Google Summer of Code 2021 Ideas

Mifos Initiative not accepted for 2021 GSOC

The Mifos Initiative was unfortunately not selected as a mentoring organization for the 2021 Google Summer of Code as Google aims to accept at least 30 new organizations each year and we didn't make the final list with more than 400 organizations applying. We hope to mentor projects related to Apache Fineract, Fineract CN and Fineract CN mobile under the umbrella organization of Apache Software Foundation. Please stay tuned for our ideas on that list at https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/COMDEV/GSoC+2021+Ideas+list. We look forward to applying for GSOC in 2022.

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



2021 Google Summer of Code - Get to Know Mifos

We're looking forward to participating in Google Summer of Code for our tenth year. In 2020, we worked with 17 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 2021 will have the option to work on a variety of projects related to our end to end open source stack for digital financial services including open source core banking, real-time payments integration with Mojaloop, digitizing government to person payments, mobile money and Open Banking APIs, and our suite of cutting edge and web and mobile apps. Participating interns will get to work on our brand new front-end Mifos X web app built on Angular, our suite of mobile apps including field officer apps and mobile banking apps for Fineract and Fineract CN, our mobile wallet and integrations with the GSMA mobile money API and Open Banking API.  We will once again have projects related to our new Payment Hub EE which provides a bridge and connection to real-time payment systems like Mojaloop and for the first time be working with students on OpenG2P, the initiative we've helped to launch to digitize large scale government cash transfer programs. You'll also have the opportunity to build new tools like chatbots and machine learning-based scorecards on the platform.

In addition, we'll be working with students on both our Apache Fineract 1.x platform for financial inclusion and our cloud-native Apache Fineract CN application framework for digital financial services. 

The best way to understand what we do is to watch a few videos. 

What is Mifos and What Does our Community Do?

|

Why Does Google Summer of Code matter so much to Mifos and what do we look for in students?

How is the Mifos software used? 

  

2021 GSOC Mentors

In Progress

The list of mentors for 2021 is currently being finalized. 


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

MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileAfghanistanIST (GMT+4:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
Fineract CNCameroonWAT (GMT +1:00)
PlatformIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
PlatformIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
PlatformMexicoCST (GMT -6:00)
Raul SibijaPlatformMexicoCST (GMT -6:00)
Karina OrtizPlatformMexicoCST (GMT -6:00)
Gustavo EspindolaMobileMexicoCST (GMT -6:00)
PlatformIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
PlatformUSACST (GMT -6:00)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
PlatformIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
MobileIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
WebIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
PlatformSerbiaCET (GMT +1:00)
PlatformindiaIST (GMT +5:30)
PlatformIndiaIST (GMT +5:30)
Fineract CNCameroonWAT (GMT + 1:00)
WebIndia IST(+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 

  • Be a quick learner
  • Be well-behaved, act in good faith and be of good humour.
  • 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):

  • Java, Spring, MySQL, Jersey & Hibernate
  • HTML, CSS, JavaScript (JQuery), Angular & Material Design
  • JUnit, REST-assured

Source Code

Mobile App Overview: https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Apache Fineract CN (Gen 3)
Mifos X and Apache Fineract 1.0 (Gen 2)

Hints

  • When you need help, ask for help after exploring all options on the web. We are very excited for you to join us, but we need to know that you're willing to put in the time and effort required to do your part. When you do ask, ask well.
  • Tips for a Good Application from former GSOC intern and Mentor, Ishan Khanna: https://hackernoon.com/7-things-you-need-to-know-to-ace-your-gsoc-proposal-8e422f2b6abe
  • Not sure if you are qualified? Download and build the code, then run the Platform and the Mifos X distribution.
  • Email the mifos-developer mailing list with your questions and project ideas.
  • Install Skype for (generally infrequent) video calls. You'll need a headset for Skype, too.
  • Get started by solving few issues on Fineract here or for the web app here.


Project Ideas

In Progress

Our 2021 Ideas lists is currently being refined. Stay tuned for additional updates. 

All 2020 projects will be related to the Mifos X Web App, our mobile apps including our Android Field Operations app, our Mobile Banking app, or our Mobile Wallet App or our Online Banking App. There will also be projects focused on our payment hub and integrations with open source real-time payments platform - Mojaloop and integrations with the GSMA mobile money API and our Open Banking API. Some projects will also center directly around the Apache Fineract platform for financial inclusion and additional tools, features, or modules on that and our brand-new Apache Fineract CN application framework for digital financial services as well as the mobile apps connecting to Fineract CN.  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. 

Functional Enhancements to Mobile Wallet

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Mifos X 
Overview & Objectives

We provide a reference mobile wallet application for consumers and merchants that has been developed by our Google Summer of Code interns from 2017 to 2020. The mobile wallet provides an extensible mobile wallet framework to support the basic use cases of a mobile wallet as documented in the Level One Project mobile wallet requirements. This extensible framework should support both merchant and client use cases as well as be capable of integrating with a Fineract or Fineract CN back-end.

Over time, we would like Mifos X to be more generically a wallet management system and this reference application is a powerful tool to support that. 

Description

The initial mobile wallet framework along with 2 reference apps, PixieCollect and MifosPay, were developed in 2017. In 2019, these functionalities were extended further by Shivansh including including improving user experience and redesigning the app, support for Kotlin, integration with two Mojaloop transaction flows via the Paymeht Hub, adding improving Deeplinks, support for standing instructions and more well-rounded support for merchant transactions.

In 2020, Devansh Aggarwal added complete support for standing instructions, integrated with Fineract CN for core use cases by mapping Fineract back-office APIs to Fineract CN APIs, added multi-theme support, completed integration with Payment Hub EE for two use cases, added support for Hover, and converted Java code to Kotlin.

In 2021 we aim to complete an MVP of a mobile wallet on top of the Fineract CN back-end so most of the major work will be around Fineract CN and Payment Hub integration and improving peer to peer and merchant transactions (initiating transactions to merchants, maintaining history of users with which recent transactions took place, adding deeplink support for unique payment links, payment related notifications using FCM). Payment Hub and Mojaloop integration will allow us to make payments across tenants and fineract deployments. A very basic integration of payment hub with mobile wallet is already in work but that will need to be extended to fully support all use cases. 

Functional enhancements include: 

  • Implement core wallet use cases and workflows for pilot customers like Darapay
  • Customer support/communications features with Rocketchat. 
  • Refine Payment Hub EE use cases like QR code generation 
  • Optimized Tiered KYC support 
  • Full support for Payment Hub EE & Mojaloop use cases like Merchant Request to Pay. 
  • Tighter integration with our notifications framework. 
  • Add additional mobile money provider support via additional Hover USSD integrations. 


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

By providing an extensible mobile wallet framework, allow partners a complete reference stack of back and front-end applications to offer digital financial services to clients.

