Google Summer of Code 2017 Ideas

Mifos Initiative has been Accepted as a Mentoring Organization!

The Mifos Initiative has been accepted as a mentoring organization for the 2017 Google Summer of Code. Subscribe to this page for the latest updates to project ideas and mentors assigned to projects. Prospective students should begin engaging with the community and working on pull requests.

Get Stoked - End Poverty. One Line of Code at a Time.



2017 Google Summer of Code - Get to Know Mifos

We're looking forward to participating in Google Summer of Code for our fifth year. In 2016, we successfully graduated six stellar interns from across the world who are continuing to make substantial contributions to our community. We hope to continue building our next generation of contributors who are joining in our movement to fight poverty through open source software. We want you to be part of our mission of creating a world of 3 Billion Maries.  

Students in 2017 will have the option to work on a variety of projects related to our front-end Web App built on top of the AngularJS framework, and a variety of other apps including our Android-based field officer app and client banking app, and modules like our data import tool. 

  

2017 GSOC Mentors

We have a talented and passionate group of mentors from across our global community who are eager to help guide the next generation of HFOSS contributors. These mentors come from various backgrounds - partners deploying Mifos, financial institutions using Mifos, volunteers, and even former GSOC students but they all share a common goal of ending poverty one line of code at a time!

Mentor

Project

Location

Time Zone


IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

CameroonWAT (GMT +1:00)

IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

USACST (GMT -6:00)

IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

USACST (GMT -6:00)

Puneet Kohli


IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
TentativeIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

USAEST (GMT -5:00)

PortugalWET (GMT)

KenyaEAT (GMT +3:00)

IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

India

IST (GMT +5:30)


IndiaIST (GMT +5:30)

Guidelines

  • Getting started Read about setting up the code and understand the basic concepts around MifosX.

Expectations

Students working on Mifos X will be expected to:

Prerequisite Skills

Basics

  • Quick learner
  • Troubleshooting Wizard
  • Passion for writing beautiful code
  • Excellent communication skills
  • Knowledge of developer tools
    • such as: a text editor, source control, how to build software
    • experience with specific tools will also help, such as: Eclipse IDE, Git

Mifos includes wide variety of technologies, we do not expect a student to be expert on all of these. But it will be helpful if you have some experience in some of these. Helpful skills (specific technology requirements vary with project chosen):

  • MySQL,Jersey, Hibernate, Spring,
  • HTML, CSS,  JavaScript (JQuery), AngularJS, Java, Android
  • JUnit, REST-assured

Hints

Project Ideas

All 2017 projects will be related to the Community App, our Android apps, or any additional tools or modules. These apps and modules are built on top of the Apache Fineract platform, the world's only open platform for financial inclusion and is banking delivered as a service via the cloud. Apache Fineract is a true platform in which the back-end is cleanly separated from the front-end and all core platform services are exposed through an API making it easy develop new applications on top of the Apache Fineract platform. 

REST API "live" documentation (Swagger, SpringFox)

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Mifos (Fineract) of course has a documented REST API already. It currently has two limitations:

  1. It's source is simply a HTML file that is maintained manually in parallel to the source code which actually defines the REST API, and therefore can be out of sync
  2. It's not "live", that is one currently has set up a REST tool such as e.g. Postman & Co. to "explore" it; contrary to the approach you can see e.g. on the Swagger Petstore example and (increasingly) other sites offering REST APIs.

The goal of this project is address this by using Swagger (now Open API Initiative OAI), most probably combined with SpringFox in for Mifos (Fineract), and replace the current apiLive.htm.

Phase II: once the Swagger live documentation is working it would be interesting to use the Swagger descriptor to generate client libraries (e. g. Java, Angular2). Nice to have optional add-on ideas for the end of the project: Add a paragraph to this new REST API Doc explaining how to easily import the (latest) Mifos Swagger into Postman, and perhaps add a Run in Postman button?

Someone suggested a potential alternative to using Swagger & SpringFox may be to instead use Spring REST Docs; if you feel that is better suite to fulfill the requirements above, please do feel free to explain this to your mentor and pursue in that direction.

Description
  • familiarize yourself with Swagger + SpringFox
  • create working v1 code demonstrating feasibility of approach
  • propose it to the community (mailing list), and react to feedback
  • don't loose any documentation that's already on the current (manual) REST API doc, maintain it's human readable comments (by moving that into JavaDoc/annotations in code which SpringFox/Swagger exploit), the "sections", etc.
Helpful SkillsJava, Spring Framework, REST, Git, Gradle
ImpactEasier to consume Mifos REST API for front-end/mobile etc. developers.
Other Resourcessee external links inline above
JIRA Task
MIFOSX-2699 - Getting issue details... STATUS

AngularJS Web App Enhancements

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Our AngularJS Web App is the standard application on the Mifos X distribution that provides all the core functionality for the most common methods of financial inclusion and products and services. It's also the starting point for any partners looking to customize or extend the UI. It's constantly being improved based on user feedback, better performance, and to integrate new design standards.

Description

In 2016, our Google Summer of Code intern refactor, re-designed, and re-skinned the Web App. This project would continue by making additional UI enhancements including:

  • Redesign the client, group, and center records
  • Redesign the loan and summary savings pages
  • Implement Wizard UI product and account creation
  • Implement UI for workflows & data table entity checks
  • Improve the collection sheet UI
  • Extend the notifications framework
  • Improve interface for role-based dashboards.


Helpful SkillsJavascript, CSS, HTML5. AngularJS and Bootstrap (CSS framework) is plus
ImpactEnhanced User Experience, Intuitive application design
Other ResourcesUsability and Design

Browser-Based Offline Access

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

For this project, we require an intern who is qualified and willing to work core HTML5 offline functionality. If we able to add offline support in community-app then we can have same application working on all browsers with offline support and need of a desktop app will not be needed.

Description

The project will involve the following. It will be a continuation of the 2016 Google Summer of Code project worked on by Mohit.

