gsoc: add summaries for 2011 and 2012

.github/config/mdcheck.json

@@ -1,5 +1,8 @@
 {
   "ignorePatterns": [
+    {
+      "pattern": "http://dtrace.org"
+    },
     {
       "pattern": "https://www.tensorflow.org/guide/keras"
     },

_activities/gsoc.md

@@ -56,6 +56,8 @@ See here the student blog posts from previous years:
 * [Student blogs 2024]({{ site.baseurl }}/gsoc/2024/blogs.html)
 * [Student blogs 2023]({{ site.baseurl }}/gsoc/2023/blogs.html)
 * [Student blogs 2022]({{ site.baseurl }}/gsoc/2022/blogs.html)
+* [Blogpost summarizing 2012]({{ site.baseurl }}/gsoc/2012/blogs.html)
+* [Blogpost summarizing 2011]({{ site.baseurl }}/gsoc/2011/blogs.html)
 
 
 ### For Projects and Mentors

gsoc/2011/blogs.md

@@ -0,0 +1,107 @@
+---
+title: CernVM's fruitful Summer -  GSoC 2011
+layout: plain
+year: 2011
+---
+{:refdef: style="text-align: center;"}
+![gsoc-logo-2011](https://storage.googleapis.com/gweb-developer-goog-blog-assets/images_archive/original_images/GSOC_2011_300x200px_URL.png)
+{: refdef}
+
+This was the first year [CERN](http://public.web.cern.ch/public/)
+participated in *[Google Summer of Code](http://code.google.com/soc/)*,
+and it turned out to be an amazing experience for us! We were given four
+students to mentor, all of whom proved to be very skilled developers.
+The students quickly familiarized themselves with our code base and
+managed to make valuable contributions within the three month time frame
+of *Google Summer of Code*. Our students were very open and willing to
+learn and spent a considerable amount of their time researching tools,
+libraries, and the latest technological developments. As a result, all
+four students were able to solve their problems and come up with
+interesting ideas for future development. The code and the documentation
+they produced is available
+[here](http://code.google.com/p/google-summer-of-code-2011-cernvm/downloads/list).
+The specific problems (projects) that we suggested to our students
+spanned several domains, ranging from consistent replication of
+terabytes of data across several remote sites to automated testing of
+virtual machine releases.
+
+**Josip Lisec** was working on the development of the monitoring system
+for the [CernVM](http://cernvm.cern.ch/portal/) Co-Pilot framework,
+which is mainly used as a distributed computing platform within the
+LHC\@home 2.0 volunteer computing project. The [LHC\@home
+2.0](http://lhcathome2.cern.ch/) project currently has more than 9,000
+registered users who contribute their spare CPU cycles for the
+simulation of the particle collision events in CERN\'s [Large Hadron
+Collider](https://home.cern/science/accelerators/large-hadron-collider) (LHC).
+After some research, Josip decided to integrate existing tools with the
+Co-Pilot as opposed to trying to reinvent the wheel by rewriting
+everything from scratch. This resulted in a nicely engineered monitoring
+framework, parts of which were put into production while the *Google
+Summer of Code* was still going on (Josip\'s developments have now been
+fully integrated after completion of the program). Since this was
+Josip\'s first encounter with Perl, he has been seen adding support for
+\'[my](http://perldoc.perl.org/functions/my.html)\' keyword to every
+other major programming language since the *Google Summer of Code*
+concluded.\
+\
+The goal of **Yin Qiu**\'s project was to devise a mechanism for a
+consistent replication of changes made to the central repository of
+[CernVM File System](http://cernvm.cern.ch)
+(CernVM-FS) to a globally distributed set of mirror servers. CernVM-FS
+is used to host and distribute the application software of CERN LHC
+experiments to hundreds of Grid sites, as well as the laptops and
+workstations of users worldwide. As such, it is currently one of the
+central components of the distributed computing infrastructures on which
+CERN [ATLAS](http://www.atlas.ch/) and
+[LHCb](http://user.web.cern.ch/public/en/LHC/LHCb-en.html) experiments
+rely. Yin\'s approach was to organize CernVM-FS mirrors into a
+Paxos-managed replication network and to enforce state machine version
+transitions on them. Following the suggestion of Jakob, his mentor, Yin
+implemented a messaging framework which is used to orchestrate the
+replication process and facilitates the implementation of new features.
+He also managed to implement a couple of Python plugins which ensure the
+consistency of data across replicas. The project is currently in the
+state of a working prototype.\
+\
+**Jesse Williamson** took up the challenge of designing a new library
+for CernVM-FS to consolidate support for various cryptographic hashing
+algorithms. The first task was to survey the implementation of CernVM-FS
+and establish a list of requirements. Next, quite a bit of effort was
+spent on designing the library specifically so that it would be easy to
+use, comparatively simple to extend, and robust enough to support
+extensions like a streaming interface and compression. Since CernVM-FS
+is heavily used in production, it has been very important to make sure
+that the new developments do not break anything. Jesse has developed a
+set of unit tests which ensure that all the existing features and
+properties were maintained.\
+\
+The design of new C++ libraries was certainly an improvement, but it
+also became clear late in the cycle that a further abstraction to fully
+separate digests and hash functions will be necessary to avoid memory
+fragmentation issues and ensure stronger const-correctness\
+\
+**Jonathan Gillet** worked on implementing a solution for automating the
+testing of CernVM virtual machine images on multiple hypervisors and
+operating systems. The solution, which is a ready to use testing
+infrastructure for CernVM, was developed in collaboration with other
+open source projects such as AMD
+Tapper (used for the reports and web interface), [libvirt](http://libvirt.org/)
+(interaction with hypervisors), and
+Homebrew (OS X support).  The main
+goals of the project were accomplished with support for all major
+hypervisors running on Linux and OS X platforms. The framework automates
+the task of downloading and configuring the CernVM images on the fly,
+and executing a series of thorough tests which check various features of
+CernVM images before release. Documentation was also an important goal
+of the project; in total there are now over two hundred pages of
+documentation which cover everything from setting up the testing
+infrastructure and virtual machines to a complete API reference.\
+\
+We certainly enjoyed *Google Summer of Code* 2011, and we sincerely
+congratulate all of our students and mentors for successfully completing
+the program!\
+\
+*By Artem Harutyunyan, Senior Fellow, CernVM Project (CERN) and Google
+Summer of Code Mentor*\
+[(original article on Google Open Source
+Blog)](http://google-opensource.blogspot.fr/2011/12/cernvms-fruitful-summer.html)