Other Resources

2020 Mobile Wallet Progress: https://gist.github.com/devansh-299/e2041c07d9ab55a747391951e9090df4

Mobile Wallet Framework: Source Code | Issue Tracker | Gitter Chatroom

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Technical Enhancements to Customer-Facing Apps 

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Mifos X 
Overview & Objectives

We provide a reference mobile wallet application for consumers and merchants that has been developed by our Google Summer of Code interns from 2017 to 2020. The mobile wallet provides an extensible mobile wallet framework to support the basic use cases of a mobile wallet as documented in the Level One Project mobile wallet requirements. This extensible framework should support both merchant and client use cases as well as be capable of integrating with a Fineract or Fineract CN back-end.

We also provide reference mobile banking apps for both Fineract 1.x and Fineract CN

This project would center around technical enhancements to these three customer-facing mobile applications. 

Description

In 2020, Ashwin worked on converting the majority of code in the customer-facing mobile banking and mobile wallet apps from Java to Kotlin. Chinmay also completed work on an Android SDK. This project would extend upon the Java to Kotlin conversion and rewrite the application to consume the common Android SDK.

Technical enhancements to customer-facing apps include: 

  • Convert remaining code from Java to Kotlin and add multi-platform support
  • Implement more widespread automated testing coverage
  • Re-write portions of app to consume Android SDK 
  • Improved security and performance of application
  • Continued refactoring and performance enhancements.
  • Upgrade core dependencies and libraries. 
Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, Kotlin
Impact

Transitioning to Kotlin enables multi-platform development capability and wider spread adoption of customer-facing apps. 

Other Resources

2020 Technical Enhancements : https://gist.github.com/ashwinkey04/7bea77a5b5880023234b04dd68214c66

Mobile Wallet Framework: Source Code | Issue Tracker | Gitter Chatroom

Mifos Mobile - Android Mobile Banking App: Source Code | Issue Tracker | Gitter Chatroom

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

UI and Design Enhancements to Customer-Facing Apps 

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Mifos X 
Overview & Objectives

Our suite of customer-facing mobile applications include our mobile wallet framework, and mobile banking apps for Fineract 1.x and Fineract CN. These are designed to serve as reference implementations for demonstration purposes but also to act as secure and robust starting dough that can be extended and enhanced and white-labeled.

With the move towards more digital financial services, these reference solutions are ever more important and critical and must appear highly polished, clean, and professional. We are working with a designer to provide a set of clean, consistent and professional UI designs and workflows to implement across our customer-facing apps.

This project would focus on implementing these new designs across the customer-facing apps providing a consistent and familiar look and feel. It will build off of efforts in 2020 implementing the UI designs previously proposed during GCI. 

Description

This project would focus on implementing these new designs across the customer-facing apps providing a consistent and familiar look and feel. It will build off of efforts in 2020 implementing the UI designs previously proposed during GCI. We provide a reference mobile wallet application for consumers and merchants that has been developed by our Google Summer of Code interns from 2017 to 2020.

Design enhancements to customer-facing apps include: 

  • Implementing the currently proposed designs
  • Optimizing screens and workflows
  • Consistent unified look and feel with option for theming/skinning
  • Design guidelines and principles
  • Upgrade core dependencies and libraries. 
Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, Kotlin
Impact

A clean and simple UI is key for our low-tech audience and professional and consistent look and feel enhances credibility of our stack. 

Other Resources

2020 UI Enhancements: https://gist.github.com/ShivangiSingh17/67b6041387c1e281caa7df23347f549e

Mobile Wallet Framework: Source Code | Issue Tracker | Gitter Chatroom

Mifos Mobile - Android Mobile Banking App: Source Code | Issue Tracker | Gitter Chatroom

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Functional Enhancement to Fineract CN Mobile

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Apache Fineract CN 
Overview & Objectives

Just as we have a mobile field operations app on Apache Fineract 1.x, we have recently built out on top of the brand new Apache Fineract CN micro-services architecture, an initial version of a mobile field operations app with an MVP architecture and material design. Given the flexibily of the new architecture and its ability to support different methodologies - MFIs, credit unions, cooperatives, savings groups, agent banking, etc - this mobile app will have different flavors and workflows and functionalities. 

Description

In 2020, our Google Summer of Code intern worked on additional functionality in the Fineract CN mobile app. In 2021, the student will work on the following tasks:

  • Integrate with Payment Hub to enable disbursement via Mobile Money API
  • Improve Task management features into the app.
  • Create UI for creating new account and displaying account details
  • Create UI for creating tellers and displaying tellers details
  • Improve GIS features like location tracking, dropping of pin into the app
  • Improve offline mode via Couchbase support
  • Write Unit Test, Integration Test and UI tests
Helpful SkillsAndroid Development, Kotlin, Java, Git, OpenJPA, Rest API
ImpactAllows 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
  1. Repo on Github:
    1. https://github.com/apache/fineract-cn-mobile
  2. Fineract CN API documentation:
    1. https://izakey.github.io/fineract-cn-api-docs-site/
    2. https://github.com/aasaru/fineract-cn-api-docs
    3. https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/FINERACT/Fineract+CN
  3. How to install and run Couchbase:
    1. https://gist.github.com/jawidMuhammadi/af6cd34058cacf20b100d335639b3ad8
  4. GSMA mobile money API:
    1. https://developer.mobilemoneyapi.io/1.1/oas3/22466
  5. Payment Hub:
    1. https://github.com/search?q=openMF%2Fph-ee&ref=opensearch
  6. Some UI designs:

    1. https://www.figma.com/file/KHXtZPdIpC3TqvdIVZu8CW/fineract-cn-mobile?node-id=0%3A1
  7. 2020 GSoC progress report:
    1.  https://gist.github.com/jawidMuhammadi/9fa91d37b1cbe43d9cdfe165ad8f2102
JIRA Task
  1. https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/FINCN-241?filter=-2&jql=project%20%3D%20FINCN%20order%20by%20created%20DESC

Create Open Banking API Layer for Mifos Mobile 

Mentors
CategoryMobile/Platform
Overview & Objectives

Across our ecosystem we're seeing more and more adoption and innovation from fintechs. A huge democratizing force across the financial services sector is the Open Banking movement providing Open Banking APIs to enable third parties to directly interact with customers of financial institutions. We have recently started providing an Open Banking API layer that will allow financial institutions using Mifos and Fineract to offer third parties access to requesting account information and initiating payments via these APIs. Most recently the Mojaloop community, led by Google, has led the development of a centralized PISP API.  We have chosen to the folow the comprehensive UIk Open Banking API standard which is being followed and adopted by a number of countriues through Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. 

Tremendous impact can be had at the Base of the Pyramid by enabling third parties to establish consent with customers authorize transactions to be initiated or information to be accessed from accounts at their financial institution. This  Open Banking API layer would enable any instituion using Mifos or Fineract to provide a UK Open Banking API layer  to third parties and fintechs.  

