Re: Free Software Job Advice

[Sindhu S <sindhus live in>]

Hello,

This is not the forum to discuss career help and am surprised why nobody has replied to this ask for help yet. That said, I genuinely feel for you and want you to read the following (in case you haven't considered them already):

1. Participating in GSoC (Google Summer of Code) will give a substantial amount of experience you would need for a job as well it pays over the summer (very handsomely enough to cover your student loans and some extent of living too). Am sorry at the point of writing this the deadline for this year's GSoC but do approach your interested organization to see if they can make an exception.It's not impossible. I'd say go for it!

2. Have you considered freelancing? There are plenty of freelancing jobs out there which pay by the hour I think. You could start at http://www.rent-acoder.com/

3. The beauty of computer applications field is that unlike others one doesn't really need a degree certificate to prove one's skills. Your code and projects should speak for you. Have you considered putting up a website of your own where you have displayed your previous and current work (even if in progress)? You should also mention you are available for hire. You could try Github.com for code hosting.

4. Advertise the code you have written, either complete it quickly by giving it a command line interface or a GUI one and put it up! tell everyone (via twitter) and ask for advice on how to better it. Also look for jobs on hasgeek.com

5. See if you can work part time at your university, you'd likely get a sys admin's job but that's good right?

Is there anything I missed? :) Let me know and I hope this helps!

Good luck!

-Sindhu

http://live.gnome.org/sindhus

On Sat, May 4, 2013 at 11:14 PM, אנטולי קרסנר <tombackton gmail com> wrote:

Hello everybody,

I'm looking for advice on making a living from working on Free Software.

I already read articles, send my CV to various companies, but I found
nothing. So I decided to ask here, hoping this question isn't too
inappropriate for this list.

I'm a software engineering student in first year (out of 4), from
Israel.
I've been coding in C++ using GNU and Gnome technologies, and I'm
familiar with the GTK/gtkmm, libxml++, etc. I do need to refresh my
knowledge of GObject, but certainly I can write code and contribute to
existing projects (or work on my own project, which I've been doing for
the past 9 months).

The problem is that I need to make a living somehow. Not just as a
student, but also later, as an engineer. I don't need much, just make a
living and do what I believe in: work on free software and promote
software freedom.

In Israel nobody cares about free software (they call it open source,
and it's just a way to save money), so after failing to find such a job
here, I sent CV to companies in Europe. I realize I'm a student, I have
no formal coding education, I have no proven experience (none of my code
has reached the stage an initial version can compile, yet) but source
files themselves... but I do want to contribute. The only reason I don't
work on Gnome projects is that my free time is spent working on my own
project, which will hopefully be a useful desktop app when it's ready
(probably until the end of the summer).

I realize all that, but I don't want to give up and accept the fact I
can't do anything for free software. I do have skills, I do have
knowledge. My current project has 7000 lines of code (not much for a
serious project, I know, but it's a lot for me as a student working
alone) written by myself from scratch, using GNU Build System, gtkmm,
libxml++, libsigc++.

Isn't there a way I can make a living with the skills I do have? I do
want to help, and I don't need much in return, I just want to make a
living. To pay my rent, to pay for my food... I'm sure my skills can be
useful to someone. With a free software project.

If you can help me or give advice, I'll be thankful.

- AAnatoly Krasner

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