwards, I was able to volunteer for moderating the talk, "The state of GTK" by Matthias, which was quite insightful. It was great to see the progress GTK has made and the future plans.

We then had a great panel discussion, which was quite a nice twist.

Later Aarti and Sri (Who both are awesome), whom I met for the first time in person, invited me for some snacks and drinks. The stories they shared were just so amazing and inspiring. Due to them, for the first time at GUADEC, I was able to have normal conversations and not just very professional ones. This elevated the conference 10x for me.

If you both are reading this, I just want to say you both are amazing, and I hope to see you again soon!

Then Mauro kidnapped me for a nice Italian dinner. We found a nice pizzeria with amazing views and food. I let him order for me, just like he did with me :).

And I have to say, that was the best pizza I ever had.

Also, I learned some new pizza cutting tricks and info on why you should NEVER share Pizza (apart from exchanging slices to try). This will stay with me for life xD.

Oh man, that was a lot for the first day. I was exhausted but happy.

The second day of the conference

On the second day, the highlight talks for me were "Getting Things Done in GNOME", "State of the Shell" and "Have a GTK app with no tests? No Problem!" (Which I had the pleasure to attend and moderate).

I also gave another lightning talk on "Why do we need GUADEC or GNOME events?" which was quite fun. I shared my experiences and insights on the importance of such events in fostering community and collaboration.

Thanks to Rosanna for giving me the idea to do so. It was really great to share my thoughts and experiences with the community.

After the conference, I took a detour to visit the beautiful Brescia Castle. The views were out of this world. I also, instead of taking the bus to the top or climbing up stairs, took the gravel path around the castle (It had fences which I decided to jump over :)). But it was worth it, climbing this way allowed me to see every corner of the city layer by layer. That you can't beat!

The third day of the conference

As you can guess by now, it was great as well, and I gave another talk - "GNOME Extensions: the gateway drug to GNOME" and also helped in moderating some sessions.

Also, I'll highly recommend you to watch the talk on Gnurd - https://www.youtube.com/live/Z7F3fghCQB4?si=H_HgN6IHeRdSVu10&t=27391 It was nice!

And we ended the day with a great dinner celebrating 25 years of GUADEC. The food was amazing, the company was great, and the atmosphere was just perfect.

The BoFs

Being a GNOME GSoC'22 Intern, and now a part of the GNOME Internship Committee, I had my fourth and final talk (kind of), GNOME Internship Committee Meetup, where we discussed the future of the program, the challenges we face, and how we can improve it.

Thanks, Felipe, for organising it and inviting me to be a part of it. It was great to see the progress we have made and the plans we have for the future.

The next day, I attended the "GTK Settings Hackfest" BoF, and it reminded me why physical meetups are so powerful. Discussing my blockers directly with the maintainers and fixing stuff together. It can't get more delightful than that!

We then went to Lake Iseo for a trip. And the picture will give you a glimpse of the beauty of the place.

The Bergamo tour

The tour was a great opportunity to check out Bergamo and interact with people.

Special shoutout to Ignacy for being my partner in crime for clicking pictures. The skyline, the view from the top and the food were just amazing. We had a great time exploring the city and taking pictures.

It was also Federico's birthday, so we celebrated it with a cake and some drinks. Celebrating the founder at the 25th GUADEC was the cherry on top.

Federico also gave great insights about Coffee. I was looking forward to buying a Bialetti Moka pot, but I wasn't sure. But after his advice, I splurged. And I have to say, it was worth it. The coffee is just amazing, and the experience of making it is just delightful. Instant is not the same anymore :(.

So thanks to Federico, I now have a taste of Italy at home. Next stop, getting a grinder!

Meeting people

At last, I met many new people and got to learn a lot. Made new friends, got to meet people I look up to and many more.

I hope I wasn't that introverted, but yeah, slowly getting comfortable around new people, especially thanks to Aarti and Sri for making me feel comfortable and helping me break the ice.

The End

This GUADEC was just awesome. And I was also able to visit 4 cities in Italy, which was a dream come true. Normally, due to college, I couldn't visit any other city than the conference city, but this time I was able to extend my trip and explore Italy a bit.

Thanks to all the people for making the event so great. It was an experience like no other. I would also like to thank GNOME Foundation for sponsoring the trip :) I hope I used it to the fullest and made the most out of it. :D

I also renewed my GNOME Foundation membership just recently, which is awesome.

Create Custom System Call on Linux 6.8

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 11:08:00 GMT

Ever wanted to create a custom system call? Whether it be as an assignment, just for fun or learning more about the kernel, system calls are a cool way to learn more about our system.

Note - crossposted from my article on Medium

Why follow this guide?

There are various guides on this topic, but the problem occurs due to the pace of kernel development. Most guides are now obsolete and throw a bunch of errors, hence I’m writing this post after going through the errors and solving them :)

Set system for kernel compile

On Red Hat / Fedora / Open Suse based systems, you can simply do

Sudo dnf builddep kernel
Sudo dnf install kernel-devel

On Debian / Ubuntu based

sudo apt-get install build-essential vim git cscope libncurses-dev libssl-dev bison flex

Get the kernel

Clone the kernel source tree, we’ll be cloning specifically the 6.8 branch but instructions should work on newer ones as well (till the kernel devs change the process again).

git clone --depth=1 --branch v6.8 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git

Ideally, the cloned version should be equal to or higher than your current kernel version.

You can check the current kernel version through the command

uname -r

Create the new syscall

Perform the following

cd linux
make mrproper
mkdir hello
cd hello
touch hello.c
touch Makefile

This will create a folder called “hello” inside the downloaded kernel source code, and create two files in it — hello.c with the syscall code and Makefile with the rules on compiling the same.

Open hello.c in your favourite text editor and put the following code in it

#include <linux/kernel.h>
#include <linux/syscalls.h>
SYSCALL_DEFINE0(hello) {
 pr_info("Hello World\n");
 return 0;
}

It prints “Hello World” in the kernel log.

As per kernel.org docs

"SYSCALL_DEFINEn() macro rather than explicitly. The ‘n’ indicates the number of arguments to the system call, and the macro takes the system call name followed by the (type, name) pairs for the parameters as arguments.”

As we are just going to print, we use n=0

Now add the following to the Makefile

obj-y := hello.o

Now

cd ..
cd include/linux/

Open the file “syscalls.h” inside this directory, and add

asmlinkage long sys_hello(void)

This is a prototype for the syscall function we created earlier.

Open the file “Kbuild” in the kernel root (cd ../..) and to the bottom of it add

obj-y += hello/

This tells the kernel build system to also compile our newly included folder.

Once done, we then need to also add the syscall entry to the architecture-specific table.

Each CPU architecture could have specific syscalls and we need to let them know for which architecture ours is made.

For x86_64 the file is

arch/x86/entry/syscalls/syscall_64.tbl

Add your syscall entry there, keeping in mind to only use a free number and not use any numbers prohibited in the table comments.

For me 462 was free, so I added the new entry as such

462 common hello sys_hello

Here 462 is mapped to our syscall which is common for both architectures, our syscall is named hello and its entry function is sys_hello.