 The API Gateway to connect to is still being chosen (WS02, Gravitee, etc.)

Description

The APIS that are consumed by the mobile banking applications have been documented in the spreadsheet below. The APIs have also been categorized according to whether they are an existing self-service API or back-office API and if they have an equivalent Open Banking API and if so, a link to the corresponding Open Banking API.

For each API with an equivalent Open Banking API, the interns must: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, do transformation in OpenBanking Adapter, and publish on API gateway.

For back-office and/or self-service APIs with no equivalent Open Banking API, the process is: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, and publish on API gateway.

For example: 
Sample APIs to be Documented
-------------------------------------------


Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, Kotlin, Gravitee, WSO2
Impact

By providing a standard UK Open Banking API layer we can provide both a secure way for our trusted first party apps to allow customers to autheniticate and access their accounts as well as an API layer for third party fintechs to securely access FIneract and request information or initiate transactions with the consent of customers.

Other Resources

CGAP Research on Open Banking: https://www.cgap.org/research/publication/open-banking-how-design-financial-inclusion

Docs: https://mifos.gitbook.io/docs/wso2-1/setup-openbanking-apis

Self-Service APIs: https://demo.mifos.io/api-docs/apiLive.htm#selfbasicauth

Open Banking Adapter: https://github.com/openMF/openbanking-adapte

    • Transforms Open Banking API to Fineract API

    • Works with both Fineract 1.x and Fineract CN

    • Can connect to different API gateways and can transform against different API standards.

Reference Open Banking Fintech App:

Google Whitepaper on 3PPI: https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/nextbillionusers.google/en//tools/3PPI-2021-whitepaper.pdf

UK Open Banking API Standard: https://standards.openbanking.org.uk/

Open Banking Developer Zone: https://openbanking.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DZ/overview

Examples of Open Banking Apps: https://www.ft.com/content/a5f0af78-133e-11e9-a581-4ff78404524e

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Create Open Banking API Layer for Mifos Mobile CN

Mentors
CategoryMobile/Platform
Overview & Objectives

Across our ecosystem we're seeing more and more adoption and innovation from fintechs. A huge democratizing force across the financial services sector is the Open Banking movement providing Open Banking APIs to enable third parties to directly interact with customers of financial institutions. We have recently started providing an Open Banking API layer that will allow financial institutions using Mifos and Fineract to offer third parties access to requesting account information and initiating payments via these APIs. Most recently the Mojaloop community, led by Google, has led the development of a centralized PISP API.  We have chosen to the folow the comprehensive UIk Open Banking API standard which is being followed and adopted by a number of countriues through Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. 

Tremendous impact can be had at the Base of the Pyramid by enabling third parties to establish consent with customers authorize transactions to be initiated or information to be accessed from accounts at their financial institution. This  Open Banking API layer would enable any instituion using Mifos or Fineract to provide a UK Open Banking API layer  to third parties and fintechs.  

 The API Gateway to connect to is still being chosen (WS02, Gravitee, etc.)

Description

This project focues on Mifos Mobile CN, our mobile banking app  on top of Fineract CN - no self-servcie APIs exist yet, only back-office ones. The APIs that are consumed by the mobile banking applications have been documented in the spreadsheet below. The APIs have also been categorized according to whether they are an existing self-service API or back-office API and if they have an equivalent Open Banking API and if so, a link to the corresponding Open Banking API.

For each API with an equivalent Open Banking API, the interns must: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, do transformation in Open Banking Adapter, and publish on API gateway.

For back-office and/or self-service APIs with no equivalent Open Banking API, the process is: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, and publish on API gateway.


For example: 
Sample APIs to be Documented
-------------------------------------------


Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, Kotlin, Gravitee, WSO2
Impact

By providing a standard UK Open Banking API layer we can provide both a secure way for our trusted first party apps to allow customers to autheniticate and access their accounts as well as an API layer for third party fintechs to securely access FIneract and request information or initiate transactions with the consent of customers.

Other Resources

CGAP Research on Open Banking: https://www.cgap.org/research/publication/open-banking-how-design-financial-inclusion

Docs: https://mifos.gitbook.io/docs/wso2-1/setup-openbanking-apis

Self-Service APIs: https://demo.mifos.io/api-docs/apiLive.htm#selfbasicauth

Open Banking Adapter: https://github.com/openMF/openbanking-adapte

    • Transforms Open Banking API to Fineract API

    • Works with both Fineract 1.x and Fineract CN

    • Can connect to different API gateways and can transform against different API standards.

Reference Open Banking Fintech App:

Google Whitepaper on 3PPI: https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/nextbillionusers.google/en//tools/3PPI-2021-whitepaper.pdf

UK Open Banking API Standard: https://standards.openbanking.org.uk/

Open Banking Developer Zone: https://openbanking.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DZ/overview

Examples of Open Banking Apps: https://www.ft.com/content/a5f0af78-133e-11e9-a581-4ff78404524e

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Create Open Banking API Layer for Mobile Wallet

Mentors
CategoryMobile/Platform
Overview & Objectives

Across our ecosystem we're seeing more and more adoption and innovation from fintechs. A huge democratizing force across the financial services sector is the Open Banking movement providing Open Banking APIs to enable third parties to directly interact with customers of financial institutions. We have recently started providing an Open Banking API layer that will allow financial institutions using Mifos and Fineract to offer third parties access to requesting account information and initiating payments via these APIs. Most recently the Mojaloop community, led by Google, has led the development of a centralized PISP API.  We have chosen to the folow the comprehensive UIk Open Banking API standard which is being followed and adopted by a number of countriues through Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. 

Tremendous impact can be had at the Base of the Pyramid by enabling third parties to establish consent with customers authorize transactions to be initiated or information to be accessed from accounts at their financial institution. This  Open Banking API layer would enable any instituion using Mifos or Fineract to provide a UK Open Banking API layer  to third parties and fintechs.  

 The API Gateway to connect to is still being chosen (WS02, Gravitee, etc.)

Description

This project focues on Mifos Mobile CN, our mobile banking app  on top of Fineract CN - no self-servcie APIs exist yet, only back-office ones. The APIs that are consumed by the mobile banking applications have been documented in the spreadsheet below. The APIs have also been categorized according to whether they are an existing self-service API or back-office API and if they have an equivalent Open Banking API and if so, a link to the corresponding Open Banking API.

For each API with an equivalent Open Banking API, the interns must: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, do transformation in Open Banking Adapter, and publish on API gateway.

For back-office and/or self-service APIs with no equivalent Open Banking API, the process is: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, and publish on API gateway.


