Mathéo Rome, Anne-Lise Magagnin, and Julian Coux share their experiences as interns at AdaCore, where they worked on independent projects while being fully integrated into their teams. Here, they reflect on their time as interns, what they valued most about the experience, and what they look forward to as they begin their permanent roles at AdaCore, where they are now writing the next chapter of their careers.

Could you tell us about your role during your internship at AdaCore and some of the projects you’ve been involved in?

Mathéo Rome: My internship was in the IDE team with my mentor, Anthony Leonardo Gracio. I was involved in a project where I worked on enhancing code comprehension based on the LSP feature. My goal was to transform the codebase into graphs so that the user could see what their codebase looked like more graphically. I was in charge of the whole project from start to finish, taking care of the research and development, of course, with the help of my mentor. My project was merged into the main branch, and there are plans to include it in the next release.

Anne-Lise Magagnin: I'm part of the certification team. My internship project was to create a domain-specific language to help write requirements more formally, and to implement rules that avoid ambiguity and help other teams to write requirements more easily.

Julian Coux: During my internship, I was in the Enterprise Tooling team, which is responsible for internal products used by AdaCore. My main goal was to revamp the Salesforce quote system. We were using an old technology, so I rebuilt the system to use only the standard quote objects integrated inside Salesforce. That was my main task, to modernise the system, and I am continuing to work on it.

Can you share a moment from your internship that you felt especially proud of?

Mathéo Rome: The moment we finally managed to merge the feature I made into the main branch. I'm really proud to have been able to deliver something before the end of my internship, and seeing it in the public repository is great too. Working on open source projects is very interesting because of what it represents - to be able to contribute to the community. I'm very proud of that. I'm also very happy to have been able to present my work in front of the company during the Interns Monthly Presentations.

Anne-Lise Magagnin: As part of my work, I implemented a quick fix to help users correct mistakes when there is an error. I had an idea for a specific quick fix that turned out to be very difficult to implement; it took a long time from idea to implementation. It also required communication with the developer of the tools I was using so that I could make it work. When it finally worked, I was really proud.

Julian Coux: Firstly, proving the concept. At the beginning, it was just an idea, and I was proud to show that it would work. Everybody accepted my solution. It's not in production yet, but it will be soon. Another moment I was proud of was when the IT director spoke to me two months into the internship to say he wanted to keep me on after my internship. I didn't expect that so early on.

What do you value most about working at AdaCore?

Mathéo Rome: I have worked in a few places before, and what I like here is that there is a very technical environment, which is excellent for learning and understanding how things work. Even when I'm not working, for example, at lunch there are a lot of very technical discussions, which are very interesting and I learn a lot. Everyone is friendly and approachable; there are a lot of interesting people who are experts in their field. I find this fascinating.

During my internship, I had regular meetings with HR to ensure everything was going well, which was very nice. The management team supports you without putting too much pressure on you. I was very happy to be given responsibility early on. My mentor trusted me with the project. We had weekly meetings, but outside of that I could work how I wanted.

Anne-Lise Magagnin: I think it's how we are supported in our work. For example, during my internship, I had a meeting with HR every two weeks. I've never seen that in other companies. Also, there is a lot of remote work because our teams are distributed around the world, but people still know each other well. That's really nice and a bit unique, I think. Everyone talks to everyone. Internships can sometimes be neglected, but here we are really guided and supported.

Julian Coux: From day one, I was integrated into the team. I was free to make decisions; if I wanted to implement a feature, I was completely free to do so. I had a mission, and I could explore as far as I wanted to - I had all the resources I needed to do the work which I was interested in.

My colleagues are what make the environment so great; I can speak to anyone, from the director to my close colleagues. It's a safe space, and I'm not afraid to say if I want to work on different things. We can choose how we want to work.

What advice would you give to future interns considering a placement at AdaCore?

Mathéo Rome: Be curious. It's not easy because there are a lot of different things to learn, and it's important to be curious and try to understand as much as you can, because there are a lot of very interesting technologies.

Also, go for it. Some job titles might seem a little overwhelming, because the technologies are not common in other fields. But AdaCore supports you well as an intern, so you can learn a lot of skills in a short time.

Anne-Lise Magagnin: Just apply! It's a really good company to join. Don't hesitate to ask questions; I was a bit reserved at the beginning, but everyone is always happy to answer any question about any aspect of the company or the products.

Julian Coux: Don't be afraid to be curious during your internship; curiosity is very valuable at AdaCore. Your managers will appreciate it. If you are curious and motivated, they will give you the tools to do the work you want to do and the assets you need to succeed.

As you move into your permanent role, what are you most excited to work on or explore further?

Mathéo Rome: My permanent role will be a bit different because I will be joining the Dynamic Analysis Suite team. It will be a complete change, new technology and a new team, so it will be very interesting to learn about another part of AdaCore. The challenge will be much more technical since this is completely different from my internship. There seems to be a lot of interesting work to do, and I'm excited to learn new codebases and technologies.

Anne-Lise Magagnin: I haven't done any certification tasks yet, so I'm excited to start working on the certification part properly. I'll get to use the tool I created for a real project. Certification work is linked to aviation, and I really like aviation and planes, so it's great to be involved in that.

Julian Coux: I want to finish the product and see it in production, to see the company using it. After that, I want to explore other tools, and work on and learn many different things.