Compiling and installing the new kernel

Perform the following commands

NOTE: I in no way or form guarantee the safety, security, integrity and stability of your system by following this guide. All instructions listed here have been my own experience and doesn’t represent the outcome on your systems. Proceed with caution and care.

Now that we have the legal stuff done, let’s proceed ;)

cp /boot/config-$(uname -r) .config
make olddefconfig
make -j $(nproc)
sudo make -j $(nproc) modules_install
sudo make install

Here we are copying the current booted kernel’s config file, asking the build system to use the same values as that and set default for anything else. Then we build the kernel with parallel processing based on the number of cores given by nproc. After which we install our custom kernel (at own risk).

Kernel compilation takes a lot of time, so get a coffee or 10 and enjoy lines of text scrolling by on the terminal.

It can take a few hours based on system speed so your mileage may vary. Your fan might also scream at this stage to keep temperatures under check (happened to me too).

The fun part, using the new syscall

Now that our syscall is baked into our kernel, reboot the system and make sure to select the new custom kernel from grub while booting

Once booted, let’s write a C program to leverage the syscall

Create a file, maybe “test.c” with the following content

#include <stdio.h>
#include <sys/syscall.h>
#include <unistd.h>
int main(void) {
  printf("%ld\n", syscall(462));
  return 0;
}

Here replace 462 with the number you chose for your syscall in the table.

Compile the program and then run it

make test
chmod +x test
./test

If all goes right, your terminal will print a “0” and the syscall output will be visible in the kernel logs.

Access the logs by dmesg

sudo dmesg | tail

And voila, you should be able to see your syscall message printed there.

Congratulations if you made it 🎉

Please again remember the following points:

Compiling kernel takes a lot of time
The newly compiled kernel takes quite a bit of space so please ensure the availability
Linux kernel moves fast with code changes

GNOME in GSoC 2025

Tue, 25 Feb 2025 14:48:00 GMT

Hi Everyone!

Google Summer of Code 2025 is here! Interested in being a part of it? Read on!

GNOME Foundation has been a part of Google Summer of Code for almost every iteration, and we have applied for this year as well, and are waiting for it's confirmation!

Our tentative projects list is now available at GNOME GSoC Website

To make it easier for newcomers, we’ve built resources to help navigate both GSoC and the GNOME ecosystem:

📖 GSoC Welcome Guide
📖 Newcomers Guide
💬 Newcomers Chat - #newcomers:gnome.org
💬 Internship Chat - #internship:gnome.org

You can also watch the awesome video on GNOME's impact and history on YouTube - GUADEC 2017 - Jonathan Blandford - The History of GNOME

From my experience, GNOME has been an incredible community filled with inspiring people. If you're looking to make an impact with one of the largest, oldest and most influential free software communities, I’d highly recommend giving GNOME a try.

You might just find a second home here while honing your skills alongside some of the best engineers around.

GNOME was my intro into the larger FOSS community when I became a GSoC 2022 Intern there, and has helped me on countless occasions, and I hope it will be the same for you!

If you have been a part of GNOME and want to contribute as a mentor, then let us know as well, GNOME can always utilise some great mentors!

For any questions, feel free to join the chat :D

Also, you can check out my previous post on the GSoC process for more insights on LinkedIn

Looking forward to seeing you in GSoC 2025!

UbuCon Asia 2024

Tue, 24 Dec 2024 19:30:00 GMT

Hi everyone!

It’s been about two weeks since UbuCon Asia (Ubuntu Conference Asia) concluded (fun fact: 13 weeks since I wrote the initial draft, so 15 now), and I’m really starting to miss it.

This blog is being posted after my GNOME Asia post as it was really hard to pack all the emotions and memories in just one blog, but here we go.

It all started as a wild idea to host GNOME Asia a year or two back. Gradually, it transformed into a joint event between UbuCon and GNOME Asia and eventually into UbuCon Asia 2024.

Why Jaipur?

This was one of the most frequently asked questions throughout the conference.

Interestingly, the local team (us) wasn’t based in Jaipur. We were spread across India, with me in the Delhi area, some members in Maharashtra, and one in Karnataka. Managing Jaipur’s affairs, as you can imagine, wasn’t exactly a breeze.

So why did we choose it? When the initial idea came up, a friend and I ruled out cities that were overcrowded, too hot (we weren’t entirely right there, but rain saved us lol), or lacking in the cultural heritage we wanted to showcase. We also wanted to pick a city with a budding tech scene, rather than an established one.

After much deliberation, we ruled out Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai, and Hyderabad. Jaipur, being relatively closer to me and ticking all the right boxes, became the chosen one!

In the end, we found the best college we could have in Jaipur, with a phenomenal volunteer team.

Why did we organize it?

Initially, the plan was to host GNOME Asia because GNOME is a community I deeply love. Having attended many GNOME events, I always wondered, "What if we host one in India?" With the largest population, immense Git activity, and a mature tech audience, India seemed perfect. But the sheer effort required always held me back - I’m just a developer who loves to code more than to manage people :)

The UbuCon planning began after GUADEC 2023, where I met Mauro at the Canonical booth. This led to rebooting Ubuntu India, with hosting UbuCon Asia as our first official activity.

I hesitated when asked to host UbuCon Asia but couldn’t resist the challenge. Bhavani (my co-lead) also proposed hosting in Bangalore, so we combined our bid with my proposal for Jaipur. To our delight, we won! Although discussions for a joint venture with the GNOME team didn’t pan out, we forged ahead with UbuCon Asia.

The Challenges We Faced

Although my role was initially to oversee and allocate tasks, I found myself involved in everything, which was hectic. Thankfully, the whole team worked as one on event days and without them, I wouldn’t have been able to handle the last two days of the event.

Managing Jaipur’s affairs remotely was tough, but the college we partnered with was incredibly supportive. Their students volunteered tirelessly.

Unexpectedly, our stage hosts backed out of the event just a day before due to placement drive in college, causing a session delay on the first day. Visa letter delays (Caused due to the Bangladesh crisis) and funding challenges due to Indian remittance laws were additional hurdles.

How It All Ended

Despite everything, we pulled it off, and dare I say, even better than many seasoned organizers might have! Seeing the community gather in India for UbuCon Asia was amazing.

We had Ubuntu and CDAC booths, delicious food (thanks to FOSS United and OnlyOffice), and lots of goodies for attendees. A proper Indian lunch with dessert, coffee breaks with Rajasthani and Indian snacks, a conference dinner, and subsidized day trips - all funded, were a relief.

Considering just weeks ago we were struggling to break even and were partially at a loss, to end with a surplus instead was truly relieving.

Fun fact: Leftover funds helped us host the release party at GNOME Asia 2024 and will support UbuCon India 2025 and UbuCon Asia 2025.

In my opening note, I joked, “I’m excited for the conference to end,” but now I realize how wrong I was.

I enjoyed every moment of it. I wasn’t able to attend more than one talk because when you are the lead, you just can’t sit, you have to work the hardest and keep everything together, but that work also gave me lots of enjoyment and satisfaction.

My favorite feedback? “We knew it was your first time organizing at this scale because we saw how tense and hardworking you were, ensuring everything ran smoothly, which it did.”