For example: 
Sample APIs to be Documented


Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, Kotlin, Gravitee, WSO2
Impact

By providing a standard UK Open Banking API layer we can provide both a secure way for our trusted first party apps to allow customers to autheniticate and access their accounts as well as an API layer for third party fintechs to securely access FIneract and request information or initiate transactions with the consent of customers.

Other Resources

CGAP Research on Open Banking: https://www.cgap.org/research/publication/open-banking-how-design-financial-inclusion

Docs: https://mifos.gitbook.io/docs/wso2-1/setup-openbanking-apis

Self-Service APIs: https://demo.mifos.io/api-docs/apiLive.htm#selfbasicauth

Open Banking Adapter: https://github.com/openMF/openbanking-adapte

    • Transforms Open Banking API to Fineract API

    • Works with both Fineract 1.x and Fineract CN

    • Can connect to different API gateways and can transform against different API standards.

Reference Open Banking Fintech App:

Google Whitepaper on 3PPI: https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/nextbillionusers.google/en//tools/3PPI-2021-whitepaper.pdf

UK Open Banking API Standard: https://standards.openbanking.org.uk/

Open Banking Developer Zone: https://openbanking.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DZ/overview

Examples of Open Banking Apps: https://www.ft.com/content/a5f0af78-133e-11e9-a581-4ff78404524e

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Create Open Banking API Layer for Online Banking App

Mentors
CategoryMobile/Platform
Overview & Objectives

Across our ecosystem we're seeing more and more adoption and innovation from fintechs. A huge democratizing force across the financial services sector is the Open Banking movement providing Open Banking APIs to enable third parties to directly interact with customers of financial institutions. We have recently started providing an Open Banking API layer that will allow financial institutions using Mifos and Fineract to offer third parties access to requesting account information and initiating payments via these APIs. Most recently the Mojaloop community, led by Google, has led the development of a centralized PISP API.  We have chosen to the folow the comprehensive UIk Open Banking API standard which is being followed and adopted by a number of countriues through Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. 

Tremendous impact can be had at the Base of the Pyramid by enabling third parties to establish consent with customers authorize transactions to be initiated or information to be accessed from accounts at their financial institution. This  Open Banking API layer would enable any instituion using Mifos or Fineract to provide a UK Open Banking API layer  to third parties and fintechs.  

 The API Gateway to connect to is still being chosen (WS02, Gravitee, etc.)

Description

This project focues on Mifos Mobile CN, our mobile banking app  on top of Fineract CN - no self-servcie APIs exist yet, only back-office ones. The APIs that are consumed by the mobile banking applications have been documented in the spreadsheet below. The APIs have also been categorized according to whether they are an existing self-service API or back-office API and if they have an equivalent Open Banking API and if so, a link to the corresponding Open Banking API.

For each API with an equivalent Open Banking API, the interns must: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, do transformation in OpenBanking Adapter, and publish on API gateway.

For back-office and/or self-service APIs with no equivalent Open Banking API, the process is: Take rest api, upload swagger definition, and publish on API gateway.

For example: 
Sample APIs to be Documented
These are for the mobile banking app but they effectively provide the same functionality. 


Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, Kotlin, Gravitee, WSO2, Angular
Impact

By providing a standard UK Open Banking API layer we can provide both a secure way for our trusted first party apps to allow customers to autheniticate and access their accounts as well as an API layer for third party fintechs to securely access FIneract and request information or initiate transactions with the consent of customers.

Other Resources

CGAP Research on Open Banking: https://www.cgap.org/research/publication/open-banking-how-design-financial-inclusion

Docs: https://mifos.gitbook.io/docs/wso2-1/setup-openbanking-apis

Self-Service APIs: https://demo.mifos.io/api-docs/apiLive.htm#selfbasicauth

Open Banking Adapter: https://github.com/openMF/openbanking-adapte

    • Transforms Open Banking API to Fineract API

    • Works with both Fineract 1.x and Fineract CN

    • Can connect to different API gateways and can transform against different API standards.

Reference Open Banking Fintech App:

Google Whitepaper on 3PPI: https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/nextbillionusers.google/en//tools/3PPI-2021-whitepaper.pdf

UK Open Banking API Standard: https://standards.openbanking.org.uk/

Open Banking Developer Zone: https://openbanking.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DZ/overview

Examples of Open Banking Apps: https://www.ft.com/content/a5f0af78-133e-11e9-a581-4ff78404524e

See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Open Banking Fintech App Framework 

Mentors
CategoryMobile
Overview & Objectives

Across our ecosystem we're seeing more and more adoption and innovation from fintechs. A huge democratizing force across the financial services sector is the Open Banking movement providing Open Banking APIs to enable third parties to directly interact with customers of financial institutions. We have recently started providing an Open Banking API layer that will allow financial institutions using Mifos and Fineract to offer third parties access to requesting account information and initiating payments via these APIs. Most recently the Mojaloop community, led by Google, has led the development of a centralized PISP API

To demonstrate these Open Banking APIs and use cases that third parties and fintechs can provide we have developed a cross-platform reference mobile app on Kotlin to showcase a number of these features. It currently connects with the Open Bank Project that adheres to the UK Open Banking API standard. The API Gateway to connect to is still being chosen (WS02, Gravitee, etc.)

The breadth and variety of apps that could be built leveraging these APIs from region to region is endless. We would like this app to be built in an extensible and modular fashion such that core libraries and components could be re-used across different use cases with this framework as the foundation and multiple reference apps on top. Applications include personal financial management apps aggregating information from multiple bank accounts in one place, wallet apps allowing payments to be made from different banks, lending apps, leveraging data and insight from multiple accounts, savings apps, etc.

Description

Intern would work on refining the initial architecture of the framework, the UI and user experience, core use cases including customer authentication and onboarding that was implemented in 2020 and integrating with the Fineract Open Banking APIs and Mojaloop PISP APIs to demonstrate use cases around account information request and payment initiation. 

  • Aggregating account information across multiple banks/financial institution
  • Initiating payments across multiple financial institutions
  • Integrate with additional Fineract Open Banking APIs
  • Integrate with Mojaloop PISP APIs. 


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

By providing an extensible open banking fintech app framework, allow partners a complete stack of Open Banking APIs and reference front-end application to rapidly build innovation via Open Banking APIs.   

