This page is aimed to be the starting point of collection for ideas for projects which could benefit the Python community, either projects that help the Python core, develop the standard library, third party packages, or more.

This page was created to foster collaboration on ideas regarding projects that could be done as part of the [http://code.google.com/summerofcode.html Google Summer of Code].

There is a related page to discuss the ./MentorshipCoordination side of the project.

We've created a [http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/summerofcode new mailing list] to discuss the Google Summer of Code from a Python POV. It is strongly encouraged people interested in discussing possible projects, people who'd be willing to help students this summer as mentors, and any students considering applying for the program to join and start discussions on that list.

Ideally, each project below should be expanded into a more full-featured description, so that people can judge the value, the effort involved, the size of the project (takes a week, takes a month, etc.), who knows enough about the project to help out, etc.

(Formatting:

• Topics with a paragraph or so of thought, start new a page with a . in front of the wiki word, i.e.  ./CleanupUrlLibProject to scope the new pages a bit

• for topics not fleshed out beyond a sentence or two, indent the sentence six spaces on a newline below the topic title/summary; this is to make sure that the description does not overpower the title/summary

)

• CleanupUrlLibProject

• Cleanup/modernize a module(s) in the stdlib

• CompleteSslSupport

• Add a MemoryUsageProfiler to python

  • Currently it is almost impossible to figure out where memory is going in a large python program, especially if you have C extensions loaded. It'd be nice to know where the memory is going, if there are circular references, or if objects are being held too long.

• JythonProjects

  • Port IDLE from tk to swing, OS X improvements.
• Port stdlib modules from C to Python

  • Jython, IronPython, and PyPy all require standard library modules to be written in pure Python; porting C-based standard library modules to Python helps them.

• Unify and extend Python's import mechanisms, possibly by prototyping it with PyPy (much easier than messing with CPython's import.c).

• UnicodeonWindowsExtensions

• ./PythonWebProgrammingIdeas

• SpeedUpInterpreterStartup

• RestrictedExecution

• ./PythonGarbageCollected

• ./RegisterVirtualMachine

• ./WebServiceStack

• ./PythonDocInOpenEbook

• fix some old, old bugs in sourceforge
  • This is not a high profile, totally new idea, but maybe even helps the community more than founding another web framework

• Add EPS import to ReportLab PDF library

  • http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.reportlab.user/4052

• make [http://www.spread.org/ Spread] Python Binding compile with Python 2.4 on win32 (and possibly other major platforms)

• A better way to create (singlefile) executeables by bringing the advantages of py2exe and McMillans compiler together.

  • Note that the next version of py2exe will allow this - it's 95% finished in CVS already -- theller.

    Don't forget [http://starship.python.net/crew/atuining/cx_Freeze/ cx_Freeze] which has a lot of nice properties too.

• [http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0337.html PEP 337]: Logging Support for Standard Library

• Enhance the Python catalog of modules

  • http://www.python.org/pypi -- contact [http://www.python.org/sigs/catalog-sig/ Catalog-SIG] for more.

• Work on the [http://www.parrotcode.org/ Parrot] VM's Python implementation

• Revive the code or idea from [http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg/python_gui/ PyGUI] or [http://anygui.sourceforge.net/ Anygui]

  • These are Python-level cross-toolkit compatibility libraries for GUI work. Currently there is a "live" project called [http://developer.berlios.de/projects/cimarron/ Cimarron] along these lines.

• Flesh out the widget library and improve the documentation of [http://www.zephyrfalcon.org/labs/wax.html Wax]

  • Wax is [http://www.zephyrfalcon.org/ Hans Nowak]'s [http://mail.python.org/pipermail/europython/2005-April/004975.html Pythonic] wrapper for [http://www.wxpython.org/ wxPython].

• An educational programming environment similar to [http://dewey.soe.berkeley.edu/boxer.html/index.html Boxer] for Python

  • Kind of a visual programming environment, where blocks are translated into "boxes" (along with a few other select ideas). One of the more conservative visual programming environments, and it seems very translatable to Python. Or maybe work on a decent programming environment for [http://pylogo.org PyLogo].

• NotebookInterfaceForIpython

• ./FileSystemVirtualization

Less fleshed-out ideas:

• ProfileReplacementProject

• ./EnhancedIterTools

• ./ExploreFunctionalProgramming

• MakeXmlrpclibAsynchronous