  • We can use IndexDB for storing data offline and once connected synchronize it, store actions that happened in same sequence and then fire against server.

  • We can store some data in JSONs as key-value pair and offer pre-sychronize which will fetch data as JSON for creating clients and other actions in offline mode.

  • Currently, HTML templates load from server everytime we refresh our application. As, discussed we should have some sort of template caching with expiry headers.

  • We can make some template made available offline using application cache.

  • With Template cache which is angular component. It looks for template in cache if not in the cache, it will load from server and then put in cache.

  • Mimic synchronization back and forth mimic how you store, how you date it out.
Helpful SkillsJavascript, CSS, HTML5. HTML5 Offline support knowledge i.e - Service workers, Sw-toolbox, IndexedDB wrappper - Dexie.js
ImpactOffline Functionality to Community App
Other ResourcesDetailed Information

Android Field Operations App Version 4

MentorsIshan Khanna
Overview & Objectives

We have released several versions of our Android app for field officers to go out in the field to process transactions, create clients, etc. Most recently in 2016, our Google Summer of Code intern refactored the entire application, implemented offline synchronization for clients and groups, and added improved functionalities for client onboarding, loan and savings collection, and GIS-based location tracking. All this work comprised Version 3.0 of the Android App

This project would continue that work and transform it into Version 4 - by extending offline synchronization and adding additional functionalities.


Extend our existing Android Field Operations App from Version 3 to Version 4 with

  • Implement collection sheet interface for bulk collection of savings, loan, and tracking of attendance
  • Extending offline support throughout additional areas of the application
  • Redesigning some of the navigation and workflows
  • Integrating the notifications framework
  • Integrating SMS communications
  • Enabling views for task list and reports
  • Improving the user interface for capture of surveys.
  • Improving data scoping and role-based permissioning
  • Unit and Integration Testing

This would all be on top of the corresponding APIs on the Mifos platform.

Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git
Impact

Allows staff to go directly into the field to connect to the client. Reduces cost of operations by enabling organizations to go paperless and be more efficient.

Other Resources

https://github.com/openMF/android-client

Architecture overview: 
Code style conventions guide:

 Self-Service - Android App Version 2.0 

Mentors

Satya Naryan, Ishan Khanna

Overview & Objectives

We have recently released a full set of client-facing APIs to enable self-service channels for clients to interact with their own data and transact in a self-service manner. Previously all Mifos operations were performed by back office staff. Now clients can authenticate themselves, view and edit their account details. and make repayments or transactions between their own accounts.

It is now possible for them to have direct banking apps that they can utilize including smartphone-based mobile banking, USSD-based mobile banking, and online banking via a web app.

Description

The initial application was developed by 2016 GSOC intern and then taken beyond its initial stages by Rajan Maurya. Detailed user stories and wireframes outlining implementing the following functionalities have been documented. Work will involve both development of the Android application as well as work on the back-end to extend the existing self-service RESTful APIs.

    • User Sign Up
    • User Details Feature 
    • Update User Details
    • Loan Make Payment
    • Savings Transactions Enhancement 
    • Charges (client, savings, loan) [This feature should be generic type, Student need to enhance the current feature and write a logic, so we will pass the only parameter in constructor that will work for all client, savings, loan]
    • Beneficiary for Third Party Transfer
    • Third Party Account Transfers
    • Update Loan Application
    • Withdraw Loan Application.
    • Unit and Integration test
    • Mobile wallet integration (API and mockups will be provided after student selection So please make your time line accordingly)
    • We want a student who can enhance the Material UI of current app and coming features too.

Integrate with the corresponding APIs on the Mifos platform.

Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest,
Impact

Allows a member/client in having a self-service channel allowing them more direct control and visibility into their financial livelihood.

Other Resources

User Stories - https://goo.gl/3xuUko

Wireframes - https://goo.gl/3xuUko

Customer Self Service APIs - https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/FINERACT/Customer+Self-Service

Source Code: https://github.com/openMF/self-service-app


 Self-Service - Web App Development 

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

We have released a full set of client-facing APIs to enable self-service channels for clients to interact with their own data and transact in a self-service manner. Previously all Mifos operations were performed by back office staff. Now clients can authenticate themselves, view and edit their account details. and make repayments or transactions between their own accounts.

It is now possible for them to have direct banking apps that they can utilize including smartphone-based mobile banking, USSD-based mobile banking, and online banking via a web app.

The focus of this project would be building out a clean and simple AngularJS application that can be used as a reference web app for financial institutions to directly deploy and offer to their customers or for our our support partners to customize and enhance to the local needs of their market.

There currently is a proof of concept architecture that can be used as a starting point along with detailed wireframes and user stories.


Description

Develop AngularJS Online Banking Interface:

  • Login
  • View Own Profile and Data Tabs
  • View Own Accounts (deposits and loans)
  • View Own Accounts' Transactions (deposits and loans)
  • Initiate Transfers from own account
  • Make Transfers to other accounts
  • Make Repayment to Loans
  • Fill up Questionnaires
Helpful SkillsAngularJS development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git
Impact

Allows a member/client in having a self-service channel allowing them more direct control and visibility into their financial livelihood.

Other Resources

Self Service APIs - https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/FINERACT/Customer+Self-Service

Source Code - https://github.com/openMF/web-self-service-app

Complete Details can be found here: Self Service Web Application

Accounting Module Enhancements

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Mifos X and the Apache Fineract platform already provide a range of sophisticated financial accounting needs, however for organizations that use it as both their core banking system and accounting system all in one, they continue to need other features. While Mifos X never intends to replace an ERP or accounting package, we do want to continue to add additional functionalities that provide the necessary integration with the portfolio and general accounting functionality to support a financial institution's core operations.

Several features have been requested by users and partners that we've grouped together as one task. Applicants should be familiar with the stack as well as the accounting and financial services domain.

Some of this work will include finalizing and incorporating existing pull requests and contributions that have been made by partners.