Other Resources

2020 Progress: https://gist.github.com/ankurs287/4ef7c3de462073bf36bd5247479cb176

Google Whitepaper on 3PPI: https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/nextbillionusers.google/en//tools/3PPI-2021-whitepaper.pdf

UK Open Banking API Standard: https://standards.openbanking.org.uk/

Open Banking Developer Zone: https://openbanking.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DZ/overview

Examples of Open Banking Apps: https://www.ft.com/content/a5f0af78-133e-11e9-a581-4ff78404524e


See https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Digital Bank UI on  Fineract CN

Mentors

Gaurav Saini, Pranjal Goswami, @Giorgio Zoppi 

CategoryWeb - Fineract CN Web App
Overview & Objectives

A new reference user interface on Fineract CN for staff of financial institutions such as digital, challenger, and neo-banks that focused on individual accounts is needed for multiple reasons:

  1. The current fims-web-app reference UI on top of Fineract CN is incomplete, unpolished and doesn't serve as a good representation of capabilities of Fineract CN.
  2. As more financial inclusion providers focus on individual lending and savings products and more digital banks/neo-banks and fintechs that don't have group or center-based operations explore Mifos and Fineract CN, we'd need to have a reference UI that is more in line with those requirements. We don't want prospective users to come and see the microfinance-centric UI and immediately think that the platform might not be useful for them.
Description

Intern will implement the front-end UI screens for the Fineract CN web UI for the following functionalities and use case:

  • Account Details
  • NOtifications
  • Account
  • Reporting
  • More Use cases to be listed.
Helpful SkillsJavascript, CSS, HTML5. Angular and Bootstrap (CSS framework) is plus
ImpactReference UI for microfinance institutions on Apache Fineract CN
Other Resources

Usability and Design

Use Cases - https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui/wiki/Use-Cases-&-Requirements

2020 Progress: https://gist.github.com/abhi40308/21cf6f1ac78efe309faaf6a0d6d971e4

Github

https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui

https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui/issues

Mifos X Web App Enhancements 

Mentors
CategoryWeb - Mifos X Web App
Overview & Objectives

Our AngularWeb 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 2018, we made the decision to re-write the entire Mifos X web app from Angular 1.75 to Angular 6 providing cleaner Material design, access to brand new libraries, better theming/skinnability, and a more stable and modern codebase. In 2019 we continued the re-write and upgraded to Angular 7.  In 2020 we upgraded to Angular 9 and continued the rewrite. The re-write is nearly complete and now just needs to focus on a few minor  remaining enhancements and optimizations. You can see the in-progress new UI at https://openmf.github.io/web-app/ (mifos/password)

The remaining issues can be found: https://github.com/openMF/web-app/issues

The progress is being tracked here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JxeJjG1GdZ3BNJi-sScCQLirfevSc8amFr8o3SfUj4U/edit?usp=sharing

Some additional work also includes adding in comprehensive keyboard shortcuts to enable power-users of the app and to ensure that the tabs and arrow keys work appropriately for navigating through the app, localization support, additional dashboards, adding of tooltips, etc. 

Helpful SkillsJavascript, SCSS, HTML5, Angular 9, Angular Material, Flex Layout
Impact

Enhanced User Experience, Intuitive application design

2020 Progress: https://gist.github.com/karantakalkar/7a4acb83f31ebfe4f3b827c86c67eec0

https://gist.github.com/muskankhedia/b0929cbf2ae6236bfe07964a140da179

Other ResourcesUsability and Design

Improve Robustness of Mifos X and Apache Fineract by Fixing Issues/Feature Requests in Backlog

Mentors
CategoryPlatform
Overview & Objectives

Mifos X and Apache Fineract is widely used by financial institutions of all different sizes and methodologies around the world. With that widespread user base there is a vast array of different processes and procedures that would like to be supported as slight modifications over the common functionality provided. Over the past several years, we have captured these minor enhancements in our issue tracker as feature requests. Also included in this backlog or additional minor and less critical bugs that have been reported but have not been fixed yet.  This backlog has grown and it would be a very impactful project for an intern to work on completing as many of these bug fixes and minor enhancement as possible.

The difficult level of these issues ranges from low to higher and touch all componets of the platform - most don't require too much domain knowledge but some will. 

Description

We have groomed the backlog and tagged issues and feature requests that are relevant for this project with the labels gsoc and/or Volunteer.  Priority level of tasks is measured by p1 being the highest priority. Tasks with an assigned fix version of either 1.4.0 or 1.5.0 have a higher priority. 

There are more than 120 tickets in the saved filter. You are not expected to complete all of the tasks in the backlog but throughout the internship you should fix as many issues/feature requests as possible. You will work with your mentor to deliver a plan for each sprint and adjust velocity as you get scaled up.

Issues to be worked on can be found at https://issues.apache.org/jira/issues/?filter=12345785 - the saved filter is named 2021 Intern Project. 

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

Better internal control and financial transparency

Other Resources

OpenG2P  - Digital Identity Proof of Concept on Sovrin & Hyperledger Indy

Mentors

Rachit Kansal

CategoryPlatform & Modules 
Overview & Objectives

Digital Identity is a pressing topic and for both generations of Fineract (1.x and CN), we'd like to have integration with emerging KYC and digital identity solutions.

KYC (Know your customer) is a fundamental banking concept. It refers to the process of identifying a new customer at the time of account opening, in compliance with law and regulation. The identification requirements may be lower for low value accounts ("Tiered KYC"). The term is also used in connection with regulatory requirements for a provider to understand, on an ongoing basis, who their customer is and how they are using their account. Most of the banks are mandated to perform basic/extensive KYC, before they can serve their customers.

Traditionally KYC is done in a centralised fashion where a central agency has the control over all the data. For example consider each bank like SBI, Deutsche, JP Morgan, etc. when creating a bank account, each of them requires a separate KYC process to be completed and all this data gets stored in their respective databases. Even the systems like Aadhar or social security number, etc. have the data stored in a central manner and maintained by the government. However, in recent times all these centralised identity servers continue to be hacked and the important and private data being stolen regularly.

With the advent of blockchain concepts and technologies, it is not ideal but imperative that we shift from the traditional identity management to a more secure decentralised claim-based identity management system. This kind of system has multiple benefits:

  • Decentralised system means that no one person has control over sensitive data.

  • It enables the re-use of KYC, i.e. each financial institution or in our case each customer using Fineract may not have to perform its own complete KYC, but re-use the KYC already performed by others (those who have the power as issuing authority for any kind of claim).

  • Cryptographic security is the heart of blockchain technologies enhancing privacy.

  • Claim-based system where the end user/customer has the control over his data.


Description

See https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=103093257 for details on the proof of concept 

P0 requirements

  1. Setup and run an Hyperledger Indy Network with Stewards.
  2. Opening a bank account scenario.
  3. Applying for a loan scenario.

P1 requirements

  1. Performing money transfer to a merchant online.
Helpful SkillsHTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, Javascript, SQL, Hyperledger Indy
Impact


Other Resources

OpenG2P  - Digital Identity Proof of Concept with MOSIP

Mentors
CategoryPlatform & Modules 
Overview & Objectives

Digital Identity is a pressing topic and for both generations of Fineract (1.x and CN), we'd like to have integration with emerging KYC and digital identity solutions.

