Google's Summer of Code application window is fast closing. Talented developers who want the chance participate in the prestigious program "need to get their skates on".

Joomla! was involved with the program in 2005 and it was a huge success — generating several high-value projects. Much of the work from last years' developers is likely to appear in the future evolution of Joomla! Three of the students who were mentored by Joomla! Core Developers in 2005 are now core members themselves.

Lead developer Johan Janssens believes the success of the Google Summer of Code has created further momentum in the Open Source world. "The calibre of coders and the buzz around Google's sponsorship created a great place for creative minds to prosper," Johan said. "I'm extremely pleased that Google taken up the opportunity to support the Summer of Code once again."

As was the case last year, students participating in Joomla!’s summer of code 2006 will be mentored by a great team of core and community developers. All projects will need to be based on the upcoming Joomla! 1.5 which is going into beta soon. This new version of Joomla! has a completely refactored codebase and runs a full PHP application framework under the hood. Students will get the chance to either create interesting extensions for the Joomla! CMS or write framework libraries. Our developer network (https://developer.joomla.org/) will be used for community communication about the projects.

As of May 1, Google is now accepting applications from students.

If you are interested, you’ve only got until May 8th to send in your proposal, so you’d better get on it.