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What's it like working on HPCC Systems? Intern with us and find out

This year, we are running our own summer internship program again. If you are a student wondering how to spend your summer doing something interesting, worthwhile and fun, read on!

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Last summer, we were lucky enough to be accepted as part of the GSoC 2015 program, as well as welcome four student interns to join our development team. Both programs were a huge success. How so? Read all about what those students achieved here.

We have a wide range of projects for students to work on this summer. So come and have a look at the list. You can choose from projects involving web interface design, compiler enhancements, IoT pluggable protocols, machine learning and more. There’s definitely something for everyone.

About the program
The HPCC Systems Summer Internship Program lasts for 10 weeks from the beginning of June to mid-August. We ask you to be around in May so that we can get you set up. From there, you can get right down to coding from the start date. We do have expectations of students who intern with us. We also expect and want you to ask questions. We want this to be a valuable learning experience for you, so make the most of working with our experienced and knowledgeable mentors.

We also like to show off how well our interns are doing by blogging about progress made and showcasing completed projects on Community Day at our annual engineering summit.

So what do you get out of it?
You get to work alongside experienced developers who are experts in their field. The projects ideas are theirs, and they are keen to see them develop into features for users in our community. Not only will you learn from the best, you will also feel their passion and excitement as they support, encourage and celebrate with you, while you work towards achieving your goals. And you get paid, too! So it’s a no brainer right?

It’s good for us, too…
There’s the obvious benefit that we get a few extra projects completed of real value to our users this year. But it’s also an opportunity to attract new, young developers. You get to work on a real-world project working with real-world developers, while making a valuable contribution to what is already a vibrant community. We like that prospect a lot! After all, this is at the heart and soul of open source.

We also know that HPCC Systems has a great future, and we’re always looking for talented and dynamic developers who love coding. If you are a student who fits this description, an internship with HPCC Systems is great place to start. Who knows where it might get you once you’ve completed your studies!

What is HPCC Systems?
HPCC Systems is an open source platform specifically designed to solve ‘Big Data’ problems. Find out how to get started using HPCC Systems from our website.

While HPCC Systems is a complete solution for solving Big Data problems, it is also highly flexible. Data may be stored in a different database, such as MySQL, with connectors available so that data can be imported into or exported from HPCC Systems. Queries to external databases, or fragments of other languages such as Python or R can also be embedded within ECL code.

While we’re on the subject, we have a number of intern projects available for interfacing to additional embedded languages such as Haskell, Clojure, Postgres, Couchbase, SAS etc. We also have similar projects available for interfacing to external datastores such as Ceph and S3.

What’s ECL?
ECL (Enterprise Control Language) is our proprietary programming language which is specifically designed for the manipulation of Big Data.  

It’s easy to learn and use so don’t be afraid to make the leap! It’s not just us that says that; our users agree – see David Dasher MD, CPL Online talking about how they use HPCC Systems and ECL.

Once you have downloaded and installed the HPCC Systems software, you can take some online training and watch some overview videos to help you get started quickly. You can also run through some examples and tutorials to get you started as an ECL programmer.  We are offering a couple of projects this year that will help enhance the ECL language.

Deadline for proposals is March 25th 2016
So it’s time to get going! What should you do next? Here’s a quick 7-step process:

  1. Take some time to find out about us and what we do, Find out about what HPCC Systems is used for. Find out how it works and what ECL is. Also, take a look at what goes on in our community.
  2. Choose a project of interest to you from our ideas list
  3. Make contact with the project mentor and discuss ideas for completing it and ask any questions you may have.
  4. Prepare a proposal outlining your ideas. The proposal also needs to contain some information about you (see our Proposal content guidelines).
  5. Ask the mentor for feedback on your proposal.
  6. Submit your proposal by email to Lorraine Chapman by 7pm UTC on March 25th.
  7. You will be notified whether you have been successful by April 22nd.

So what are you waiting for? 
Opportunities are at your fingers tips and we’re waiting to hear from you! Be a contributor to HPCC Systems this summer.

For more information about the HPCC Systems Summer Internship Program, email Lorraine Chapman.