KYC (Know your customer) is a fundamental banking concept. It refers to the process of identifying a new customer at the time of account opening, in compliance with law and regulation. The identification requirements may be lower for low value accounts ("Tiered KYC"). The term is also used in connection with regulatory requirements for a provider to understand, on an ongoing basis, who their customer is and how they are using their account. Most of the banks are mandated to perform basic/extensive KYC, before they can serve their customers.

Traditionally KYC is done in a centralised fashion where a central agency has the control over all the data. For example consider each bank like SBI, Deutsche, JP Morgan, etc. when creating a bank account, each of them requires a separate KYC process to be completed and all this data gets stored in their respective databases. Even the systems like Aadhar or social security number, etc. have the data stored in a central manner and maintained by the government. However, in recent times all these centralised identity servers continue to be hacked and the important and private data being stolen regularly.

Omidyar Network along with Gates Foundation have developed the MOSIP project which provides an open source digital ID platform. Integration between Mifos along with Mojaloop can provide an end to end reference architecture for a digital cash transfer system built on open source digital public goods. 

  • Decentralised system means that no one person has control over sensitive data.

  • It enables the re-use of KYC, i.e. each financial institution or in our case each customer using Fineract may not have to perform its own complete KYC, but re-use the KYC already performed by others (those who have the power as issuing authority for any kind of claim).

  • Cryptographic security is the heart of blockchain technologies enhancing privacy.

  • Claim-based system where the end user/customer has the control over his data.


Description

Integration between Mifos/Fineract and digital identity systems and KYC protocols could be deepened. This project would focus on an initial proof of concept integration with MOSIP APIs for digital identity including

  • ID Repository
  • ID authentication
  • Biometric Integration 
  • Registration 

Registering a client with a MOSIP-powered Digital Identity in a Fineract system and verifying that digital identity to perform transactions. 


Helpful Skills

HTML, Spring, Hibernate, REST, Java, AngularJS, Javascript, SQL, 

MOSIP 

Impact


Other Resources

Self-Service User Administrative Portal on Web App 

Mentors
CategoryWeb - Mifos X Web App
Overview & Objectives

Now that we have a robust mobile banking and online banking application which allows for users to self-create their own accounts, we need to add better back-end administrative support for staff of the financial institution to manage their self-service operations including user management, notifications to clients, task management, logo uploads, etc. 

Description

This project would involve front-end development of the new UI screens (some part has been already been implemented but may be enhanced) and development of additional APIs on the Apache Fineract back-end to support the following use cases:

  • User Management - creation of new users, reset of user password, user activity tracking, searching of users, freezing/closing of self-service user accounts
  • App configuration - upload of custom logo, look and feel, about app details.
  • Customer Support/Communications - schedule campaigns to be delivered as in-app notifications, respond to incoming client support requests
  • Task Management - view and respond to pending tasks - new loan applications, loan disbursements, etc.
Helpful SkillsJavascript, CSS, HTML5. Angular 7, Angular Material, Flex Layout
ImpactImproved usability and staff control for self-service operations.
Other Resources

Android Field Operations App Functional Enhancements 

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Mifos X Android Field Operations App
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 2020, our Google Summer of Code intern, Shashank, added support for instant search, optimized the UI, added language support through locale, added dark mode support, extended support for Kotlin in the app, and added  KYC/Client Onboarding feature.

For 2021, the functional focus for the application would include:

cus for the appbuilding out new functionalities, UI enhancement to the application, and providing widespread coverage of automated testing throughout the app.   


Functional enhancements for 2021 include: 

  • Improved GIS features
  • Improved Task Management 
  • Support for external payments via Payment Hub EE
  • Deeper integration of the notifications framework
  • Integrating SMS communications (Sms Communication will be in the form of in-app push notifications. User will receive a push notification is three case:
    1. Triggered (when user has applied for a loan and the loan get approved then user will receive a notification)
    2. Scheduled (when we want that user should receive a notification on a scheduled date and time).
    3. Direct (when users receives a notification when loan payment is overdue or a happy birthday wish on his birthday
  • Improved Task Management 

This would all be on top of the Android SDK  on the Mifos platform.

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

2020 Progress: https://gist.github.com/robustTechie/85e9fde225be7926a77b1dd08c9906d1

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

Architecture overview: 
Code style conventions guide:

Optimize Payment Hub EE Operations UI 

Mentors

@Istvan Molnar

CategoryWeb 
Overview & Objectives

For our Payment Hub EE integration layer and payment orchestration engine, we provide an operational user interface which allow staff of the financial institution participating in a real-time payment scheme to manage view detail of the incoming and outgoing transactions that are flowing through the switch, manually process refunds, complete reconciliations, view and take action on unsuccessful and disputed transactions, and more. 

Description

Intern will implement the front-end UI screens for the Fineract CN web UI for the following functionalities and use case:

  • Account Details
  • Notifications
  • Account
  • Reporting
  • More Use cases to be listed.
Helpful SkillsJavascript, CSS, HTML5. Angular and Bootstrap (CSS framework) is plus
ImpactReference UI for microfinance institutions on Apache Fineract CN
Other Resources

Usability and Design

Use Cases - https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui/wiki/Use-Cases-&-Requirements

Github

https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui

https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui/issues

Cloud interoperability Project

Android SDK Project

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Android SDK
Overview & ObjectivesThe goal of this project is to continue work on developing the Fineract 1.x Client Android SDK which will be used in other Mifos Mobile Applications (android-client, mifos-mobile, mobile-wallet). The project aims to remove a lot of repeated code in the mobile apps and help mobile apps easily migrate to newer versions of Apache Fineract 1.x
Description

The student will be working on implementing the following things:

  1. Generate and release latest Fineract Client SDK for Android using the Open API Specification of Apache Fineract
  2. Generate and publish documentation for the Fineract Android Client SDK
  3. Add support for RxJava + LiveData
  4. Migrate Mifos Android Field Officer App project to consume the new Fineract Client Android SDK
  5. Provide testing coverage throughout the SDK
  6. Implement CI/CD to automate steps 1 and 2
Helpful SkillsJava, Kotlin, Android, Swagger Specification, Open API Specification, Spring (Good to have)
Impact
  1. Enabling other mifos mobile apps to easily migrate to latest versions of Fineract.
  2. More stable and error free codebase
Other Resources

Last year progress: https://gist.github.com/Grandolf49/f79537436a467dac0baa9458a38290c5

Jira Issue for reference: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/FINERACT-838

Github

https://github.com/apache/fineract

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

Digital Bank UI on  Fineract CN

Mentors
CategoryWeb - Fineract CN Web App
Overview & Objectives

A new reference user interface on Fineract CN for staff of financial institutions such as digital, challenger, and neo-banks that focused on individual accounts is needed for multiple reasons:

