At the beginning of August this year, we put out a call for applications in our newly launched grant programme. The intent of the programme is to leverage donor and sponsor funding in order to support community members with great ideas to improve the underlying infrastructure of the QGIS project and code base.

We have had a really great response to the call for applications (detailed list of applications is here for your reading pleasure – 233KB download). There has also been some good discussion on the QGIS Developer mailing list about the evaluation process.

Given that we have 18 proposals and only 20,000 Euros to disburse, the QGIS voting members will need to make some tough, pragmatic choices. Its also noteworthy that this is the first time since establishing our community of QGIS Voting Members that we have asked them to vote on an issue. Our intent with the voting member system is to have a streamlined process for deciding on important issues whilst ensuring good representation of all members of the community. In case you are wondering who the QGIS Voting members are, I have prepared this little infographic below which lists the members and shows how they are elected  etc.

The voting for the grant proposals ends at the end of the September 2016, and we plan to announce the successful candidates soon after that – probably on the 4th of October. The PSC will arbitrate in the case of a dead heat or the proposal amounts of the top voted proposals not adding up to our funding target.

This round of grant proposals is special not only because it is the first time we are doing this, but also because the grant programme precedes the upcoming release of QGIS 3.0. Providing grants to facilitate this work will help to assure that QGIS 3.0 gets all the love and attention it needs in order to make it a success. That said, there is a huge amount of work to do, and it is mostly being done by a handful of very dedicated and generous (with their time) individuals. If you have the wherewithal to further support some of the grant proposals that did not make the cut, or the QGIS 3.0 effort in general, please get into contact with our treasurer, Andreas Neumann (finance [at] qgis.org) or head over to our sponsorship or donations page to support their work!

Lastly, I appeal to those QGIS Voting Members who have not yet cast their votes to check your email and head over to the voting form to cast your vote!