Description

These enhancements will all be built into the Apache Fineract platform as part of or enhancements on top of the existing accounting module which provides full configuration of the chart of accounts, support for cash and accrual accounting, automated integration with the portfolio accounts and financial mappings, and single and compound journal entries to the general ledger. New enhancements include:

  • Recurring Journal Entries (see spec below)
  • Bank Reconciliation
  • Fixed Asset Register
  • Improved End of Period Processing
Helpful SkillsHTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, Javascript, SQL
Impact

Better internal control and financial transparency

Other Resources

Collateral Management Module

Mentors

Maek Twain, Avik Ganguly

Overview & Objectives

As financial inclusion evolves, more loan products are collateral-based and require more detailed tracking of the asset (gold, property, etc.) along with its value, and its depreciation.

Some institutions also require tracking collateral as off-balance sheet items.

Description

We have a complete specification in place and need a team to build out a new module on top of the platform that tracks the additional collateral values. The work involved includes creation of new APIs and database tables to track additional parameters for the collateral, and to build out the UI screens for this module.

If the off-balance sheet collateral tracking is included, the work will also require extending the general ledger to support new types of accounts that are off-balance sheet.

Helpful SkillsHTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, SQL  
Impact

Clients and Small Businesses are able to take out higher value loans when they can offer up different forms of collateral. This is essential as MFIs move beyond just group loans and to individual lending.

Other Resources

Insurance Claims Module

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

A crucial part of financial inclusion is micro-insurance and the ability for clients to safely manage risk in their lives. Mifos X will not fully handle the entire lifecycle of an insurance product but it should integrate with microinsurance system and track the key parts of the process that relate to the core banking system - collection and pass through of the premium and tracking claims and processing of these.

Description

This project would involve building out a separate module that tracks claims being made by a client, likely leveraging the CRM functionality being build to track activities. It will integrate with APIs to enable processing of the claim and tracking what proceeds must be paid out to the client.

It will involve creating a new module with data model, UI screens and business logic that leverages Mifos X APIs

Tasks involved include:

  1. Implementing a flag at the client level to denote if a person is deceased - if deceased, all loans would go into different status where all income, interest, fees, etc should stop accruing.
  2. Utilize Data Tables to enable a user to initiate an insurance claim with details of the claim and corresponding updates to follow up on the claims process. Must limit this data table only to the clients with the corresponding flag so it's not displayed for all clients.
  3. Processing of Claims - the insurance claim can either go directly to the client or directly to the Financial Institution. If directly to the FI, the outstanding amonst should be offset by the claim - it could be automatically applied using a new different payment of insurance claim. Corresponding accounting entries need to get passed as well.
    1. If there is money to be refunded to customer, they must have a savings account as can''t like journal entry to customer directly.
  4. Closing of Account - once claim has been processed and outstanding balance settled, should implement a different status such as Closed - Deceased or Closed - Via Insurance Claim
Helpful SkillsHTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, SQL  
Impact

Clients are able to lower their risk and have a much larger safety net when they have affordable access to insurance policies.

Other Resources

See http://www.openunderwriter.com/

See Insurance Product

Configuration Wizard

Mentors
Overview & Objectives


A critical barrier to greater scale and reach of the Mifos X software is the time to deploy and ease of onboarding new financial institutions Spinning up a new instance and tenant of Mifos X in the Cloud is rather trivial but Mifos X is a core banking system and a user struggles to independently get the system up and running in spite of having access to documentation or local support.

  • Provide a self-guided configuration wizard to help financial institutions more quickly and more independently set up and configure the Mifos X system for the first time. 
  • Ideal goal is to allow a financial institution to fully configure Mifos without any manual intervention or support from an individual - from signing up for the cloud to moving into production, they should be able to do everything on their own. 





Description

This project would involve building into the Mifos X Web App a self-guided configuration wizard.

Upon initial log-in, user will be prompted with a wizard as part of the Community App that will walk them through the first stages of configuring Mifos. The wizard which is optional and can declined, should provide the user the necessary prompts to guide them through the administrative setup of their organization and hierarchical structure, configuration of staff and roles and permissions, configuration of financial accounting, creation and configuration of loan and savings products, configuration of reporting and initial data entry. 


  • Wizard should provide both overlays on the screen as well as advance user to specific areas of the application. 
  • Wizard should refer to and reference documentation and video tutorials as much as possible.
  • Wizard should follow steps outlined in the Initial System Setup and Pre-Configuration Plan


Helpful SkillsHTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, Javascript, SQL  
Impact

Financial institutions can more easily adopt the software and increase the scale of our social mission.

Other Resources

See


Extend Surveys & SPM Framework

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Financial Inclusion providers need a comprehensive view into the overall livelihood of their client both for better risk analysis, credit scoring, as well as social performance management.

Description

We have the back-end in place for a surveys/social performance management framework that allows the import of XMLs for the PPI (progress out of poverty index) SPM scorecard. We need to implement a front-end UI for viewing and recording PPI surveys as well as a UI in which to create new surveys from scratch (similar to Question Groups in an older version of software).


1) Build out the UI for creating survey from available PPI scorecard
2) Capture/record surveys from a given entity in the web app
3) View recorded surveys from the web ap
4) Interface to create new surveys from scratch via the UI

See Resources below for specs/wireframes.

Helpful SkillsHTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, SQL  
Impact

Ability to measure social impact and have one single point of information on a client within the platform.

Other Resources

Extend Mifos Data Import Tool

Mentors

 Nayan Ambali, Kyriakos Patsias

Overview & Objectives

Data migration can be one of the most challenging and time-consuming phases of an implementation of a core banking system. In 2013, GSOC intern, Avik Ganguly, built our data import tool for generating pre-configured Excel templates to migrate data into Mifos X. In 2014, Diunuge, extended this to other types of information in Mifos X along with integrating it from a stand-alone web app to a core part of the platform. The data import tool is now the foundation for all of our data migration tools.