  1. The current fims-web-app reference UI on top of Fineract CN is incomplete, unpolished and doesn't serve as a good representation of capabilities of Fineract CN.
  2. As more financial inclusion providers focus on individual lending and savings products and more digital banks/neo-banks and fintechs that don't have group or center-based operations explore Mifos and Fineract CN, we'd need to have a reference UI that is more in line with those requirements. We don't want prospective users to come and see the microfinance-centric UI and immediately think that the platform might not be useful for them.
Description

Intern will implement the front-end UI screens for the Fineract CN web UI for the following functionalities and use case:

  • Account Details
  • Notifications
  • Account
  • Reporting
  • More Use cases to be listed.
Helpful SkillsJavascript, CSS, HTML5. Angular and Bootstrap (CSS framework) is plus
ImpactReference UI for microfinance institutions on Apache Fineract CN
Other Resources

Usability and Design

Use Cases - https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui/wiki/Use-Cases-&-Requirements

Github

https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui

https://github.com/openMF/digital-bank-ui/issues

Live Fineract CN API Documentation as Part of Developer Portal 

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

The aim of this project is to provide a visual display of the Fineract CN API Documentation. We are now starting to use more of the Postman toolset for our developer portal and this project would focus on extending the existign work that was done. 

Description

This project involves providing a visual display of the API Documentation of Apache Fineract CN. Student would have to optimize documentation snippets ( .adoc ), document any service which isn't completely documented like template and reporting, document failing unit tests too and develop a visual website where these html files will be hosted.

SkillsJava, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, Cassandra, TDD With JUnit 4, Spring REST Docs, Asciidoctor, HTML/CSS, Graphic Design
ImpactA visual presentation of the Fineract CN APIs will be a key building block for an enabling environment for developers working on Fineract CN.
Other Resources

https://github.com/aasaru/fineract-cn-api-docs

Functional Enhancements to Mifos Mobile - Mobile Banking App

Mentors
CategoryMobile - Mifos X 
Overview & Objectives

Mifos Mobile is a reference mobile banking app which enables clients to authenticate themselves, view and edit their account details. and make repayments or transactions between their own accounts. It is now possible for any It is now possible for any financial institution using Mifos to provide an omni-channel banking experience including  including smartphone-based mobile banking, USSD-based mobile banking, and online banking via a web app.

In 2019, our Google Summer of Code intern, Prashant, extended our mobile banking app, completing a mix of functional, architectural, and design improvements including improving the outbound notification system by migrating from GCM to FCM, initial integration with RocketChat for direct customer support between staff and clients, a dark theme and better support for skinning, and phase 1 of integration with Mojaloop via the payment hub.

With the payment hub and API Gateway now in place, next we look to add additional mobile money and payment system integrations into the app as well as having the app connect via the Open Banking API rather than the self-service APIs. This exercise of mapping the Fineract self-service APIs to the Open Banking APIs will be the major focus of this project. 

It was built on top of the Apache Fineract 1.x client-facing APIs to enable self-service channels for clients to interact with their own data and transact in a self-service manner.

Description

Work will involve both development of the Android application as well as work on the back-end to map the Fineract APIs to Open Banking APIs. New features to be added for 2020: 

    • Replace API layer from self-service Fineract APIs to Open Banking APIs
    • Complete Support for customer support/chat via RocketChat
    • Integration with an external payment system (Mojaloop, mPesa) via our payment hub. 
    • Improved support for skinning/theming/white-labeling of the app
    • Implement dashboards and visuals to provide more user insight. 
    • Implementation of Unit and Integration testing
    • Refine UI and overall user experience in accordance with new designs found at https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1yFR19vGlKW-amxzGms8TgPzd1jWkrALPFcaC85EyYpw/edit?usp=sharing
Helpful SkillsAndroid development, SQL, Java, Javascript, Git, Spring, OpenJPA, Rest, WS02 API Gateway
Impact

By providing an extensible mobile banking app, allow 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

UK Open Banking API Standard: https://standards.openbanking.org.uk/

Source Code: https://github.com/openMF/mifos-mobile

See: https://openmf.github.io/mobileapps.github.io/

Mifos Webinar on Open Banking API: 

Mifos Open Banking API Documentation: https://app.gitbook.com/@mifos/s/docs/


Build Beyonic/MFS Africa Connector for Mifos Payment Hub EE

Mentors
CategoryPlatform - Payments Integrations
Overview & Objectives

Mobile money is rapidly transforming financial inclusion by providing more immediate, impactful, affordable, and secure financial services to the client. Providers like MFS Africa and Beyonic provide a set of cross-border payment rails to enable remittances across Africa terminating in mobile money wallets. 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

The Payment Hub EE has been built out as an integration layer between Fineract and real-time payment systems like Mojaloop. Built around the Zeebe as an orchestration engine, it's built with an extensible architecture with a set of connectors for additional core banking systems, channels, and payment systems. We have a connector built for Mojaloop and the GSMA mobile money API and would like to build additional ones for the most widely used payment rails across our community. As part of our DIAL-funded project to integrate Mifos with the open source Mojaloop payments platform the team from DPC consulting built out a middleware component called the payment hub to enable the integration with the Mojaloop APIs. This middleware will also serve as the point of integration for all other external payment systems - the payment hub is extendable by additional payment connectors. This project would focus on adding the connector for the Beyonic APIs. Beyonic is a global mobile money aggregator which provides a common set of payment and collection APIs to seamlessly integrate with the leading mobile money platforms in East and West Africa. 

Our 2020 project provided a connector for GSMA mobile money API which can be followed as a blueprint for other connectors. 

This project will involve building the Beyonic connector and integrating with the specific Beyonic APIs for the mobile money use cases to be supported.

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

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

Other Resources

Extend GSMA Mobile Money API Connector for Mifos Payment Hub

Mentors
CategoryPlatform - Payments Integrations
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

As part of our DIAL-funded project to integrate Mifos with the open source Mojaloop payments platform the team from DPC consulting built out a middleware component called the payment hub to enable the integration with the Mojaloop APIs. This middleware will also serve as the point of integration for all other external payment systems - the payment hub is extendable by additional payment connectors. This project would focus on adding the connector for the GSMA Mobile Money API. In 2016 GSMA published a first set of harmonized mobile money APIs to "ensure best practice in API design, security design, and more and to "address the complexity and fragmentation that is apparent in the fast-growing industry. 

The GSMA Mobile Money APIs are OTT (Over the Top) APIs that have been designed to cater for a core set of mobile money use cases:

  • Interoperability between mobile money and banks, or among mobile money providers
  • Merchant payments, online and offline, including delegated authentication of transactions
  • Bill payments and instant notification of payment
  • Basic account management
  • International transfers, including request for quotation
  • Bulk transactions
  • Cash in / Cash out

This project will extend the work started by Sidhant Gupta under the mentorship of Avik Ganguly in 2019. 

This project will involve building the GSMA Mobile Money API connector and integrating with the specific APIs for the mobile money use cases to be supported.