I regret not being able to meet many people I wanted to in more depth. Like Debian India folks, Aaditya Soni from AWS Rajasthan, Vishal Arya from FOSS United, Rudra the reviver of Ubuntu Unity and more.

We truly had astonishing people attend and I just wish to re-witness it all from an attendee's perspective now :P

The aftermovie can be viewed at - https://youtu.be/Ul8DQh3yroo?si=U2F3wi6mKBIVPJ6g :D

Future Plans?

Well... UCA’24 was draining and I don’t want to think of another event for a while haha (This didn't last long considering the release party we hosted xD).

We are currently working on creating smaller regional Ubuntu communities in India, and hopefully organise UbuCon India.

So if you are a sponsor, please reach out, we can really use your help in the initiative :)

Also, if you want to be a part of the Ubuntu India LoCo community, let me know and we can have a conversation about it ;)

A special thanks to Canonical, CDAC, FOSS United, Only Office and Ubuntu Korea for their sponsorship :)

GNOME Asia India 2024

Wed, 11 Dec 2024 20:32:00 GMT

Namaste Everyone!

Hi everyone, it was that time of the year again when we had our beloved GNOME Asia happening.

Last year GNOME Asia happened in Kathmandu Nepal from December 1 - 3 and this time it happened in my country in Bengaluru from 6th to 8th.

Btw, a disclaimer - I was there on behalf of Ubuntu but the opinions over here are my own :)

Also, this one might not be that interesting due to well... reasons.

Day 0 (Because indexing starts with 0 ;))

Before departing from India... oh, I forgot this one was in India only haha.

This GNOME Asia had a lot of drama, with the local team requiring an NDA to sign which we got to know only hours before the event and we also got to know we couldn't host an Ubuntu release party there even when it was agreed to months and again a few weeks ago and even on the same day as well in advance... So yeah... it was no less than an India Daily soap episode, which is quite ironic lol.

But, in the end, I believe the GNOME team would have not known about it as well, and felt like local team problems.

Enough with the rant, it was not all bad, I got to meet some of my GNOMEies and Ubunties (is that even a word?) friends upon arriving, and man did we had a blast.

We hijacked a cafe and sat there till around 1 A.M. and laughed so hard we might have been termed Psychopaths by the watchers.

But what do we care, we were there for the sole purpose of having as much fun as we could.

After returning, I let my inner urge win and dived into the swimming pool on the hotel rooftop, at 2 A.M. in winter. Talk about the will to do anything ;)

Day 1

Upon proceeding to the venue we were asked for corporate ID cards as the event was in the Red Hat office inside a corporate park. We didn't know this and thus had to travel 2 more K.M. to the main entrance and get a visitor pass. Had to give an extra tip to the cab so that he wouldn't give me the look haha.

Upon entering the tech park, I got to witness why Bengaluru is often termed India's Silicon Valley. It was just filled with companies of every type and size so that was a sight to behold.

The talk I loved that day was "Build A GNOME Community? Yes You Can." by Aaditya Singh, full of insights and fun, we term each other as Bhai (Hindi for Brother) so it was fun to attend his talk.

This time I wasn't able to attend many of the talks as I now had the responsibility to explore a new venue for our release party.

Later I and my friends took a detour to find the new venue, and we did it quite quickly about 400 metres away from the office.

This venue had everything we needed, a great environment, the right "vibe", and tons of freedom, which we FOSS lovers of course love and cherish.

It also gave us the freedom to no longer be restricted to event end, but to shift it up to the Lunch break.

At night me, Fenris and Syazwan went to "The Rameshwaram Cafe" which is very famous in Bengaluru, and rightly so, the taste was really good and for the fame not that expensive either.

Fenris didn't eat much as he still has to sober up to Indian dishes xD.

Day 2

The first talk was by Syazwan and boy did I have to rush to the venue to attend it.

Waking up early is not easy for me hehe but his talks are always so funny, engaging and insightful that you just can't miss attending it live.

After a few talks came my time to present on the topic “Linux in India: A perspective of how it is and what we can do to improve it.”

Where we discussed all the challenges faced by us in boosting the market share of Linux and open source in India and what measures we could take to improve the situation.

We also glimpsed over the state of Ubuntu India LoCo and the actions we are taking to reboot it, with multiple events like the one we just conducted.

My talk can be viewed at - YouTube - Linux in India: A perspective of how it is and what we can do to improve it.

And that was quite fun, I loved the awesome feedback I got and it is just amazing to see people loving your content. We then quickly rushed to the venue of the party, track 1 was already there and with us, we took track 2 peeps as well.

To celebrate we cut cake and gave out some Ubuntu flavours stickers, Ubuntu 24.10 Oracular Oriole stickers and UbuCon Asia 2024 stickers followed by a delicious mix of vegetarian and non-vegetarian pizzas.

Despite the short duration of just one hour during lunch, the event created a warm and welcoming space for attendees, encapsulating Ubuntu’s philosophy: “Making technology human” and “Linux for human beings.”

The event was then again followed by GNOME Asia proceedings.

At night we all Ubunties and GNOMEies and Debian grouped for Biryani dinner. We first hijacked the Biryani place and then moved on to hijacking another Cafe. The best thing was that none of them kicked us out, I seriously believed they would considering our activities lol. I for the first time played Jenga and we had a lot of jokes which I can't say in public for good reasons.

At that place, the GNOME CoC wasn't considered haha.

Day 3

Day 3 was a social visit, the UbuCon Asia 2025 organising team members conducted our own day trip, exploring the Technology Museum, Beautiful Cubbon Park, and the magnificent Vidhana Soudha of Karnataka.

I met my friend Aman for the first time since GNOME Asia Malaysia which was Awesome! And I also met my Outreachy mentee in person, which was just beautiful.

The 3-day event was made extremely joyful due to meeting old friends and colleagues. It reminded me of why we have such events so that we can group the community more than ever and celebrate the very ethos of FOSS.

As many of us got tired and some had flights, the day trip didn't last long, but it was nice.

At night I had one of my best coffees ever and tried "Plain Dosa with Mushroom curry" a weird but incredibly tasty combo.

End

Special thanks to Canonical for their CDA funding, which made it possible for me to attend in person and handle all arrangements on very short notice. :smiley:

Looking forward to meeting many of them again at GUADEC or GNOME Asia 2025 :D

GNOME Asia Nepal 2023

Sun, 04 Feb 2024 01:27:00 GMT

Namaste Everyone!

Hi everyone, so it has been a while since the successful completion of GNOME Asia Summit 2023, but well, when you have back-to-back exams, it becomes hard to write up.

Last year GNOME Asia happened in Kathmandu Nepal from December 1 - 3. Like GNOME Asia 2022, it was an amazing experience, to say the least.

Nepal and India having really close cultural ties made it feel like we are at home without being there, the friendly people, scenic beauty, the superpower to use Hindi in situations where English wasn't recognised, or visiting our holiest sites, Nepal offered us every bit of amazingness we could have asked for.

If I get to talk about Nepal, it can be a really big separate blog post, but this is about GNOME Asia, so let's proceed in that regard.

