website-v2/templates/donate/donate.html

{% extends "base.html" %}

{% load static %}

{% block content %}
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      <h1 class="text-4xl">Donate to the Boost C++ Libraries</h1>

      <p>
        According to <a class="text-orange" href="https://www.openhub.net/p/boost/estimated_cost">OpenHub's
        Boost page</a>, as of August 2014 there are 14.2 million lines
        of code in Boost. Given the high quality of coding needed to
        pass Boost's community review process, and the extensive unit
        and functional testing required, a cost of US$20/line is not
        unreasonable. By that metric, the Boost C++ Libraries would
        cost US$284 million to rewrite from scratch in a commercial
        organization.
      </p>

      <p>
        If you want more of the same, please donate generously. We
        will use donations to fund Boost infrastructure, help finance
        <a class="text-orange" href="http://cppnow.org/">the annual C++ Now conference</a>,
        and help fund students to work on Boost code without having to
        worry as much about finding the time or money to do so. You
        should be aware we may also use donations for any other purpose
        the Boost steering committee feels appropriate.
      </p>

      {% include "donate/_donate-button.html" %}

      <h3>Why ask for donations for the first time in fifteen years?</h3>

      <p>
        Boost was not generated, for the most part, by any
        commercial organization. It is available in the public interest
        as one of the purest forms of open source: its license,
        <a class="text-orange" href="{% static 'license.txt' %}">the Boost
        Software License</a>, is highly permissive and allows
        unrestricted commercial use. Most of the code was written,
        documented, and tested in the spare and family time of some of
        the very best C++ engineers in the world, many of whom are also
        involved in the ISO C++ standardization process. Many of the
        additions to the C++ 11 standard library started life in the
        Boost libraries, and so will many of the additions and changes
        to the next C++ standard library.
      </p>

      <p>
        Yet, for its first fifteen years, Boost has never asked for
        donations of money from its users. So why begin now?
      </p>

      <p>
        As Boost grows, more time and resources are being spent on
        dealing with the size and complexity of Boost, especially as
        libraries are transitioned to make full use of the new language
        features in C++ 11/14. If you wish to support those efforts to
        bring more Boost libraries into first tier support for the
        latest generation of C++, please donate generously.
      </p>

      {% include "donate/_donate-button.html" %}

      <h3>Why you should donate with a recurring monthly donation</h3>

      <p>
        Boost has participated in <a class="text-orange" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Summer_of_Code">Google's
        Summer of Code</a> since 2007. This is an annual student open-source programming stipend program lasting three months during
        which experienced Boost developers mentor students who work on
        improving Boost libraries, usually in all the boring, thankless
        stuff none of us like to do. The problem with the three month
        duration is that the student is only just getting familiar
        enough with the Boost libraries to ramp up their
        productivity and rate of output when the program ends. This
        leads to these outcomes:
      </p>

      <ul>
        <li>We don't reap the full rewards of what we should given
        the substantial investment in mentoring our developers invest
        into students each year.</li>

        <li>The student is just getting into the Boost libraries when
        they need to return to concentrating on their studies, and
        often back to the part time work needed to finance the high
        expense of university study nowadays.</li>

        <li>Students, when they graduate, get pulled into the
        development of proprietary rather than open-source software,
        or they end up gravitating to one of the many open source
        projects much better at running a student-to-developer
        pipeline than Boost historically has been.</li>
      </ul>

      <p>
        Whatever the case, Boost is not benefiting as it should from
        enthusiastic students with great ideas about where C++ should
        go next, and we hope that <em>you</em> can help us change
        that.
      </p>

      <p>
        So, if you or your company or organization has benefited
        from the Boost C++ Libraries, or you would like to assist
        promising young C++ engineers develop their talents to the
        full, please strongly consider making a regular monthly
        donation to Boost! Please donate generously. Thank you in
        advance!
      </p>

    </div>
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