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

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

Other Resources

Transformation Layer for GSMA Mobile Money API to Mojaloop Open API

Mentors
CategoryPlatform - Payments Integrations
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

As part of the GSMA Inclusive Tech Lab, they are building an Interoperability Test Platform to test how service providers can connect to a mobile money system via the GSMA Mobile Money API and how MNOs and DFSPs can connect to a central switch/hub via the Mojaloop API. The Mifos Initiative has also built and configured a lab environment that provides an immersive user experience complete with rich user interfaces to test out various scenarios and transaction flows originated across Mojaloop and via GSMA mobile money APIs from the perspective of various DFSPs including MFIs, wallet providers, merchants, etc. GSMA has built a transformation layer on PHP to map the GSMA Mobile Money API to the Mojaloop Open API. We would like to incorporate this transformation layer into our lab environment and to do so must write the transformation layer in a more production-ready language like Java. This project would focus on writing that Java transformation layer and ensuring the GSMA Mobile Money API connector is in place for the payment hub and API gateway. 

In 2016 GSMA published a first set of harmonized mobile money APIs to "ensure best practice in API design, security design, and more and to "address the complexity and fragmentation that is apparent in the fast-growing industry. 

The GSMA Mobile Money APIs are OTT (Over the Top) APIs that have been designed to cater for a core set of mobile money use cases:

  • Interoperability between mobile money and banks, or among mobile money providers
  • Merchant payments, online and offline, including delegated authentication of transactions
  • Bill payments and instant notification of payment
  • Basic account management
  • International transfers, including request for quotation
  • Bulk transactions
  • Cash in / Cash out

This project will extend the work started by Sidhant Gupta under the mentorship of Avik Ganguly in 2019. 

This project will involve building the GSMA Mobile Money API connector and integrating with the specific APIs for the mobile money use cases to be supported.

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

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

Other Resources

Build Safaricom M-Pesa API Connector for Mifos Payment Hub EE

Mentors
CategoryPlatform - Payments Integrations
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

As part of our DIAL-funded project to integrate Mifos with the open source Mojaloop payments platform the team from DPC consulting built out a middleware component called the payment hub to enable the integration with the Mojaloop APIs. This middleware will also serve as the point of integration for all other external payment systems - the payment hub is extendable by additional payment connectors. This project would focus on adding the connector for the Safaricom M-Pesa APIs. M-Pesa is the leading mobile money platform from Kenya. 

The payment hub built upon the work of previous interns, most recently the efforts on the Mifos Payment Gateway which were led by Sidhant Gupta in 2019.

This project will involve building the M-Pesa connector and integrating with the specific M-Pesa APIs for the mobile money use cases to be supported.

Helpful SkillsWeb Services, Java, SQL , JavaScript , Git, Spring, Apache Camel, Kafka, Rest, Zeebe
Impact

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

Other Resources

Optimize Containerization & Deployment of Apache Fineract CN

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

The increasing need for fast and reliable access to financial services has prompted the expansion of Apache Fineract from a single complex financial platform to a platform constituted of multiple micro-services that interact and scale to meet up with this increased need - Apache Fineract CN. Apache Fineract CN is a digital financial application platform built to render financial services to consumers in a fast, reliable and scalable manner. Deploying this platform such that consumers get the latest features with no reduction impact requires an optimized release cycle in a CI/CD (continuous integration and continuous Deployment) environment.

Description

In view of that, last year Courage began this work by implementing the needed scripts to containerize and deploy the Fineract CN services using Docker, Docker compose and Kubernetes. For the Google Summer of Code 2020, you are required to complete this work by performing the following task:

  • Improve Docker-compose deployment configuration to deploy on a swarm node
  • Implement new Fineract service to generate RSA keys and complete the provisioning process.
  • Improve provisioner and migration script to work with both a swarm cluster and a single machine running multiple compose services.
  • Build and publish the Fineract images on Docker hub.
  • Link Docker Hub to Github service repositories via an Automation Server pipeline.
  • Publish the built Fineract CN services libraries to a Maven Artifactory so developers will not have to manually clone and publish these services by themselves.

N.B: 

  • I would like to hear the applicants own ideas.
  • The task for the completion of this project may change depending on input from the community, the mentors and the applicant.
Helpful Skills

Docker, Kubernetes, Jenkins, Bash, Java - Spring, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, Cassandra, TDD With JUnit 4, Gradle

Impact

Provide a CI/CD pipeline to mange the the release of Apache Finerect CN microservices

Other Resources

Vendor pages

GSoC 2018: https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/archive/2018/projects/5060024451727360/

Computer Vision Based PPI Tool Version 3.0

Mentors
Overview & Objectives

In 2019, Appoorva built out the alpha version of this project including the initial app and machine learning model for image processing.  In 2020, Yash made this a functional application. The student for 2021 would extend the application and refine the model to achieve the original vision. Build out an AI-powered tool that leverages Machine Learning and Google's Cloud Vision to capture responses for the 10-question Poverty Probability Index (PPI) Scorecard using the simple image capture via a smartphone camera.   Social Performance Measurement is a critical tool for financial inclusion providers and the PPI is a widely-accepted tool for capturing it. Student would work on training the model for analyzing these images based on the scorecard requirements for multiple PPIs. 

Description

The Poverty Probability Index (PPI®) is a poverty measurement tool for organizations and businesses with a mission to serve the poor.  The PPI is statistically-sound, yet simple to use: the answers to 10 questions about a household’s characteristics and asset ownership are scored to compute the likelihood that the household is living below the poverty line.

Recording the answers to these 10 questions on initial onboarding of a client and at future period intervals is fraught with manual human error and data integrity issues. Leveraging Cloud Vision, a field officer would simply have to take a series of photos with their smartphone camera inside and outside of the house and then the Cloud Vision would be able to deduce based on the images the response to the 10 questions (i.e. the presence of soot on the walls would denote a coal-base stove is using, the image could easily depict what material the roof is made of, the image could detect the BMI of the family, the image could detect if there is a TV in the household. 

Cloud Vision won't be able to answer every single question in each 10-question scorecard but for some it would. 

Helpful Skills

Machine Learning, AI, Data Science, Statistics

ImpactMore widespread adoption of Social Performance Measurement and Increased Efficiency and Improved Data Integrity by reducing manual data entry for PPI scorecard capturing. 
Other Resources

2020 GSOC Output

About the PPI

About Google's Cloud Vision

Static Analysis and Vulnerability Scanning of Apache Fineract CN 

Mentors
CategoryFramework - Apache Fineract CN, Security 
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 analyze 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. As our environments become more containerized we can also utilize tools like: Anchore, Snyk.io, and Docker Bench for Security

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

Static Analysis and Vulnerability Scanning of Apache Fineract 1.x 

Mentors