It has become a critical part of independent and partner-led deployments

This project would continue to extend the data import tool with the following enhancements:

  • Integration into the Platform: Current implementation is stand-alone and user has to install separately from Fineract - has to be deployed, user downloads templates, adds data, uses remote call against Fineract REST API
  • Templates at Office/Staff Level: Currently all download templates try to fetch data for entire organization which becomes problematic when you have larger oganizations (10 branches/10000customers) - templates should be specific to office or given staff
  • Extend functional coverage of data import tool - Data import tool didn't cover all functionalities - want to upload bulk chart of accounts, data tables, etc.o new types of data and APIs that need to be imported, enabling office-level import, and continued integration into the platform.
  • Batch APIs - instead of single thread, make use of executing services and start configured thread - if hundred objects are created - JDBC template - batch APIs- some entities.
Description
  • Import for other types of data not currently supported
  • Integrate into platform
  • Populate date using bulk APIs
  • Enable office-level imports for larger organizations who find it too cumbersome to migrate an entire organizations worth of data at once

Helpful SkillsJava (Spring/JPA/Jersey), SQL , JavaScript , Git, Apache POI
Impact

It has many impacts

  1. This drastically reduces the time to set up of initial configuration/data of Mifos X for organization adopting this system as MIS.
  2. For data entry operator, this feature can be used as bulk creation option (such as import bulk loans, import clients)
  3. These templates can be used as offline store. And once user has internet connectivity can upload these templates with captured data.
Other Resources

2016 Design for Integration of Data Import Tool - https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/FINERACT/Bulkdata+Import

GSOC 2013 - Data Import Tool

GSoC 2014 - Data Import/Export feature

Scalability & Performance Enhancements for Supporting Millions of Clients


Mentors
Overview & Objectives

As Mifos X has matured as a core banking platform, it's been adopted and used by larger institutions serving hundreds of thousands and even millions of clients. Partners operating cloud-hosted subscription models are also supporting hundreds of thousands of clients across their multi-tenant installations. We need to benchmark, analyze and improve the performance and scalability of the system.

Description


Enhancements to the back-end platform will include parallelization of all the jobs with a configurable amount of concurrency, look at the explain plans of the queries being used in the jobs, paginate input queries for jobs, put lazy fetching where required, node-aware scheduler and cache, office-wise configurable jobs to distribute job-load across servers and write some tests to prove that the concurrency will work for a decent amount of scale.

In addition, you'll provide some metrics which can help mid-sized MFIs (those having around a million active loans) in adopting Mifos X.


Helpful SkillsJava, Javascript, Spring, JAX-RS, JPA,
ImpactHigher outreach to the unbanked by supporting larger institutions and scaling more rapidly.
Other Resources


Static Analysis of Apache Fineract

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

As our product is core banking platform and our clients are financial institutions, we strive hard to make our code base as secure as possible. However, due to ever increasing security threats and vulnerabilities, it is the need of hour that we analyse our code base in depth for security vulnerabilities. During pull request merge process, we have a process in place wherein we do peer code review,QA and integration tests. This practice has been very effective and our community is already reaping the benefits of such a strong code review process. However, we should test our code against the standard vulnerabilities which have been identified by reputed organisations like Mitre to gain more confidence.It has become a critical part of independent and partner-led deployments

Description

We can make use of opensource tools like JlintFindbugs , SonarQube or frameworks like  Total output Integration Framework (TOIF) - used by companies dedicated to produce military grade secure systems. 

It would be worthwhile, if we can dedicate one GSOC project for this analysis. The student would be responsible to analyse the findings, generate reports, identify if it is really a bug and then submit a fix after consultation from the community. Of course, the student needs to demonstrate some basic understanding of security vulnerabilities( like buffer overflow etc) and should have some academic level of experience working with static analysis tools.


Helpful SkillsJava (Spring/JPA/Jersey), SQL , JavaScript , Git, Apache POI
Impact

Improved security keeping the integrity and privacy of the underbank's financial data intact.

Other ResourcesStatic Analysis of Apache Fineract Project- A GSOC project idea

Front Desk Service Module / Experience Module

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Before booking a loan, the customer needs to require and assess the details of the loan he is enquiring for and there is no way to personally judge it, based on the parameters, Sales staff right now is using different external loan calculator and loan product schemes are not documented. We need a frontend experience service with personalized match to loan products.

DescriptionThe staff or customer should be able to enter their requirements before applying for a loan, like Loan amount, what kind of loan product he is interested in, and based on a questionnaire or a survey he should be presented a view where loan products are personally matched based on recommendation engine.After setting basic loan parameters, customer should be able to get a quote and then will be transferred to CRM given by Ankit Sharma
Helpful SkillsANDROID UI, Integrating Backend Service, MIFOS X
ImpactStreamlined sales, Staff and Customer Better Interaction
Other Resources

https://docs.google.com/document/d/18rS0gVWkjQvNdRnNj40uKNl32zuTh-uuzNv161n6YrY/edit?usp=sharing

Integrating FINOCIAL.AI / Machine Learning Build Model and Predict  Module

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

In the current version of the MIFOS X/Apache Fineract there is no way where we can infuse the product to machine learning straight to the Algorithms and then start predicting around certain entities and models or domains with integration of finocial.ai we can now do that by including a lib which will send data to the existing cluster running a finocial.ai and letting the partners/FI to decide what kind of learning tool they want to use and generate a POJO or MODEL and thus start predicting using that MODEL

Description

Major use cases are predicting BAD Loans Or GOOD Loans, Predicting Fraud ,RISK and many other predictions which FI wants to do on certain Domain, Logic where FI can utilise to understand customer in a better way.

FINOCIAL.AI Provides better way Personal profile data, spending history, social media data, transaction data, asset information and demographic data can provide a much more holistic view of a prospective client, instead of past credit scores. In this age of data abundance, the financial services industry can take advantage of new data sources when approaching a decision to approve a purchase or a credit card application, stop a withdrawal or recommend new financial products.