Day 0 (Because indexing starts with 0 ;))

Before departing from India, I used my trimmer, you know, to look good, unfortunately, while hearing music I got so lost in it that I didn't secure the adjustable comb properly and trimmed with 0.5mm :D Lost my beard just before the trip, yipeeee.

We landed in Nepal on 29th December, and after having some struggle with getting a cab and taking lots of photos, we went on to our hotel. The hotel was really nice, so thanks GNOME for that :D

We freshened up a bit and went sightseeing, exploring Thamel, and ate momos (Still like Uttar Pradesh (North Indian state) ones more ;)) We also bought some really needed and mandatory fridge magnets, because if you can't flex it, did it really happen?

Day 1

Where do I even start lol, it was probably the most jam-packed day. Waking up in the morning was hard, to say the least, but I conquered it. After freshening up I went for breakfast and had the pleasure of meeting - Rosanna, Kristi, Anisa, Fenris, Jipmang, Matthias and others I met at the previous two conferences.

It was nice catching up again.

We briefly discussed about next GNOME Asia and UbuCon Asia with stuffed mouths, because that is important as well. Fun fact, we won the bid to host UbuCon Asia 2024 in India and are hoping to have a joint event with GNOME Asia as well.

After being the last to finish up (Eating slowly and enjoying fully:P) we proceeded to the venue of the conference. There I met Aaditya Singh (Local team lead). We conversed a few times online and it was great to meet in person. After looting some swags, we went to the conference rooms.

Holly (New GNOME ED) started the conference and then we proceeded to the Keynote by Justin, It was just awesome!!!! Probably something I'll recommend my peers to watch. Then we had a talk by Federico and Rosanna, again awesome and then we had the best talk of the conference, mine!!

After draining myself with the presentation and the brief Q&A (If the talk felt a bit small and fast-paced, time was the issue) I proceeded to resume my role as an attendee and judging others ;)

After attending many more awesome talks, we got to witness the Fedora release party, and even when we were literally on power saving mode, with a 5% charge, the party acted like a charger (Yeah.... not the best at having metaphors)

Due to the cake delay, we had a nice intro section, it acted like an icebreaker and made everyone know each other well. After the party I don't know what we did tbh, most probably crashed at the hotel hehe. Phew that was a lot for one day. Fedora and GNOME you are cool ;)

Day 2

We had to miss the Keynote on the second day to visit Pashupatinath temple in the morning when it is quiet and peaceful. It is one of our holiest sites and if you visit Kathmandu and don't go there (for Hindus) then you are missing out on the most peaceful place. Those memories still give me chills.

But, I did watch the Keynote in Enitrety later on, and I have to say, the only time I watched a video this long it was of Linus Torvalds haha. It was next-level and full of insights. I just wish I could have attended it. I had the pleasure of talking with Hempal sir multiple times, and he was one of the best personalities.

Then had the pleasure to listen to amazing talks including by Federico, Nasah, Khairul, and others. Ps from my experience of GUADEC and GNOME Asia, Anisa's would have been great as well. I presented a talk on accessibility at GUADEC, but the one by Federico made me learn so much, which also makes the point that we need better documentation in this area, as it was painful to find those.

We then visited Thamel again, because why not, bought some Pashmina shawls from the hotel, and called it a day!

Day 3

Day 3 was a social visit, which means the day when you become poor after buying too much stuff, tired after walking too much, and amazed after exploring the beauty of a place like Nepal.

The best part was explaining about our god Shiva and about Shivling to curious Rosanna and Fenris. It was a moment where we shared our cultures and did knowledge exchange. Have to say, I became this spiritual after quite a long time, but it was a nice change.

We also ate Newari traditional lunch, where I also tried Tongba, a native alcoholic drink made from fermented millet, boiled milk and herbs, it was the second time I touched Alcohol in my life, and only after getting assurance that the Alcoholic content was too little :)

It was some really nice food, and the Tongba was also surprisingly good. There me and Asmit also did some mischief with fire, which was well... childish and fun :)

Don't know what happened to me there, but it was probably the most I have ever networked, maybe because after two conferences I became more comfortable and familiar with the community at large.

Day 3 was more of an experience so I don't think there is much more to be said for that.

Day 4

Visited Monastries and Boudhnath Stupa, and then departed back home.

End

To end with I want to thank GNOME Foundation for sponsoring my visit and giving me the opportunity to witness the awesome talks in person and bond with the community.

Btw, looking forward to meeting many of them again at UbuCon Asia 2024 India and also hopefully GNOME Asia 2024 :D

GSoCxBMU event India

Mon, 27 Nov 2023 15:26:00 GMT

Namaste Everyone!

This is a quick blog to share my recent experience of speaking at BML Munjal University (BMU), India.

I was invited there as a speaker to shed some light on GSoC and Open Source in general for their GSoCxBMU event.

The event was great, where we collectively shared the love of open source, and the students got to learn about how they can participate in it and got to know about GSoC and similar opportunities (Outreachy, LFX Mentorship, MLH Fellowship, GSoD, etc...)

Near the end, we also discussed about the GNOME Foundation and the GNOME Project, where I shared some projects to which they can contribute and details about GNOME Internships.

In the end, there was a short Q&A session where any queries were resolved, after which the students received some GNOME stickers which the engagement team sent me and we called it a day :D

The event was co-organised by GDSC BMU and Sata BMU in collaboration with GNOME Users Group, Delhi - NCR.

Let's do more events and spread the love about FOSS :D

GUADEC 2023 Experience

Sat, 02 Sep 2023 21:52:00 GMT

Sveiki visiem!

In this blog, I'm pumped to share my experience attending GUADEC 2023 held in Riga, Latvia.

Let's start :)

During the conference, I presented a joint talk with Pooja Patel on "How to add 16.67% more users and contributors: A guide to creating accessible applications".

The talk was on Day 2 of the conference and we got quite nervous haha. We didn't join the walking tour and had to skip some of the most amazing talks on Day 2.

Fortunately, The journey was made more streamlined due to the extensive support of the staff team. I also want to thank Melissa for doing all the bookings and keeping up with our issues xD

The conference was not easy to attend in any way. Me and Asmit (One of the organisers and friends) decided pretty early on that we would volunteer for the GUADEC Organising team. Unfortunately, a lot of stuff happened and I got late. Then I refrained from joining conferences for some time, but my friends convinced me in the end :D And then another downturn came when my exams got severely delayed and clashed completely with the conference. I wanted to volunteer there but it crashed all the plans.

After severe planning and exploring options, I decided to skip 2 exams and attend the conference either way, hence I had to take the remaining exams the next day on reaching India. Although I will have to give the skipped ones again, I don't regret it even a bit. But it made the trip somewhat hectic as I had the tension of remaining exams throughout the trip which took a toll on my health :(

Anyway, let's proceed with the blog :D

The touchdown

After reaching Helsinki (Layover for flight), I met the GSoC'23 interns of GNOME. It rejuvenated the memories when we were one and took our first flight. It was amazing to interact with them and share our love for open source.

We then took a Flight to Riga. The sights from the plane were mesmerising, to say the least.

