Lift off: Weeks 1 & 2The firs...

 

Lift off: Weeks 1 & 2

The first month of Google Summer of Code has been nothing short of a whirlwind. Here's a quick breakdown of how the first two weeks went down:

  • Navigating the Codebase: If you've ever stared at a massive codebase and wondered where to begin, you know how my first few days felt. Getting my hands dirty made things click into place rapidly.

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Beyond the Abstraction

The glow of the screen hits different when you're reading an email that dictates your entire summer. Getting accepted into Google Summer of Code 2026 programme for Astropy, under the OpenAstronomy umbrella, was one of those really defining moments; all I could do was stare at the screen in disbelief (I'd done it). Then, the abstraction fades away, and suddenly, you need to get down to the real work.

This post, is the first of many. I plan to keep these updates transparent and real—documenting, so it's really not just going to be about the code that ships, but rather the (not-so)basic commands I need to google, or the dumb mistakes, or the long hours spent scouring the internet for things that developers ought to know (but I don't), and the brutal reality of open-source development or at least the reality from the perspective of a first-timer (that would be me needing to google how to squash and rebase, haha fun times:| or not)

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GSoC’25@OpenAstronomy — Final Report

GSoC’25@OpenAstronomy — Final Submission

Organization: OpenAstronomy (RADIS)
Mentors: Nicolas Minesi, Erwan Pannier

Electronic spectra for RADIS

This project will extend RADIS to calculate electronic spectra, enabling analysis of high-temperature phenomena in plasmas, flames, and exoplanet atmospheres. Currently, RADIS excels at rovibrational calculations but lacks electronic capabilities. This project will implement electronic spectroscopy in RADIS by leveraging existing ExoMol integration, adding separate electronic temperature parameters, implementing population distributions for electronic states, and creating functions for manual adjustment of electronic band intensities. Deliverables include OH electronic spectra with manual band adjustment capability, implementation of electronic temperature handling, non-equilibrium OH spectrum calculation, and extension to support electronic spectra for all ExoMol molecules. This enhancement will make RADIS a comprehensive spectroscopic tool capable of handling the full range of molecular transitions within a unified framework.

The Solution

My work focused on extending RADIS to calculate electronic spectra by:

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My GSoC journey @Open-Astronomy

Introduction

So for people who don’t know, Google Summer of Code is a global program by Google where students and developers get the chance to work on real open-source projects with mentors from around the world. It’s not just about coding it’s about learning how to collaborate, contribute to big projects, and ship something useful. And yes, there’s also a stipend, which makes it even more exciting.

Well, the first time I heard about GSoC was in my first year of college, but I didn’t give it much attention. I thought it would be really hard to get in. Then, in my second year, two of my friends got accepted, and that really inspired me. It made me realize it was actually possible.

Starting Early

So I started searching deep, even before the orgs got announced. I really wanted to get in, since there aren’t many internships out there that give both good experience and a stipend. I navigated through different orgs' codebases, read a lot of issues and PRs from different orgs to understand how OSS contributions are done, but I didn’t pick a specific org at that point.

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Time Series Analysis in Stingray.jl

From Stargazing Dreams to Code Stargazing:)

Ever since childhood, I have been passionate about the mysteries of the universe. Over time, that passion grew into something more technical — not just looking at the stars, but wanting to understand their signals.

This summer, through Google Summer of Code 2025 (GSoC), I had the opportunity to contribute to Stingray.jl, a Julia library for time series analysis in astronomy. What follows is both a story of my personal journey and an exploration of the science and code I worked on.

The Beginning – Switching Languages and First Steps

When the organization was announced, I immediately started exploring Stingray (the Python version). I wanted to understand the structure, so I made my first PRs there.

Soon, I understood the Stingray a bit, then I started working on Stingray.jl, the Julia port of Stingray initiated by Aman Pandey in 2022. That meant learning Julia from scratch! Thankfully, Julia was similar to Python in many ways, so I picked it up quickly.

During my early testing, I noticed outdated dependencies — for example, some packages were only compatible with Julia 1.7, while the project was moving towards Julia 1.11. My first clumsy PR (on power_colors) wasn’t great, will tell you in a bit,t but it gave me valuable lessons.

Later, I worked on updating fourier.jl. This was also my first time seriously using structs in Julia. My mentor @fjebaker guided me on abstract methods and struct design, while @matteobachetti helped me understand what kind of astronomical data the project needed.

At first, I was confused about telescopes and their instruments. To learn, I went to NASA HEASARC documentation, where I discovered FITS data (Flexible Image Transport System) — the standard format for astronomical data. That’s when things started making sense.

My First Big Task – Reading Event Data

@fjebaker opened a milestone and assigned me the readevent task. At the same time, I became good friends with fellow contributor Jawd Ahmad. We often helped each other understand the codebase.

I implemented the readevent function with a small struct called
EventList something like :

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