Helpful SkillsJAVA, Integrating Backend Service, MIFOS X, Apache Fineract, FINOCIAL.AI
ImpactStreamlined Operations, Better RISK Management, Automated Response Mechanism
Other Resources
http://portal.finocial.org

Integrating FINOCIAL.CHAIN / Private Blockchain to Enable FI to Perform DIGITAL 3.0 Transactions with Everyone

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Finocial.Chain is a private Open Source blockchain platforms for FI/MFI and Everyone which will enable customers and FI to transact directly without a network dependency.

It allows any FI to securitise customer data and perform different kind of transactions in different Entities of MIFOS X such as Smart Contracts, Managing Digital Identity and Running their own economy of Currency

Description

Remittances

Micropayments

Mobile Money

Services for the Underbanked

Digital Assets

Finocial Contracts


Helpful SkillsJAVA, Integrating Backend Service, MIFOS X, Apache Fineract, FINOCIAL.CHAIN API
ImpactCustomisable Payments and Transaction Level Infra
Other Resources
http://portal.finocial.org

 Integration of Egalite Agent Banking App 

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Agent Banking has become a key new delivery channel to increase reach, lower cost, and broaden the depth of services available. We will be taking over the Egalite codebase that's being donated to the Mifos Initiative by BFSI Consulting - it's a fully functional Android-based app for agents that works with any core banking system. This project would involved extending the application so it fully integrates with and works on top of the Mifos X platform

Description

The current codebase is stand-alone and can integrate with any core banking system. This project will involve converting it to work on top of Mifos X by leveraging the Mifos X APIs for all functionalities that exist in Mifos X and adding in APIs for the functionalities that aren't present in Mifos X but in Egalite. The project will consist of the following:


1) Integrate the existing web service into Mifos X
2) Extend the webservice to use Mifos related data
3) Modernize the front end by using Material design
Helpful SkillsAndroid, REST, Java
Impact

By enabling branchless banking, the costs of serving the poor are dramatically lowered, outreach can be extended to rural offerings, and brand new products and services that are more relevant can be delivered.

Other Resources

 Self-Service - USSD App Development

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

This has a dependency on the Self-Service backend API's being available 

Description

Develop USSD App that allows clients to:

  • Login
  • View Own Accounts (deposits and loans)
  • View Own Accounts' Transactions (deposits and loans)
  • Initiate Transactions from own account (repayments, deposits, transfers)

1. Loans

  • Apply loans
  • Check loan balances
  • View summary of last few transactions

2. Savings

  • Check balance
  • Withdraw (To mobile money
  • Transfer

3. Other Services on the USSD menu

  • Can add the service that is useful to the mifos users/customers


Helpful SkillsUSSD, Java, SQL, Finite State Machine (FSM)
Impact

Allows a member/client in having a self-service channel allowing them more direct control and visibility into their financial livelihood. Enable members of the society on-demand access to their.financial records even with basic mobile handset

Other Resourceshttp://mycloudcode.com/category/ussd/

 Mobile Money Integration Phase 2 - East Africa 

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Mobile money is rapidly transforming financial inclusion by providing more immediate, impactful, affordable, and secure financial services to the client. Mobile money platforms like M-Pesa offer the client unparalleled value in terms of convenience, security and the possibility of new services and products that are more in line with real-world financial habits.  For financial institutions and their clients to fully scale mobile money and leverage its potential, it needs to be fully integrated with their core-banking system.

Description

In 2016, GSOC intern Daniel Carlson, built out an initial mobile money integration module which supports capturing in real-time the transactions that occur in the mobile money system via the APIs along with a web interface for initiating transactions to occur via mobile money.

This project would work extend upon this module to continue genericizing it to support the mobile money APis of other countries and to complete the integrations for mobile money systems or aggregators in East Africa from countries such as Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda s M-Pesa, TigoCash, MTN Money, AirtelMoney, Beyonic, etc.

Helpful SkillsWeb Services, Java, SQL , JavaScript , Git
Impact

Great efficiency, reduced risk for clients, more impactful and relevant products & services.

Other Resources

Mobile Money Integration - West and Central Africa 

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Mobile money is rapidly transforming financial inclusion by providing more immediate, impactful, affordable, and secure financial services to the client. Mobile money platforms like Orange Money and MTN Mobile Money offer the client unparalleled value in terms of convenience, security and the possibility of new services and products that are more in line with real-world financial habits.  For financial institutions and their clients to fully scale mobile money and leverage its potential, it needs to be fully integrated with their core-banking system.

Hence integrating Mobile money and Orange money to Mifos X in Central and West Africa will give the MFI an edge over their competitors and assist the client to carry out secured distance transactions. The end product of this project should allow a client to save from his mobile money account to his MifosX account, request or withdraw money from his Mifos X account to his mobile money account using probably a small mobile application to carry out these transactions. The Client self service API will be used in its fullness to accomplish this Tasks. Other APIs could be developed and used if the present Client self service API are not able to this these.

Description

In 2016, GSOC intern Daniel Carlson, built out an initial mobile money integration module which supports capturing in real-time the transactions that occur in the mobile money system via the APIs along with a web interface for initiating transactions to occur via mobile money.

This project would work extend upon this module to continue genericizing it to support the mobile money APis of other countries and to complete the integrations for mobile money systems or aggregators in West and Central Africa from countries such as Cameroon, Ghana, Nigeria, Gambia, and Sierra Leone.


Helpful SkillsWeb Services, Java, SQL , JavaScript , Git
Impact

Great efficiency, reduced risk for clients, more impactful and relevant products & services.

Other Resources


Client Impact Portal Phase 2

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Microfinance institutions usually work with various external parties, such as funders or investors. Using the data that is available in MifosX we would like to offer those stakeholders a seperate portal showing accurate and high-level information about the institution that would otherwise be reported manually by the institution. This information helps them in their decision making processes, but also enables them to assess the broader impact they are having with their funding.