On reaching the hotel all my friends surprised me, it was great to catch up with them and meet them again after GNOME Asia. They are the best ;)

Unfortunately, I didn't arrive on time for the introductory party but well

The first day of summit

The first day was quite good, got to attend the talks which I was looking forward to like - "Accessibility update: the Python stack, Rust, and DBus" by Federico, "Oxidizing GTK" by Emmanuele (The memes like the Elon one were awesome xD), "Community building and best DEI practices in Free and Open Source Communities" by Anisa was great, I had the pleasure of meeting her during GNOME Asia and it was the same energy and an amazing talk as expected.

During the break, I met many people like the Ubuntu staff (Mauro you were a delight to converse with). Met Matthias and Rosanna again, awesome as always and finally met Melissa :D.

Then I attended "GNOME Design: State of the Union" which was awesome as I got a sneak peek into how GNOME is evolving and saw those beautiful designs. It amazes me how much GNOME has progressed.

After that, we attended the "How GNOME Gets into Ubuntu" and "Keynote: All the little things that keep open source going" which following the overall themes, were again great.

The second day of summit

On the second day, I mostly attended online due to our talk. We practised it, tried to remove our nervousness and got ready.

And the moment finally came. Anisa and Caroline introduced and motivated us :) In the end, it went quite smoothly, There were things which could have been executed in a better manner, but in the end, what can't.

Then we attended the Lightning talks, and man they were so fun. Probably one of the best moments of the conference. There I got to learn Melissa's awesome stage-handling skills LOL. It was just indescribable.

I also conversed with Regina during the break and it was awesome to discuss various topics. She had some great viewpoints and insights regarding GNOME mentorship and contributor involvement.

After the talks, we explored the city a bit and enjoyed the mesmerising architecture and culture of Latvia.

The third day of summit

Attending "Building Student Communities to Foster OSS" by Hrittik was quite a good experience, he then handed out some swag which I'm using right now to plan the blog haha, so thanks for that.

Then the AGM and group photo session came. The group photo was funny and amazing, I wish that was recorded as well lol.

I certainly enjoyed the "Our logo sucks" Lightning talk just after the "pants of thanks". You need a certain level of courage to bash the logo in front of its creator at a conference organised by the same organisation lol. Jokes aside, it was quite on point and I can relate with most of the stuff mentioned. Even if it is not implemented, I hope it stirs a discussion at least.

After which we continued to attend other talks and enjoyed the conference end.

Then we attended the GNOME Dinner, it was great! I met Rudolf and we conversed quite a lot. He was awesome and full of energy. I also met Georges Stavracas (feaneron), the person who killed the meme (iykyk) Unfortunately due to my introvertness I wasn't able to converse much with them but yeah, was great to finally meet. There were many more people there whom I wanted to ping but dinner is probably not a good time to do so lol unless sitting together.

I also had a great time talking with Felipe, a person I hoped to meet for quite a long.

The BoFs

Being a GNOME GSoC'22 Intern, I was looking forward to the "GSoC + Outreachy internships with GNOME" BoF by Felipe, we discussed various points which we hope to get implemented to enhance the contributor experience even more and strengthen our community more.

The Nothern Riga tour

The tour was a great opportunity to check out Riga and interact with people.

Met Emmanuele there and finally decided to speak to him. He was as awesome as I imagined, Again introvertness killed me but yeah, it is always great to meet people you look up to.

Meeting people

At last, I met many new people and got to learn a lot. Made new friends, got to meet people I look up to and many more. Overall it was amazing. I hope I wasn't that introvert but yeah, slowly getting comfortable around new people :)

The End

Thanks to all the people for making the event so great. It was an experience like no other. I would also like to thank GNOME Foundation for sponsoring the trip :)

I also got accepted as a GNOME Foundation member just recently, which is awesome :D.

GNOME Asia 2022 Experience

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 17:10:00 GMT

Hai semua

In this blog, I'm pumped to share my experience attending GNOME .Asia 2022 Summit held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from 2nd December - 4th December.

Let's start :)

During the summit I presented on two topics - Topic 1: "Starting the open-source journey, and sharing my GSoC experience" which was of 30 Minutes and Topic 2: "Pitivi - GTK4 port" which was of approx 5 min.

The conference was filled with amazing experience, but the journey to the stage was quite hard.

The tough times began with the unavailability of appointments for my passport, which delayed it to November, which got again delayed due to issues with address verification as I just started living in hostel.

But, fortunately, due to the constant support of my family, and my undying dedication to attending the conference, we got everything under control, then comes the visa. In a pleasant surprise, unlike others I got it in under 2 hours, the thing I was most scared of got to be the easiest lol.

Then what, with the help of the GNOME Foundation, I got my tickets confirmed (Thanks Melissa), and I got ready to fly, btw, this was my first ever flight, I never had the chance to even fly domestically, so exploring the airport, immigration, customs, the security check was all an adventure for me.

The touchdown

On reaching Kuala Lumpur we had a cab waiting for us, which was a really great gesture by the Organizing committee. Also, thank you Syazwan for waiting with me there and organizing the pickup.

There I got to unite with my fellow GSoCers - Pooja Patel, Asmit Malakannawar, Aman, and Anupam. They were a delight to meet, the trip became 1000x more fun due to them.

We then reached the hotel, freshened up, and did some sightseeing. And let me tell you, Kuala Lumpur is just beautiful.

The first day of summit

We got to meet and interact with so many new people. It was just awesome. The DEI workshop by the one and only Jonna was really cool, it was something we don't see much in conferences but is a much-needed activity. I also wrote some thank you packets as an activity :D

Then the newcomer's workshop by Felipe was great, I along with other attendees missed him at the conference, but even virtually, his talk was really nice.

After the summit, we again went on to explore the city, unfortunately, it rained and delayed our plans, thus we weren't able to visit every place. But it was still awesome. We visited a fountain show, and it was the most amazing thing.

Second day of summit

On the second day, my talk was the first in line, I presented on the topic - "Starting the open-source journey, and sharing my GSoC experience" unfortunately I got a bit late due to timezone issues, but nonetheless, it was my fault, but everyone was so nice about it and didn't let me feel down. Again, the Open Source community is the besttttttt.

The talk can be accessed at - GNOME Youtube

After receiving some really nice compliments, we proceeded to attend other talks, the talks by Anisa Kuci, Mantoh Kuma, and Matthias Clasen were just amazing. After which we got to listen to the amazing - Kristi Progri and Sammy fung in their lightning talks. By the way, they have opened the bidding for the next GNOME.Asia, so if anyone wants to host it in their country, be sure to reach out to them :)

After this, we again went for some more sightseeing and shopping :D

If you ever visit KL, be sure to visit Petronas and or KL tower, the view from there is heavenly

Last day of summit

All things eventually come to an end, and the same happened with this trip. On the last day, we had our intern lightning talks, where I and my fellow GSoCers / Friends gave talks on our projects during our GSoC internship at GNOME Foundation. It was an astonishing experience, I actually didn't have my talk prepared as I was going to cancel it first due to some reasons, but everything got sorted hence I decided to present, thus it wasn't my best presentation, but I'm proud of it :)

The talk can be accessed at - GNOME Youtube

Thanks

In the end, I would just like to thank the whole organizing team - especially - Kristi, Fenris, Syazwan, Sammy Fung for all their amazing work, the event was a blast.

