Google Summer of Code 2021: Rocket.Chat and Credit Suisse work together to leverage the open-source community

GSoC, Credit Suisse and Rocket.Chat: a powerful partnership

Rocket.Chat was born as an open-source organization and our transparent mindset is well recognized within the enthusiastic global open-source community. As a way of giving back to this community by providing guidance to young developers, we are thrilled to be participating in Google Summer of Code (GSoC) for the fifth year.

Over 16,000 students have participated in GSoC since its creation in 2005. The program connects student-developers with mentors and projects from all over the world.

Since day one, we have adopted the open-source core values of sharing and paying it forward. GSoC aims to incentivize and introduce new college and code-school students each year to the wonderful world of open source development. It was only natural for Rocket.Chat to fully embrace this program.

Sing Li | Chief Opportunities Officer @ Rocket.Chat

Twelve official GSoC projects were hosted by Rocket.Chat in 2021. But it doesn’t end there: we are delighted to count on our long-time community supporters and open-source enthusiast partners from Credit Suisse to help sponsor and mentor three additional projects this year.

The mentors from Credit Suisse contributed their expertise to provide guidance and mentorship to students, thereby helping to empower the next generation of open-source developers. Thanks to the partnership with Credit Suisse, more students have had the opportunity to participate in GSoC 2021, working side-by-side with experienced developers and living the open-source culture to its full potential.

GSoC provides Credit Suisse with a valuable platform to engage with and mentor young developers. It’s exciting and energizing to exchange a variety of ideas with the students, and watch the ideas grow into tangible solutions by leveraging the strength of the diverse developers and communities in GSoC.

‍Fong Cheng Wong | Head of Front Office Channels @ Credit Suisse

Check out this year’s projects only made possible with support from Credit Suisse:

1. Out of office settings with assigning deputy (mentored)‍

Author: Aditya Mitra‍

Mentors: Amol Babu, Asrar Zaman

In today’s world, where everyone is continually connected, an out-of-office notification message is a quick and easy way to let colleagues know when you are not available. The goal of this project is to improve the out-of-office feature on Rocket.Chat. After implementation, users will be able to customize their out-of-office settings by indicating a ‘from’ and ‘to’ date with the auto-reply message. New improvements including the below will be incorporated:

Users can select the channels which would receive the out-of-office notification.
The out-of-office notification would only be sent once for the first incoming message.
The user can designate a deputy from a list of eligible users.
At the beginning of the out-of-office period, the selected deputy will be automatically added to the channel and can reply on behalf of the main user.
After the out-of-office period ends, the deputy will be automatically removed from the channel.

Learn more about the project here.

As a mentor for GSoC, I have learned so much, including the importance of maintaining a positive environment and guiding the student to achieve success.

‍Amol Babu | Full Stack Engineer @ Credit Suisse

2. Poll App Mega Extensions (mentored)

Author: Rohan Lekhwani

Mentors: Murtaza Patrawala & Ramkumar KB

The most downloaded app in Rocker.Chat’s ecosystem, the Poll App, allows anyone to create engaging rich interaction polls within any chat room. This project aims to significantly expand the app’s scope and capabilities by enhancing user engagement via interactive quizzes, trivia and live polls.

Learn more about the project here.

While it has been hard work to mentor and conduct code reviews, it has been a very rewarding experience. Students stand to benefit a lot by having good mentors, not only with respect to the project but even more importantly when it comes to planning one’s career.

‍Ramkumar KB | Domain Architect @ Credit Suisse

3. Image Manipulation: Editing/Cropping on Upload (sponsored)‍

Author: Priya Bihani‍

Mentors: Vibha Chawla (Credit Suisse), Gabriel Henriques (Rocket.Chat), Tasso Evangelista (Rocket.Chat)

Being able to edit an image when sending it within a team is important for those that collaborate remotely, and it is a feature that is often overlooked. This project aims to improve the image upload feature on Rocket.Chat, allowing users to crop images before sending them to a channel. It also allows users to modify the image by adding doodles and text.

Learn more about the project here.

It’s been a great journey so far! We managed to deliver a successful demo that incorporated various new features. I am pleased with what has been accomplished, and especially that the mentors’ suggestions were taken on board in a positive manner and were implemented in a timely way. I have also learned a lot through the process and will look for similar mentorship opportunities in the future.
‍
Vibha Chawla | Assistant Vice President @ Credit Suisse

Empowering the next generation of developers

We are thrilled to be part of GSoC 2021 and to extend our collaboration with Credit Suisse for another successful year. As Rocketeers and open-source enthusiasts, we are committed to our goal of empowering developers and giving back to the open-source world. GSoC 2021 ends its term in September — which means that you will see these projects up and running on Rocket.Chat soon. So stay tuned! :)