Description

To develop a portal that aggregates information from different Mifos X deployments and report on predefined social and operational metrics

Objectives:

  • Implement back-end logic in MifosX required to make information available to the client impact portal
  • Implement UI and back-end logic of the Client impact portal
Helpful Skills SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Web Services, Scripting (Bash/Perl/Ruby), Regexes & Parsing
ImpactFunders and investors are vital for almost all MFI's, providing them with accurate information on the impact they are making with each of their MFI's is something they highly value and that enables them to assess whether they want to further support the MFI's moving forward to enable growth of the MFI.
Other Resources

2014 GSOC Client Impact Portal Project

Vision for Generic SPM Framework for Mifos X (PPI)

Background on Client Impact Portal

Credit Bureau Integration Phase 2 

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Because of regulatory reasons or to do background check of a client (risk management), MFIs depend on credit bureaus. As part of it, MFI must submit client details to credit bureau and also need to pull client information from credit bureau before approving any new loans to a client.Mifos X can be integrated with a popular CBs in India and from other regions (based on the demand).

Description

During the 2016 Google Summer of Code, Nikhil Pawar, completed the credit bureau integration module with integrations for the major credit bureaus in India. This project will continue extending the functionality of the module and work on integrations with the major credit bureaus in Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa.

The major functionality will be sending the data to CBs on regular intervals in the format CB expects. And option to pull the client’s information from CB whenever loan officer/branch manager/ user wants to view the information for a particular client.

Helpful Skills SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Web Services, Big Data (Hadoop, Hive)
Impact

The credit report shows account information such as repayment record, defaults, type of loan, amount of loan, etc. of the customer. This information facilitates prudent decision-making when the credit underwriter processes the loan application. This help MFI to reduce the risk of bad loans and reduces the multiple lendings to same person from different MFIs.

Other Resources

Detailed requirements https://goo.gl/aZWMZa

Mifos Credit bureau Integration. (Risk calibration Module -RCM)

Source Code: https://github.com/apache/incubator-fineract/pull/215

ETL-Based Data Migration Tool for Loan Performer to Mifos X

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Data migration can be one of the most challenging and time-consuming phases of an implementation of a core banking system. It's often a barrier to financial institutions moving on to new and better more modern systems. It's critical to cleanly migrate over the historical data of a client and their transactions. Often the legacy system data needs to be cleaned up and transformed before it can be migrated into Mifos X and is one of the most costly and time-consuming phases of a deployment. We have an existing data migration tool for migrating from Mifos 2 to Mifos X that utilizes the Pentaho Kettle ETL tool.

This project would extend the existing Mifos 2 to Mifos X Kettle-based migration tool to provide a standard migration tool from Loan Performer - a low-cost, widely adopted system in use by hundreds of microfinance institutions throughout Africa and Latin America. It would provide one standard tool that any partner or financial institution could use for migrating from that specific system - it wouldn't require new tools to be made each time a migration is done.


Description

Extend the existing Kettle-based Mifos to Mifos X migration tool

  • Write ETL scripts to get data and transform data it from Mambu format to Mifos format
Helpful SkillsJava (Spring/JPA/Jersey), SQL , JavaScript , Git, Pentaho, Kettle,
Impact

It has many impacts

  1. This drastically reduces the time to set up of initial configuration/data of Mifos X for organization adopting this system as MIS.
  2. It widely opens the market that Mifos X is applicable for as it lessens the burden of converting from Loan Performer - a system that is widely used but not as modern and sophisticated as Mifos X.
  3. It dramatically lowers the cost of implementing a system like Mifos X by reducing the complexity of the deployment
  4. It increases transparency by ensuring financial institutions using Mifos can retain the full history for their clients.
Other Resources

http://nayan.github.io/move-to-mifosx/

https://github.com/openMF/move-to-mifosx

Actionable notifications/alerts/status updates in Mifos X (Update)

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

For better usability system needs to have notifications to the logged in user about actions he/she needs to perform in the application.

Description

Build near-real time notification system in the web application to notify the user about action she needs to take. For example, if a branch manager is logged in the application and a new loan is created and is pending for approval by her, then the system should notify her about the pending action.

This involves both invoking and triggering these notifications based on actions or activities in the server as well as the extension of the user interface to support the display of the notifications along with the ability of the user to take action upon the notifications.

Notes on the proposed approach to invoking and triggering these notification can be found at: https://goo.gl/SD0HgC

It outlines:

  1. Piggybacking on response header to send notifications
  2. Create a new set of database tables for notifications
  3. Implementing Queuing system like SpringXD for Notifications
Helpful SkillsJava, Javascript, CSS, HTML5. Spring , Hibernate, AngularJS and Bootstrap (CSS framework) is a plus
ImpactBetter usability. Improve the productivity of users and actions will be taken on time.
Other ResourcesUsability and Design

Two-Factor Authentication

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

The Mifos X platform is a cloud-based core banking system for delivering financial services to the poor. We provide a web and mobile interface, our AngularJS Web App and Android Field Officer App for the staff of a financial institution to manage their portfolio and service their clients. The security of their client’s financial data is paramount so we would like to add 2FA as another additional layer of security to the platform when staff are logging in via these apps. The most commons means of accessing Mifos X is via the Community App but we have a need for 2FA for the Android client as well.

The generation and sending of the verification code/one-time password will primarily be via SMS and/or email since that is the most user-friendly and most accessible given the equipment available to staff using Mifos X. However, we should aim to support configurability of other authentication methods via an app or virtual authentication device to generate the verification codes.