I would also like to thank GNOME Foundation for Sponsoring my trip, it wouldn't have been possible for me to attend without their support.

At last, I also want to thank my college KIET Group of Institutions, Ghaziabad for co-sponsoring the trip and taking care of miscellaneous charges.

Oh, btw, if you are vegetarian, you are up for an adventure in Malaysia, it is super hard and rare to distinguish veg and non-veg, and well, even finding veg options is tough, special thanks to my friends who well, accompanied me every time during this crazy adventure.

I would also like to say, I'm in love with the goodies I got at the event, they are super cool!

End

I hope to meet all these amazing people soon again. It hasn't been many days, but I have started to miss them. Open Source and GNOME have a special place in my heart. Hopefully, we will meet again at GNOME Asia or GUADEC or some other event:D

My journey and a begginers guide to Open Source

Tue, 04 Oct 2022 20:46:00 GMT

Namaste, Everyone!

For quite a while I've been receiving multiple questions regarding how to start contributing to open source, how to get into GSoC, My journey, etc...

After repeating myself, again and again, I'm writing this blog, to answer some of the most asked queries 😃

My Journey -

How did I start?

Well, I don't have a definite date, you can assume the day I started coding to be my start :P I started with making some personal websites, they were pretty basic, but they encouraged me to achieve more.

I soon learned about Web development, both backend, and frontend. My main language until then was Java, but due to frameworks like Django and Flask, I became more accustomed to Python instead. Java is still my main language for anything other than Project development (CP folks hail 😛 ) 😄

How I started Open Source?

I started with my own projects, I learned there is a platform called GitHub, where I posted very basic sites which I made ( They are gone now, you don't want to see them lol), they were nothing serious but gave me some idea about how Git works, but it was mostly dormant. I then did courses like CS50 and CS50w which required Git, so that made me more comfortable using it.

I then worked on a project, which didn't solve any problem, but just strengthened my skills, it was my own Penguin-based OS, called Aryan Linux, made by using "Linux from Scratch". On compiling it, I understood what open source really is, it made me so happy.

Then I finally made the switch to Penguin (Linux in common folks terms), I used to use that in a VM, but then I realized that I can use it without issues as my main OS, It was hard to convince my brain to make the switch, it took months of consideration to finally dual boot my system, and well, it was one of the best decisions of my life.

I started with Garuda Linux (An Indian distro :D ), and although it was great, the theme started to poke my eyeballs, so I decided to do an experiment, ~~switch back to Windows, Easy Peasy 😄~~ I took a theme that I like, but didn't like the color scheme of - WhiteSur, and combined it with other themes and added a bit of my own flavor to make a new theme - NewSur (Innovative name, right? ), and like others, I made a setup and flexed on Reddit :P Turns out there were other crazy peeps who liked it and asked me to post it, so I did, on GitHub 😌

This made me even cozier with the community and Git. I then did some other projects like - Logo Menu, Modified AndOTP, Modified LBRY, DraculaSur, etc... All these were made by me for myself or someone specific, but through the power of open source, other people also wanted it and strengthened my love for Open Source.

I then also made one commit to GNOME Extensions website. Though it was nothing big, it was a step in the right direction.

How GSoC?

I came to know about GSoC from my sister, at the time it was something that I believed was impossible for me, on opening the website, all the organizations listed there scared me but also inspired me.

But, later on, I forgot about it. Once during family dinner, the topic of GSoC came up, and my sister told me that the deadline is now reached, and I was late.

I got a bit sad but assuming it was impossible anyway, I didn't feel too bad. So I thought even if I couldn't participate, I can at least learn from this year's GSoC and maybe crack it in 2023. The first thing I saw was that there was still time, the proposal period was going to start the next day so I had just 16 days.

I then searched for GNOME Foundation, as I love it, then I opened the ideas list and searched through it, and to my surprise, I found two port to GTK4 projects, one of which used the snake language python, and well, that gave me a ton of hope.

I instantly conveyed it to my guru sis and began drafting the proposal. I removed all thoughts of it being impossible and just began working on the proposal. The only guidance I had was from my sister and her junior who achieved GSoC'21 under Chromium. (Most probably the browser you are reading this on, uses Chromium 🙂 )

I then submitted my proposal, and well after some back and forth with my amazing acharya/mentor Aleb, and some PRs to Pitivi, I got the acceptance mail in May 🥳

How can you start?

Where to contribute?

Don't contribute just for the sake of GSoC, contribute because of the love for Open Source, and it will become much easier. Start to use open source alternatives for your existing apps, if they lack something then make issues on the repository, and if you can, maybe fix it yourself 😁

Become active on platforms like Reddit, and join some communities (Although, beware, there are some toxic communities, you just have to ignore them :) Most of the community is not like that ), there are tons of small niche projects where you can contribute a lot, don't just start running after big shiny projects, start from small projects instead.

Unable to understand code?

If you know the programming language with which the code is written, then it becomes easier. If you use the program, then check some unique text in the application and then search for it in the code. Editors like VSCode help in this regard as you can search the whole repository.

Once you find the string, start to expand your view. You will be able to see how the string was declared, and how it was added to the application, and if everything goes right, using this method you will start to understand some of the code. Understanding the whole code at once is not easy, so don't try that, don't throw all of it towards yourself at once, make it digestible first, only understand parts of it, and then start to connect the dots.

But what to contribute?

Most repositories have "good first issue" labels, these are put on issues that the developer believes could be a good starting point, so start from those. In Pitivi there were some very easy issues, dating back years and were still unsolved, so try to start from those, don't think this is too small or too old, if it is open and has the label, then the developer wants that to be fixed 🤯

In my case, one of them was to just change one "True" to a "False" 😁

Conclusion

Nothing is impossible if you dedicate yourself to it.

Don't just have dreams, have life goals. Because dreams vanish when you wake up and are something you already assume you can't do, but goals are something that you believe you can achieve and work towards it.

If you still have any queries, feel free to reach out to me, hopefully, I can guide you 🤗

That's it for this one, hope to see you in the next blog :)

Pitivi GSoC: Final Report

Sun, 11 Sep 2022 12:50:00 GMT

Pitivi GSoC Final Report

This project was aimed at porting Pitivi to GTK4, Pitivi used the GTK3+ library and required the change.

The whole project is confined to a single MR: gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pitivi/-/merge_requests/442

The port required extensive changes and brainstorming. There were namely three categories of changes -

Component renamed
Component gone but ideal replacement given
Component gone with no real/simple replacement

Some code needed refactoring, with varying complexity and length, some were small but some were very extensive, for example, GtkDialog run() removal, some parts were easy to refactor to the callback-based system but some places still remain to be ported over due to the extent of their reliance on the return process.

After getting suggestions, I have also listed basic things I've done in the MR for easy reference and tracking.

The last commit I did during the GSoC period is: "Fix effectslibrary.ui search" "gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pitivi/-/commit/0ad9503df5f49e3a3dbbf1f71bc3b87b706ad213?merge_request_iid=442"

Work Done -

Till now I have been able to port a lot of the stuff to GTK4, most files are ported over and with some local changes I can open the application, this has given me a chance to understand what I should focus on. Pitivi is hard to port due to its massive size, but I'm really happy that I was able to port it to the extent I did.

