July 13, 2021
The Foundation has continued our successful partnership with the University of Waterloo Co-Op Program. Since 2017 we’ve had 14 interns with some having returned for more than one internship. We’ve also had two interns become full fledged committers. This year’s summer program includes two interns, one of whom is a returning student. We sat down with our co-op students to learn more about them and why they chose to work with FreeBSD.
Name: Cyril Zhang
Q: Tell us a little bit about yourself and where you are in your education journey.
I study mathematics and computer science at the University of Waterloo and I’m in my third year there. But I don’t just consider myself to be a math/CS kind of student. I have been enjoying many other courses in writing, art, and languages, just to name a few.
Q: How many co-op positions have you held?
I have had two co-op positions prior to this one. I was previously a web developer intern for one co-op term and an instructional support assistant at the University of Waterloo for the other, so they were both quite different from working at the FreeBSD Foundation.
Q: Why did you want to work for the FreeBSD Foundation?
One reason is that I wanted to get a variety of experiences, which is why my co-op terms have all been different. Another reason is that I have been passionate about open-source software for a long time, but I never made significant contributions before. I really like the community and philosophy around open source, and I feel that I am using my skills to make meaningful contributions when I work at the FreeBSD Foundation. And yet another reason is the operating systems course that I took in the previous term. It piqued my interest and I realized that I wanted to know more about how operating systems worked, are implemented, that kind of thing.
Q: What are you hoping to learn from this internship?
In addition to expanding my knowledge about operating systems, I also hope that I can continue to contribute to FreeBSD and other projects even after this internship.
Q: What are you currently working on?
I’m currently looking at improving the interoperability of FreeBSD jails, particularly in accordance with the OCI specifications.
Q: How has the FreeBSD experience been so far?
Excellent.
Name: Yang Zhong
Q: Tell us a little bit about yourself and where you are in your education journey.
Like Cyril, I’m a student at the University of Waterloo in the faculty of Mathematics. I’m halfway through my third year studying Computer Science.
Q: How many co-op positions have you held?
This is my third co-op term, and my second time at the FreeBSD Foundation. In my first position I worked at a small marketing company doing web development work.
Q: Why did you want to work for the FreeBSD Foundation?
Before my first term at the Foundation I remember thinking that out of all the positions I saw, this was the only one that felt really ‘concrete’. I could envision the work I would be doing and understand what impact my work would have. I became interested in this position due to this, and my experiences here have aligned with these expectations; I feel a strong sense of ownership in what I do here, which I really like. I also like the open-source nature of the FreeBSD Project.
Q: What are you hoping to learn from this internship?
Since it’s my second time here, I’m currently working on a pretty big project. So, I’d like to learn some skills related to this: How to manage different priorities, how to make decisions, how to compromise and make trade-offs, how to communicate my process and goals, things like that.
Q: What are you currently working on?
I’m working on the FreeBSD installer! In particular, I’m currently adding on to an experimental graphical installer that uses a web interface. Along with this, I’m thinking about how to make FreeBSD’s installation system more modular, so that we can more easily incorporate different installation methods.
Q: How has the FreeBSD experience been so far?
It’s been really enjoyable. We co-op students get a lot of direction and help, and I always feel like I know where I’m going. The work-from-home experience has also been good; it’s very flexible, but I hear from my co-workers enough to keep connected.