Description
  1. Stabilize the existing SMS integration in Mifos X

  2. Generate and store Verification Code/One-Time-Password (OTP) at Mifos

  3. Verification of OTP by Mifos X System

  4. Sending of OTP via SMS and/or Email

  5. Configuration of 2FA by System Administrator

  6. Input of the OTP

  7. OTP Verification and Expiration

    1. Configurability of Length of OTP

      1. Default should be six digits

    2. Configurability of Validity Period of OTP: How long the OTP will stay valid before it expires must be developed

      1. Default of 5 minutes (300 seconds)

    3. Configurability of Length of Remember Me Period: We will we allow an option for recognized devices to be remembered (not requiring 2FA if for a defined period of time)

      1. Default of 15 days

Helpful SkillsJava, Javascript, Spring, JAX-RS, JPA, AngularJS, Android
ImpactIncreased Security
Other Resources

Spec & Workflow - https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=67641984


Basic CRM Functionality - Inquiries/Complaints Module

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Right now Mifos X contains core client management functionalities including tracking basic demographic information, know your customer information, document management, and survey collection through data tables. As financial institutions, serving the poor begin to offer a more in-depth and diverse range of financial inclusion products, the need for more robust client management and in-depth client understanding has grown. Their core system needs to provide more and more CRM-type functionality that compliment the portfolio management and financial/social reporting that the Mifos X provides.

This project will work to deliver the initial set of customer relationship management functionalities including a module for tracking inquiries, complaints

Description

This module will have a request management functionality. A request can be of 2 types: Complaints and Service Requests. Each request must be against a customer and optionally against an account of the customer. Each request will go through a simple workflow.

Actions that can be performed on a request:

Assign -> will change status to "assigned"

Start Work --> will change status to "in progress"

Close --> will change status to "closed" (with a sub-reason code)

At each step user can enter comments.

The customer summary screen will have a link to view the requests of the customer - along with a summary and current status - with options to click-through to get the complete history of each request.

Helpful Skillsfamiliarity with Mifos X tech architecture, angular js,node js, java,Spring, backend integration
Impact

Deepening the client relationship and ensuring fair, responsible, and transparent financial services to the poor is a core piece of the industry's roadmap for financial inclusion. Providing customers the ability to voice their concerns and feedback about the services they're receiving provides a simple yet powerful tool to protect the client. Empowering the financial institution with the ability to track these inquiries and overall maintain a more holistic relationship tracking entire lifecycle of their clients gives them a much better ability to understand their clients and respond to their needs with appropriately designed services and products.

Other Resources 

JPOS Integration - Point of Sale Cash Out

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Integrate MifosX with an opensource Point of Sale (POS) called JPOS.

Description

Use case would be to get a debit transaction (cash withdraw from checking account) thru the POS device /local runtime with 2FA.  In India, the ability to get cash out through a point of sale network is provided for under RBI regulations. In production there will likely need to be an intermediate "Merchant Acquisition" or "Payment Processor" in between a single POS and MifosX Instance, but this could be abstracted out as a payment gateway only (primarily data mapping). The implementation target is the ability to do a 2 factor authentication on a POS device running JPOS (emulator ok), input account number (via some simple method), then be able to do a (cash-out) account withdrawal in real time to the MifosX account. Additional use cases would be to implement a transaction for payment for goods. i.e. enter specific goods, then do payment from MifosX account to Merchant Account (probably also in Mifos).

Helpful Skills

Familiarity with API work. Understanding of transactional flows.

Java.

Two-factor authentication - see other project idea .


Impact
Other Resources

https://github.com/jpos/jPOS/

Security Penetration testing

MentorsMark Reynolds
Overview & Objectives

We believe the Mifos X platform is super secure and impenetrable. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to prove us wrong, and help close gaps you may find.

Description

Beyond a one time exercise, you should integrate (some of) the tools you've used into our build chain so that, even after you've gone, tools flag up future newly introduced potential vulnerabilities.

Helpful SkillsCandidates applying for this project would ideally have prior experience in penetration testing, and document this in their application.
ImpactRe-assuring the more Entreprise-y type Mifos clients that they can safely bet on Mifos X as an MFI platform.
Other Resources

https://www.owasp.org/index.php/Main_Page

https://code.google.com/p/zaproxy/

http://wapiti.sourceforge.net

Run FindBugs & related tools for some serious static code analysis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penetration_test

Mifos ID/Profile - Single Sign On for Community Infrastructure

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

This project would seek to create one unified ID/login and profile for community members similar to the OpenMRS ID. It would achieve the following two primary objectives:

  1. One unified profile and identity for community members in which they can share with the community who they are and also build reputation and recognition. This ability to discover and self-identify with other community members is difficult when we have so many different tools and profiles to maintain.
  2. Single Sign On for our various collaboration and community infrastructure tools listed below.


Description
  1. Identifying a single sign-on authentication protocol that ties together authentication of our various community collaboration tools: 1) Atlassian Studio - JIRA, Confluence, JIRA Agile, 2) Social Q&A - AnswerHub 3) Mailing Lists - Mailman (administered through SourceForge 4) Source Code Version Control - GitHub 5) Continuous Integration - Jenkins 6) General Community Website (mifos.org) - Wordpress 7) Partner Directory
    1. This could be built out independently, tie into some OpenID protocol, or leverage one of our existing tools for this authentication - Atlassian Studio/Crowd or AnswerHub or another common OpenID protocol. 
  2. Design and implement a dashboard to handle the creation of this unified ID
  3. Design and create a common profile tied to this ID with basic information and photos that is searchable by the community.

Design a profile

Extra Credit:

Helpful SkillsLDAP
Impact

Impact is two-fold:

  • Common unified profile and identity can help to grow collaboration and participation in the community. By being able to simply share who you are or discover who's in your community, we can deepen the bonds of community which motivates each member to participate more often and invest personally in the health of the community. Building reputation and recognizing efforts of each type of community member (users, partners, volunteers, etc) in a tangible way also helps to increase participation.
  • Single sign-on will it make much easier for community members to collaborate and communicate. Right now there is often a high barrier to signing up for the various tools - SSO will make that process easier but also encourage others to more regularly be involved.
Other Resources

Scalable Mifos X deployment on OpenShift: Automated Continuous Delivery, Scripts, Documentation (UPDATE)

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Create a POC of a scalable MifosX implementation on OpenShift. Also publish a whitepaper with details of this set up.