gsoc/2012/blogs.md

@@ -0,0 +1,98 @@
+---
+title: CERN Summer Thrills GSoC 2012
+layout: plain
+year: 2012
+---
+
+{:refdef: style="text-align: center;"}
+![gsoc-logo](https://wiki.osgeo.org/w/images/a/a7/Gsoc-2012-logo-color.png){: width="600" }
+{: refdef}
+
+
+For the physics software development group at
+[CERN](http://public.web.cern.ch/public/), our second year of *[Google
+Summer of Code](http://code.google.com/soc/)* couldn't have come at a
+better time. Motivated by CernVM\'s [awesome experience in
+2011](http://google-opensource.blogspot.ch/2011/12/cernvms-fruitful-summer.html),
+our colleagues from the [Geant4](http://geant4.cern.ch/) and
+[ROOT](http://root.cern.ch) software projects joined us as mentors this
+summer. And while physicists around the world snatched the first
+evidence of a long-sought [Higgs
+boson](http://cds.cern.ch/record/1459565) from the Large Hadron Collider
+(LHC), our seven *Google Summer of Code* students worked on core parts
+of the open source software engine that makes LHC data processing
+possible.
+
+Two of our students worked with the Geant4 team at CERN. Geant4 is a
+toolkit for the simulation of the response of a material when
+high-energetic particles are passing through it. Geant4 can be used to
+model a gas detector, a gamma-ray telescope, an electronic device next
+to an accelerator or the inside of a satellite. In order to keep up with
+the rate of real data coming from the LHC detectors, Geant4 has to be
+both accurate and fast.
+
+
+-   Stathis Kamperis improved the speed of Geant4 by re-ordering the
+    simulation of particles according to particle type. By simulating,
+    for instance, first all electrons, than all photons, and so on, the
+    number of instruction cache misses decreases. In the course of this
+    work, Stathis also ported Geant4 to Solaris which gives us access to
+    the very powerful [DTrace](http://dtrace.org/blogs/) profiling
+    machinery.
+-   Dhruva Tirumala Bukkapatnam contemplated Geant4 pointers and data
+    structures. He developed code for a particle navigation algorithm
+    optimized for use on GPU architectures.
+
+\
+Two more students were working together with the ROOT team. The ROOT
+framework is the main working horse for LHC experiments to store,
+analyze, and visualize their data.
+
+
+-   Omar Zapata Mesa worked on an
+    [MPI](http://www.mcs.anl.gov/research/projects/mpi/) interface for
+    ROOT. On a cluster of machines, the MPI interface enables ROOT to
+    toss around its C++ objects from node to node while also integrating
+    with ROOT\'s C++ interpreter.
+-   Eamon Ford worked on the CERN iOS App.The App brings CERN news and
+    information on an iPad or iPhone. In case you can't sleep at night,
+    you can now peek at the live display of particle collisions from
+    inside the LHC.
+
+For the CernVM base technology, we had three more students working with
+us this summer. CernVM provides a virtual appliance used to develop and
+run LHC data processing applications on the distributed and
+heterogeneous computing infrastructure that is provided by hundreds of
+physics institutes and research labs around the world.
+
+
+-   Josip Lisec, back for his second *Google Summer of Code*, worked on
+    the log analysis and visualization of CernVM Co-Pilot, the job
+    distribution system which powers the [LHC\@home
+    Test4Theory](http://lhcathome2.cern.ch/) volunteer computing
+    project. Want to see the world map of active volunteers from the
+    19th of November at 3:07pm?  Check out the [Co-Pilot
+    dashboard](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXHSXt9poCA).
+-   Francesco Ruvolo worked on broken network services, such as
+    misconfigured DNS or HTTP servers. Breaking such services in a
+    controlled way comes in handy when simulating the behavior of a
+    CernVM running on a hotel WiFi.
+-   Rachee Singh programmed maintenance tools for the content
+    distribution network that is used by the CernVM File System to
+    distribute terabytes of experiment software to all the worker nodes.
+    All the proxy servers of the content distribution network can now be
+    plotted on a map and every CernVM can automatically find a close
+    proxy by means of a [Voronoi
+    diagram](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voronoi_diagram) produced by
+    Rachee\'s code.
+
+
+Overall, we were very glad to see so much interest and enthusiasm from
+the student programmers in LHC software tools. We'd like to
+congratulate all of our students on their hard work and on successfully
+completing the program!
+
+Sun, 09/30/2012 - 00:00
+*By Jakob Blomer, CERN Organization Administrator*
+[(original article on Google Open Source
+Blog)](http://google-opensource.blogspot.fr/2012/12/cern-summer-thrills.html)