Progress and hardships in chronologial order -

During the first update -

Work - Ported stuff over to GTK4 which was backported to GTK3+, allowing for an easier porting experience, as you can run the application in this stage.
Click Here for Full Blog 1

During the second update -

Work - Started the breaking phase, and enjoyed compile errors, ported quite a lot of stuff to GTK4
Hardships - Event controllers were a mess to understand
Click Here for Full Blog 2

During the third update -

Work - Still in breaking phase, fixed most big errors and made significant progress.
Hardships - All the errors? :P Mostly event controller, GtkContainer, GtkLayout, etc...
Click Here for Full Blog 3

During the fourth update -

Work - Finally able to run the application (with some caveats) and able to solve big issues, the moment where things start to fall in place. Was also able to port most of the event controller.
Hardships - Drag and Drop, GtkDraw, UI nightmare, GtkLayout, GdkScreen. Fell ill and had to change university, causing less productivity.
Click Here for Full Blog 4

Is the port complete?

No, there is still work remaining, but it is not much, most things are done, and the things which are remaining, are so because of the amount of refactoring they would require and some cosmetic fixes.

Most of the application is ported over, but if you open it, you won't be able to do much, the reason for which is that if some places fail to run, then it will prevent the rest of the file from loading further, making a lot more things useless. Currently, you can open the application, open, import, or create a new project, access the effects and medialibrary (some work is required), and other miscellaneous things.

The timeline still remains to be properly ported due to the removal of GtkLayout and drag & drop event controller.

You cannot hope to do extensive refactoring work during GSoC because that will limit how much work you can do. In the start I was pushing commits with great quality, i.e. no change required later on, but that results in less time remaining thus it is better to get a working version and push that. If you still have remaining time before the deadline and other work is done then make those commits better and better, else just continue and after the work is done, focus on how you can improve it further to get the best result.

At least that's what I've come to believe.

But it depends on the project's length, complexity and expectations.

My plans after GSoC -

GSoC never made me join Open Source, it is something I believe in and love to be a part of. GSoC gave me an opportunity to work on such a big project along with the support of mentors and I appreciate all the love I've got. Thus, to conclude, this was just the beginning, you will keep hearing from me, in a good way :D

GUADEC -

I also had an amazing experience presenting my work during GUADEC, it gave me great confidence and was an awesome experience. Thanks, GNOME for providing me the opportunity.

You can watch me present at - GUADEC Youtube

That will be it for this one, have a nice time everyone :)

Pitivi GSoC: 4th Update

Sun, 04 Sep 2022 18:14:00 GMT

Welcome to Pitivi GSoC Update 4

Hey everyone, hope you are doing fine. This is my fourth update related to Pitivi GSoC, and this time I got a bit late at publishing, more details later on in this blog, so keep reading :)

Update

After talking to Pitivi GSoC'21 Intern Pratyush Tiwari, and my mentors, I was able to stop some things from loading, allowing us to finally load the app a bit, it is not usable from any stretch of the mile, but it is something. Previous to it I was porting the whole application at once, and thus the app would not have been able to load unless it was completely GTK4 ready, but now we can take a look at some of the work.

If you were following along with my activity on GNOME Gitlab then you would have noticed that I am not pushing commits as often as I used to, this is because I got stumbled pretty hard and thus I wasn't able to push anything significant, but now I'm back with speed.

Roadblocks

So some of the roadblocks I'm facing now are - GtkLayout Removal, Event handling changes (Drag and Drop is at another level), and some API changes regarding Pixbuf and GdkScreen.

Another issue I faced was that it is very hard to port Pitivi because it uses mostly everything which Gtk has to offer, which considering it is a video editor seems reasonable. But, this also makes it significantly harder to port over, thus I really appreciate the patience of everyone waiting for it to happen :D

GSoC is ending

As GSoC Deadline is approaching, my hands have no time to chill, it's all hands on deck, no matter how much work you do, how much of your soul you pour in, you start to doubt everything, you start to question that did you do what was required, did you really had what it takes, etc.. etc.. and the answer can only be seen after mentor evaluations.

I now have to finish my work and also work on the final report, I always say, I like good documentation but I don't like creating one, thus I admire documentators so much.

The big question

Will Pitivi be GTK4 on GSoC end? Probably not, it still has rough edges, and some parts are left to port, some things can't be just ported over but requires a whole working change. In one case we need to completely rework 6 functions that rely on each other which is a major headache. In some cases we don't have an ideal replacement so we have to rework that too, etc.. etc.. thus it will still take time and patience to get a good working port.

I have attached some screenshots of the current look, it's not much, but seeing this, I'm very happy with the work I've put in.

After GSoC

So, this will be a very top-level view, but, first things first, I will work on completing the work, this time others would be able to join me if they want, then we will smooth out the rough edges, making it usable, implement LibAdwaita, giving Pitivi a new and fresh look, and then fix all those test cases crying in the corner.

Things to learn

One of the many things I learned is that experience speaks loud and clear, and programming is not just about knowing how to code, I many times wrote some piece of code that spans multiple lines, after getting to and fro with my mentor many times, I reduced it to a couple of lines, only to see my mentor doing it in just one line.

Both of our codes worked, both do the trick, but his way is more cleaner and efficient. In my early days of programming, I used to check how big of a file I created, when I reached 1k lines I rejoiced and thought I'm good at programming now, but that's not how it works, if you do something in 6 lines and the other person does it in one line and still keep it very readable and easy to comprehend then you didn't do a better job. Number of Lines != Quality of code.

At last, taking rest is very important, I can't tell you how many times I am stuck so badly I don't even know who I am, and just continue to stare at the screen, but the moment I lie down and take a rest, my brain gives out solutions.

Pitivi GSoC: 3rd Update

Sun, 31 Jul 2022 19:18:00 GMT

Namaste everyone :)

This is now the third blog, and this time I will like to keep it a bit different, owing to the suggestions I got :D

Updates

So, as usual, we will start with updates, we are still in the breaking phase, but most big errors are gone, there are some things that need to be sorted out, but we can do that once we can at least open the application.

Workflow

In this blog, I want to show you all what my workflow for the project goes like.

To start with, I have a small notepad, in which I write various things, like

Delayed fixes -> Used this during GTK+3.x backport phase, to list things that can be done now, but optimal replacement is in GTK4
Errors -> Errors that I'm getting while trying to run the application, I list them and then comment out the responsible lines or do a temp solution to move on (Better discussed in my previous blog).
Check -> These are things that I have fixed but have the tendency to be broken or can look bad, thus they have to be checked when a workable version is ready.

These are just some example pages :)

In this the checkbox means check.

After that, I also sometimes write down code on the notepad, when I'm really stuck or can't wrap my head around some piece of code. What I do in these cases is that I do sort of a dry run, writing what the code will do line by line but in normal language, to be honest, I don't read it again, because what counts is you writing it down, making it easy to comprehend.

