Re: GSoC Proposal 2022

["Maíra Canal" <maira.canal@usp.br>]

On 04/10, Jonathan Cameron wrote:
> On Thu, 7 Apr 2022 00:23:29 -0300
> Maíra Canal <maira.canal@usp.br> wrote:
> 
> > Hi everyone, I am Maíra Canal an undergrad student at the University
> > of São Paulo, Brazil, pursuing
> > computer engineering. I wish to participate in the GSoC 2021 as a part
> > of the Linux Foundation, IIO Project.
> 
> Hi Maíra,
> 
> Nice to 'meet' you ;)
> 
> > 
> > I have been contributing to the Linux kernel for a couple of months
> > and have more than 20
> > accepted patches in a couple of subsystems.
> > 
> > I started looking through the catalog of Analog Devices Inc. and I'm
> > pretty interested in writing a driver for gyroscopes, inertial
> > measurement units (IMUs), magnetometers, pressure sensors, proximity
> > sensors, or temperature sensors. But, while looking through the
> > catalog, I could not figure out a sensor that would be relevant to
> > Linux Kernel. I mean, I would like to work on a sensor that would be
> > relevant to the community and to Analog Devices Inc.
> > 
> > In that sense, I would like to know if anyone in the IIO community
> > could recommend a sensor that would make sense for the company and the
> > IIO community. Any suggestion is appreciated!
> 
> I'm not going to recommend a particular sensor, but more offer some general
> tips on what 'sort' of device makes a good target for a GSOC.
> Finding a sensor means trawling datasheets and I'm tight on time today
> + I've no real insight into what the ADI folk might like to see
> supported!
> 
> The nature of a GSOC driver submission is often a little different to
> how an experienced driver author might go about things, simply because you
> will / should be looking for feedback at more stages of development and
> hopefully to upstream things in multiple stages.  An old hand at IIO
> drivers will often just jump directly to a driver supporting all the
> features they wish to target.  As such, the 'perfect' device to target
> should meet a few requirements that may not be true for the approach of jumping
> straight to the end goal.  Note this is equally true for other people
> starting out writing drivers - though they can often do very simple
> devices first and that is not a good plan for a GSOC project where
> you need to have a progression during the project.
> 
> Try to find something that offers some advanced features to provide
> stretch goals but make sure the basic functionality will work with
> a much simpler driver. So devices that provide straight forward
> registers to access the latest channel value are great, whereas
> those that only offer a streaming interfaces / fifo may be less suitable.
> However if they offer both that is perfect as the fifo make a good
> later feature for a GSOC project if things are going particularly
> well!  For a real stretch goal, find a device with features that
> we don't support at all today (perhaps new sensor types, or some
> other new feature) as they'll give you the experience of defining
> new ABI + possibly modifying the IIO core to meet some requirements.
> 
> Another thing to look at it is whether the part is sufficiently
> different from those supported by existing drivers to justify a
> separate driver. If not, you may find your GSOC project becomes
> simply adding an ID! (then rapidly choosing a second device to
> work on).
> 
> Hope that provides a few hints on what to look at.  Probably the best
> way around is to suggest one or more parts you think look interesting
> then we can give feedback on whether we think they'd be a good choice
> or not.

Hi Jonathan,

I really appreciate the answer. Thank you for your attention and time!

During the week, I ended up picking the ADXL375 accelerometer (although I am
open to any change proposed by ADI or the IIO community). Based on that device,
I wrote a proposal and I would appreciate if you provide some feedback on the
device choice and proposal: https://pt.overleaf.com/read/xsmmdpvzqrhd.

Regards,
Maíra

> 
> Good luck!
> 
> Jonathan
> 
> 
> 
> > 
> > Sincerely,
> > Maíra Canal
>