Google’s summer of code is finally here and Mozilla will be taking part as one of the participating organization. More information about how to take part are on the GSoC page and Mozilla’s SoC page. I have also found some tips on how not to apply for SoC. Found it really helpful. Meanwhile, you should start talking to the developers from the participating organizations to brainstorm ideas for your SoC project.

If you’re unsure about why you join GSoC, check out nushacker’s blog post. Working on side projects like GSoC adds lots of value to your resume.

Download a IRC client

There are lot’s of IRC chat clients available. Here’s a list of them.

• Chatzilla – A Firefox Add-on (Recommended)
• Instantbird – Open source chat client powered by Mozilla
• Adium – A OS x chat client
• IRSSI – A CLI based IRC client. It’s my favorite IRC client

I would recommend you to use chatzilla. It doesn’t really require any other programs except Firefox itself.

Connecting to a chat server

My guide will be based on Chatzilla and Irssi. On chatzilla, simply click on the list of the servers on the welcome page as shown below.

For Irssi, (I will assume that you have already installed it by whatever package manager that you have)  use this command to connect to a chat server.

$ irssi -c irc.mozilla.org


Joining a channel

Once connected, issue /join #[channel name] to join a channel. e.g /join #maildev Joins the #maildev Thunderbird channel. Once you are there you can start chatting just like how you would use any other chat clients.

Common IRC Commands

IRC commands come in the form of a / prefix. These are some of the common commands that I use.

• /join #maildev – Joins the #maildev channel
• /msg jyeo

– PMs a particular user

• /who #nus – Lists the users in the #nus channel
• /leave #maildev – Leaves the #maildev channel
• /whois jyeo – Shows information about a user
• /ping jyeo – Gives round trip information between you and the user

Other Resources

There are lots of guides for using irssi and Chatzilla. There is also a page full of commonly used irc commands. Like I always say, Google is your best friend.

You get to work on real software

In your typical software engineering class, you work alone or in teams on a project and you apply software engineering techniques that you have learned in class on the project. The project might be forgotten and ignored once the class ends. However, when you work on open source projects, you work on real working software. Software that is already in used by millions of people. What does that mean? It means that code/documentation that you contribute will be used by millions of people. A new feature implemented by you might change thousands of lives. To quote Steve Jobs, you get “to put a ding in the universe.” See the patches that I have contributed.

Impress People Around You

You get to impress friends when they use the open source projects that you work on. Let say a friend is using Thunderbird and finds that it lacks a feature or is encountering a bug. You can say to him “Have no fear, just give me some time and I will fix that in the next release.” Most importantly, contributions to open source are always a plus in employers’ eyes. You will definitely stand out when you say you have worked on a software that the employer is using.

You learn A LOT!

When I am fixing bugs, I learn a lot from the whole process of contributing code. I’ve learned numerous technologies that I have never heard of (XPCOM, XUL), coding standards to make code readable, software testing techniques and many many more.

Conclusion

There are many more reasons why you should be fixing bugs. The main reason why I am still doing so even when the class has ended is because I like doing it. Most importantly enjoy what you are doing.

Javascript Resources

First up, javascript != java. Do not confuse them. They are entirely different languages. When I am fixing javascript bugs, the first place I will go is Mozilla Developer Network. Since you are working on the mozilla platform, it would definitely make sense to go to mozilla’s javascript standard. Other browser may implement it differently so I will generally discourage people to look for javascript guides/docs elsewhere. (Please do not go to W3Schools. See w3fools.) If you really wanna learn javascript from scratch, you might wanna check out codeacademy. You might also wanna look at Mozilla’s own re-introduction to javascript.

Printing Output in Javascript

There are some techniques we use when we debug code. Firstly, it is pure eyeballing. If you are gonna eyeball the code, do use MXR to do it. The syntax highlighting helps. Although I know there are some good developers who tend to only use their eyes to debug code, IMO this is a terrible way to debug code. Another technique we should use is the usage of print statements. In javascript, we do it by using alert()statements. It generates a pop-up with whatever you pass in as argument. Another way to do it is by dump() messages. This function outputs to the terminal. See MDN’s write up about it.

Enter Venkman. The javascript debugger

Venkman became my best friend when I am dealing with javascript code. It is kinda like the javascript’s gdb. You can see the values of variables, set breakpoints and step through code. It is extremely useful. It is basically an add-on for firefox and thunderbird. Download it here.

XUL Resources

Basically, XUL is XML. XUL files are where you define the layout of the program. Kinda like how HTML does it. Yes, both of them are really similar. Since XUL is a mozilla technology, I would recommend you to go to MDN for help. They have a XUL school and a XUL reference documentation.

