Google Summer of Code '15 student

[Andrei - Constantin Popescu]

Hello!

Quick info

Full name : Andrei - Constantin Popescu
IRC Handle: andrei_ / andrei__
Studies: Graduated Bsc in Computer Science at Polytechnic Univ. of
Bucharest/
              will start Master's at Vrije University of Amsterdam.
Github: https://github.com/pandrei


*Background *

First of all, thanks for helping me out on IRC on making an initial
decision.  I'll try to divide my introduction mail into three main parts:
my background, why LibreOffice and why these projects at LibreOffice.

I usually go by Andrei,  I got my Bsc. in Computer science at Polytechnic
University of Bucharest, in 2014. I will be starting a Master's degree in
Computer Sicence at Vrije University of Amsterdam this fall. So far, I've
participated in two GSoC's (2012 and 2014) and I've been three times a
Google Code-in mentor [2012-2014]. All of these at BRL-CAD. You can find my
development logs here <http://brlcad.org/wiki/User:Popescu.andrei1991> . I
can say I am familiar with open source and I see certain benefits to it.

Between the first and second GSoC, I have been a Linux kernel developer
intern at Freescale. The main reason I switched from C to C++ was that I
consider OOP more expressive, more natural. I enjoy much more designing the
flow of an OOP application, even if it's more difficult. Another reason was
that kernel development was too static for me. As you can see, the second
GSoC involved extending a geometric kernel, so I worked with C++ in CAD
area. It's not relevant, but here
<https://www.dropbox.com/s/9zgki85xmy6w02f/Popescu_Andrei_proposal_latest.pdf?dl=0>
you can find my detailed proposal. After that, I took a job(which I
currently have) developing VoIP apps in C++ on a real time system. It's
interesting how much of a difference it is between the C++ code.

*Why LibreOffice?*

Why LibreOffice? That's a pretty good question. And I'll be upfront.  I did
not start looking for a project on this GSoC having the fixed LibreOffice
org in mind, I was just looking for a C++ project. Why? Because there are
plenty orgs, with plenty projects and it's easy to overlook one. On short,
I landed on your project page more or less randomly.

But I stayed. And here's why. I've been a Linux guy for the last 5 years. I
realized that I use LibreOffice daily since i gave up my Windows VM and
it's doing a great job, it has't crashed, nobody has complained about my
documents, even if I save them in .docx. On short, it works!

Another reason I stayed was that there were quite a few projects that
seemed interesting to me, that I would see myself working on throughout
summer, that I would enjoy seeing rolled out into it. But this posed quite
a problem, and I've been asking people on IRC without giving them too much
info, which leads us to last part.

*Why "these" ideas at LibreOffice?*

1. Reuse Mozilla's rolling update mechanism for LibreOffice
     I would make this project my main focus for two reasons. First, it
might sound silly but automating tasks in user experience is, in my humble
opinion, "hot". Something that users want and appreciate. I would
appreciate that in an application. It's smart.
     Secondly, I believe it represents the open source ideals in a
practical way. This project would benefit from already written open source
while further providing a free feature,  an extension based on what's
already been done.
2. Add Impress shape animations that use a real physics engine
   I overlooked this one, but it came as a suggestion from a community
member who's nickname I forgot( I think it was bubli as an IRC handle?
Sorry!) . It seems as a continuation towards CAD background but it's worth
pointing out that I'm not a CAD expert. I enjoyed writting code and
mentoring for BRL-CAD simply because of the difficulty involved.

If I am to go with one of these projects, I will go with which is more
useful for the LibreOffice community, I'm quite even on them.

Currently, I'm looking over getting involved
<https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/GetInvolved> and I'll be
around on IRC quite a lot, but I'll get in touch more once I got the code
base cloned and start working on something. If you have any feedback or
criticism, please do, it's appreciated!


Sorry for the long-ish mail!

Regards,
Andrei
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