Apart from it, I also seek help from the community and my mentors from time to time, if you ask at the correct time then you won't waste your time, and would also not spam the help channels just because you missed a line in the documentation.

Documentation nightmare

At any moment of time, I usually have 150+ Tabs of documentations open on my browser, it includes the port guide page, other project's GTK4 port MRs ( These really help), and normal gtk4, and gtk3 guides.

GSoC involves tons and tons of reading. Documentations are like holy writing for us, as they tell us how to do something without breaking our peace.

How I choose what error to work on

Choosing what to work on takes quite a bit of consideration, and tbh it is very random. So here's how I do it ->

Most of the time, I like to go with the flow of the port guide, but I always end up going off track. What I do is, I try to run the app, I then get errors, I comment them out or do a silly temp fix, write down the cause in my notepad and move on.

Then I get another error, if this error is something that can't be bypassed, or is small enough, or is small but spans multiple files, then I usually work on fixing it, so it is just very random.

After going through multiple errors, I take a look at the notepad and check the root causes behind the errors, many times multiple errors are caused due to changes in the derivation hierarchy. For example, if c was derived from b, and b was derived from a then if either c is now directly derived from a, or b is just gone then all elements derived from b will lose it's functions and properties.

Thus, many times errors from seemingly completely different entities are caused by the same node in the hierarchy.

Once I know the root cause, I work on fixing them, some are simple name changes, some have easy enough replacements, while some are very problematic, needing refactoring of quite a lot of stuff.

GUADEC'22

This year's GUADEC was amazing, I got to learn many things and also got to present my work so far. I was quite nervous at first, but it all went smoothly, I hope to someday attend it physically.

My presentation is at - GUADEC Youtube

End

In the end, GSoC makes you -

I hope you enjoyed this blog, see you in the next one :)

Pitivi GSoC: 2nd Update

Mon, 18 Jul 2022 08:04:00 GMT

Hello everyone! I hope you all are doing well.

This is my second GSoC update blog, in the 2 weeks since my last update, we have reached further in the port progress.

Updates

In my last update, I said that we will move on to changing the version to GTK4 once the event controllers are implemented, but it didn't go well, not all event controllers were backported and one of the most used ones had a different name in GTK3+ thus, for the time being, we have delayed event controller implementations and moved onto changing the dependencies to GTK4, officially starting the Breaking Phase.

As expected, the breaking phase did break everything, one error after another, it is like watching a domino effect, but we are also making progress. One thing which helped me a lot in fixing stuff when everything falls apart is to comment out or make a temporary fix to the errors I want to deal with later, and once I find an error that can be fixed now, I stash the temporary bypasses and fixes, I then fix the error which I want to fix, commit them, apply the stash, check if the error is gone and push the commit, allowing me to make more progress.

Due to this, there will be stuff that I think is fixed but could be broken in some way or another, hence I call it blind archery (There should be an Olympic for it, the one with the least errors at the end wins :P), but we will only get to know that once the application becomes usable again. I still have a long road ahead, but I'm having lot of fun in the progress.

These errors make me question many times "what did I smoke when I made the decision to choose CS as my career field?", but then I remember that I don't smoke and take on the challenge 😄

The reading

Most of my work during the port has been reading documentation, lots of it, I don't like to read, but I am sure after GSoC that is going to change, either I will love it or would make it my archenemy 😂.

Biggest Challenge

The biggest challenge I believe will be to implement the new event controllers when the time comes, especially the drag and drop functionality, and as you know we can't have a video editor without that, I mean we maybe can but would you like to use that? 😛.

Feedback for documentation devs

Which also leads me to a feedback for the port guide and GTK documentation developers, I know you guys work really hard, but I think something we all will appreciate is to have code samples in more than one programming language and or a functionality allowing devs who have used the modules to post tips and tricks and code samples to help others going through the same issue. Also, it will be amazing if you can modify GTK3 docs to say which functions or properties are now deprecated along with replacement recommendations, I think the GJS Docs do that for some things.

GUADEC'22

Also, GUADEC 2022 is arriving and I have prepared my intern lightning talk for it, I hope you guys will enjoy it as much as I enjoyed it while making it, I tried to keep it more fun and less bland. Hopefully, I will be able to meet some of you in-person during GNOME Asia, but for the time being, I'm looking forward to GUADEC'22.

That will be it for this one, see you all in the next one 😀

Pitivi GSoC Update

Sat, 02 Jul 2022 18:30:00 GMT

Hello everyone! I hope you all are doing well.

This is the 4th week since GSoC coding period officially began, this summer I'm hacking on the Pitivi project, porting it to GTK4, a much-requested feature for the editor.

I have had some experience with GTK before as I developed an extension for GNOME, called Logomenu which helped me in jumpstarting the work.

We have made considerable progress till now, and we are on track (specifically on the porting part), but not everything went as planned, there were some hardships causing delays to the timelines I anticipated, but well, you can't anticipate everything beforehand. These failures make us learn new things and makes us better coders, provided we learn from them :D

We are currently in the backported stage, implementing changes that were made available to gtk+ 3.x for a smoother transition, and it is getting over soon, my next goal is to implement gesture and event handling changes and some miscellaneous changes after that, which will mark the ending of this phase, I believe it won't be a smooth ride but I'm ready for the challenge :)

Once the backported phase is over, we will go to the "Breaking Stage" (Starting the port) during which I think hell will break loose with compile errors, this stage will also include some blind archery and will be as fun as it is scary. I can't wait to enter and finish it successfully.

What this work has taught me till now is that any port or development won't be possible without proper documentation and community support, I knew the importance of good documentation, community, and dev supports, but working on something this big has given me a new level of appreciation for them.

I'm not a good writer, even writing this blog was not easy for me, thus I have great respect for all the documenters clanking their keyboards to make our life easier.

I'm also glad on getting amazing mentors, both my mentors are super cool and helpful, I like to refer to one of my mentors, Aleb as Git Ninja (Haven't told him that yet :p). I didn't know git was so strong, I mostly only used git clone, add, fetch, pull, commit, and push commands, but now I use so many. Thanks, Mr. Torvalds.

I'm also looking forward to GUADEC'22, I wanted to attend it physically but it is not cheap, to say the least, thus I will be joining remotely (If someone from India goes there, please bring me back some stickers ;) ). Which reminds me that I also have to work on my lightning talk presentation, please help my hands.

Well, that would be it for this blog, have a great time :)

Selected for GSoC'22

Tue, 24 May 2022 18:30:00 GMT

Welcome, readers!

I'm pleased to share that I'm accepted for Google Summer of Code (GSoC) 2022 under GNOME Foundation umbrella on the Pitivi project. This summer I will be updating the project from GTK3 to the latest GTK4 toolkit.

To anyone that wants to be a part of GSoC, I have only one piece of advice, just go for it. Don't think if you can do it or not, don't assume failure before attempting, and don't overthink. I always felt that it is for the best of the best, and I won't be able to clear it, all the big organizations on the GSoC page overwhelmed me, but instead of making it a dream, I made it a life goal. And well, now I'm enjoying it.

I will be posting more blogs here regarding my progress on the project and also some casual ones too.

So be sure to check this page :)