ESA Summer of Code in Space NEST Ideas

The NEST team is applying to become a mentoring organization in the  ESA Summer of Code in Space programme. We hope to find the brightness and most creative student open source developers to help us add new and exciting possibilities to the Next ESA SAR Toolbox.

Background

ESA Summer of Code in Space 2012 (SOCIS 2012) is a program run by the European Space Agency. It aims at offering student developers stipends to write code for various space-related open source software projects. Through SOCIS, accepted student applicants are paired with a mentor or mentors from the participating projects, thus gaining exposure to real-world software development scenarios. In turn, the participating projects are able to more easily identify and bring in new developers.

F.A.Q

Timeline

Requirements

We are looking for intermediate level Java developers from undergrads to PhD's with some experience with geospatial software.

Student application deadline is July 27, 2012

Mentors

Mr Luis Veci - NEST Software Lead / Spatial Nerd

Dr Jun Lu - NEST Scientist / Math Guru

Dr Robert Manners - SAR Scientist / Tinkering Expert

Project ideas

1) Updated NASA WorldWind integration with the latest version and lots of cool new features and capabilities. Implement some example applications combining WorldWind and NEST features.
required: java, kml, wms
nice to have: opengl, worldwind
priority: high

2) Integration of other open source image processing libraries such as imageJ, JavaCV, etc. Create an interface between NEST graph processing and these libraries to be able to take advantage of the many plugins developed these highly active projects.
required: java, image processing
priority: high

3) Develop basic tools for statistical analysis, machine learning, segmentation, feature extraction and classification or integrate from existing open source libraries.
required: java
priority: moderate

4) Enhance the GIS capabilities of NEST with integration from other Java GIS software. Improved vector handling, additional vector format import/export, etc.
required: java, GIS
priority: moderate

5) Support for a targeted application area such as ice classification, environmental monitoring, monitoring of surface movement, ocean applications, etc.
required: knowledge of SAR application area
priority: moderate

6) Graph operator interface to OpenCL or CUDA  to offload processing to graphics cards
required: java, jocl or cuda
priority: low

7) NEST web interface to select data, create graphs and process data on a server over the web.
required: GWT or other
priority: low