A DOM Inspector Calls

You might have heard of firebug or the Chrome browser’s html inspector. The DOM inspector works the same way like them but it is used to inspect both html and XUL. If you are working on layout bugs, you can’t live with it.

Conclusion

When you are working on bugs in open source projects, always remember to RTFM (Read The Friendly Manual). Do get used to the MDN docs when you are working on these two languages. If you are still in doubt, don’t be afraid to ask! You may approach me (:jyeo), the tutors in CP3108 or any of the developers in irc.mozilla.org. Have fun squashing those bugs!

Look for good first bugs and [mentor= bugs

Bugzilla uses these terms to label easy bugs. If you do not know how to search for these terms, refer to my previous blog post. The search links are there.

Make sure no one else is working on it

I would recommend you to work on bugs that labeled unassigned. Assigned bugs usually have someone already working on it. You wouldn’t want to redo someone’s work right? Also, sometimes contributors forget to assign the bugs to themselves although they have submitted a patch to it. Make sure you don’t see this in the attachment box:

Also, make sure the attachment type is not a patch file type. A typical patch should look like this.

Try to understand the bug

Most bugs are reproducible. If it is not, the bug may not be a bug at all. Reproduce the bug and see where the problem lies. You might need to download the latest Firefox or Thunderbird to test the bug. Do note that these builds are not the release builds. They contain the latest patches that are pushed into the code repository. Do not confuse them with the widely available release build.

If you are still in doubt about what the bug is all about although it is labeled as a good first bug, you should contact the mentor through irc.

I’ve found my potential bug, what’s next?

You should put yourself in the CC to find keep yourself in the loop regarding any recent comments or progress of the bug.

Lastly, get yourself a copy of the source and compile it from source. The instructions are here. I would recommend you to do this on a *NIX machine, either on a mac OSx or Linux. The required software are easy to download and install and the compilation process is faster on it.

Conclusion

When I was fixing my own bugs, I spent a lot of my time going around looking for answers and asking question questions on IRC. There are a lot of well documented sources on the net and helpful people on IRC. Just don’t be afraid to ask! Enjoy!

• Good first bugs with mentors
• Calendar good first bugs with mentor=fallen
• JS bugs[lang=js]
• CSS bugs [lang=css]
• Python bugs [lang=py]
• My patches
• My Nosy List

For newbies: IMO, those language bugs are the easiest to fix because they are “code to order” tasks reported by developers. For example, the CSS bugs usually require refactoring and simplifying of their CSS code.
UPDATE: I have fixed the broken links. Thanks for letting me know.

Enjoy.

Bug 635993 – Attachment reminder doesn’t recognize file names with matching file-type extensions

Bug 635938 – Support more common ms-word extensions for the missing attachment query
Now off to more difficult stuff: C++ and Objective C. I am now left withthis:

Bug 309708 – “Send To” unavailable when Thunderbird is the default Mail client on OS X

I have been stuck on this bug for a long time. A TB user has even contacted me to update him on the progress of this bug. Desperation pushed me to search for answers on irc. Thankfully, Mike Conley pointed me to another direction: nsMessengerOSXIntegration.mm. Apparently I have been looking in the wrong direction. I guess I should start mucking around in this file. To make my debugging easier, I need to create a xcode project for TB as I will encounter more C code now.

Also, there are some bugs that are worth looking at with regard to Mac OSX applescript integration. I guess I will come back to this when I am done with this “Send To” bug.

I do pray that I can finish this before the next semester starts but it might seem difficult to do so with all my commitments. Oh God, let me know my priorities.

http://blog.finette.com/post/11370209405/never-walk-a-talk-about-entrepreneurship-and-running?5331d1f0

• “Send To” unavailable when Thunderbird is the default Mail client on OS X
  
• Trashcan icon in message header area remains a trashcan when viewing a deleted message
  
• mark read by date should use a filter enumerator
• Attachment reminder doesn’t recognize file names with matching file-type extensions (Assigned to me)
  
• Support more common ms-word extensions for the missing attachment query (Assigned to me)

Some updates for the first one. I am looking into how to create my own XPCOM component. This would be especially difficult as I will be creating a objective c component instead of the usual C++ one.

For the second one, I need to look for an UI/UX person to design the icon.

The third requires more time to look at home the filter enumerator works. I would need to just read the C++ function signatures to figure it out. There are zero documentation on this thing.

The fourth needs improvement with the patch that I’ve submitted. It mainly involves some tweaking of the regex and the algorithm used to detect the keywords.

The last one is simple, a patch has been submitted. I am now waiting for the code review.

Back to my exam preparations…