Description

Mifos X was built to be cloud ready from the ground up. One of the most popular deployment environments for MifosX has been on Amazon EC2, however due to country specific regulation, many implementors are forced to seek alternative models that can scale as effectively. The aim of this project is two-fold:

  • Propose a scalable deployment model for Mifos on the OpenShift PaaS. Your application should highlight a starting point with some details of your planned deployment architecture, as Mentors would be not giving you step-by-step instructions in this project, just "nudge" you along; you would be expected to learn about how to deploy Mifos yourself and by autonomously using the documentation available and help from the public mailing list and IRC channel, and figure out the details of the Cloud deployment.

  • Propose how the above proposed model could be contributed to Mifos in the form of e.g. ready-to-run "configurations" etc. allowing ANYONE to deploy THE LATEST VERSION of Mifos in the Cloud themselves, and then implement this approach in practice. (Contrast this with a "one-off exercise", e.g. taking the current Mifos X WAR file, and UI, and manually making some changes to it, and then manually deploying that to some Cloud PaaS - this would not be sufficient for this project's expectations.)

  • Implement a Continuous Deployment "Devops" EXAMPLE instance of this scalable blueprint using the latest nightly Mifos build artifacts.

  • Publish a high level whitepaper of the same, which can be used as a reference for local implementors, who would additionally take care of provisioning their own hardware. This documentation should be ideally high-level, and what it described much be automated; only providing lengthy step-by-step manual instructions would not be sufficient for this project's expectations.

To prepare for this project, applying students must demonstrate at least that they have already successfully locally built and ran a Mifos X REST back-end server and UI, populated the database etc. as well as provided a simple pull request proposing some minimal deployment related improvement.

Note that we now believe that a Platform as a Service (PaaS) is a more suitable foundation for this project than a raw Cloud Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) platform (such as Openstack, offered by public cloud provider such as e.g. Rackspace; or Azure, or raw Amazon EC2). This is because a PaaS, such OpenShift, already come with relevant features such as built-in, managed, supported and monitored HTTP load balancing (e.g. OpenShift comes with HAProxy).

We are aware that OpenShift out-of-the-box currently does not provide supported clustering for the MariaDB/mysql database used by Mifos (there is documentation for un-supported example based on an OpenShift template and suggested descriptions on blog posts, or also this one based on Severalnines.com; similarly one could deploy the commercial Percona XtraDB Cluster product ). However at this point we believe that this would not be required, and that proper configuration on OpenStack of the already existing cache facility (incl. distributed cache invalidation) available in Mifos X will add more value at signficantly less operational complexity.

You may need to develop some minor "adjustments" for Mifos X to work well in a PaaS. For example, writeable directories may be limited, and configuration changes may be needed to pick up allowed data directories from an environment variable configuration (but consider multi node distribution in this cluster setup!). Also a cloud PaaS like OpenShift may not support "always running" instances, and scheduled jobs may have to be configured to be kicked off via an explicit HTTP "wake up" request from a cron job.

While OpenShift should already take care of automatic distribution of Mifos code (WAR) updates among nodes in the cluster, you may also have to consider distributed configuration in a cluster. Normally all Mifos X configuration should reside 100% fully in the database only, and as such this may be a non-issue. If however there are any customized configuration files, then perhaps something like the Spring Cloud project could be of interest to ease distributed configuration management.

We are aware of other PaaS product similar to OpenShift, such as notably Cloud Foundry, or even Heroku (closed source..) but would suggest to use OpenShift.

Helpful SkillsContinous Integration, UNIX, OpenStack, experience with any public cloud (AWS etc) and Percona Server is a plus, plus some minor Java coding required to adapt Mifos code to be able to pick up the database configuration from the OpenStack provided environment variable (and possibly automated Cache configuration tuning on OpenStack).
ImpactImproves deployment options for Mifos. Would be very helpful for specialists in African countries who deal with strict regulatory controls in hosting data outside their region
Other Resources

OpenShift https://www.openshift.com

Old Mifos mailing list posts related to related things, search e.g. "mifos google app engine", and find as this one as well as this one.

Mifos X on "Enterprise Stack" - IBM WebSphere and Oracle WebLogic tests & documentation (UPDATE)

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Mifos X today is typically used on Tomcat (with Jetty known to work). For a certain class of users, testing it on "Enterprise Stack" application servers (meaning IBM WebSphere and Oracle WebLogic) is desirable - this project would properly test Mifos X on these configurations, make any adaptations to the code which may be required, and produce easy to follow documentation or even small tools helping future users how to go about this.

Description

This project could be combined with and taken up by the same candidate as the Enterprise database project.

Helpful Skills

Java, Application Server configuration, WAS classloading crap tricks, documentation writing.

Use Cargo, Arquillian etc. for automated testing against WAS & WLS containers?

ImpactEnable Mifos X to be considered by users wanting it to run (only) on an Enterprise stack


Other Resources

Vendor pages


Ad Hoc Reporting Module/Business Analytics (OLAP)

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

Develop ETL scripts to create OLAP cubes (fact and dimension tables in MySQL). This will allow managers to perform ad hoc slicing and dicing of their data 
to answer important questions about their operations.

  • Create ETL scripts and tests
  • Create a Mondrian schema to work with Saiku Analytics

This project would extend off of the work of a previous GSOC intern in building out integration with Saiku

Description


Helpful SkillsDatabase Management Systems, MDX, SQL,
ImpactData drives a microfinance institution - the more powerful and robust analytical tools management has, the better they can tailor their services and outreach to impact the poor most effectively.
Other Resources

Saiku Analytics Demo - demo.analytical-labs.com
Wikipedia OLAP Article - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olap
Introduction to OLAP - http://www.db-class.org/course/video/preview_list
Gentle Introduction to MDX - http://www.iccube.com/support/documentation/mdx_tutorial/gentle_introduction.html

MIFOSX-1448 - Getting issue details... STATUS

Custom Fantastic Mifos Project

Is there something missing from this ideas list that you want to do? Let us know! Send your project proposal(s) to the developer mailing list.


Timeline

Official GSoC 2016 timeline

See also