Category Archives: Events

Safe Surfing, Safe Parenting: Security Awareness lecture by Rohit Srivastwa – 26 June

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What: CSI Pune workshop on ‘Safe Surfing, Safe Parenting’ by Rohit Srivastwa
When: Saturday, 26th June, 3pm-6pm
Where: K.B. Joshi Hall, Cummins College of Engineering, Karve Nagar, Pune.
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all. Register here

Click on the logo to see all PuneTech posts about CSI Pune
Computer Society of India, Pune Chapter, is one of the oldest technology user groups that is still active. Click on the logo to see all PuneTech posts about CSI Pune

Safe Surfing, Safe Parenting

This workshop by security evangelist Rohit Srivastwa aims:

  • Create awareness among the society at large about the social threats hidden in uncontrolled access to internet
  • show how parents can inculcate safe internet habits in their children and how they can monitor for any unwanted activities by children.
  • show children as to how they should refrain from the internet sites which are tempting but not safe for their age / level of knowledge.

This event is sponsored by Symantec Corporation.

Update:
The slides used by Rohit are now available online:

Cyber Safe Parenting

Click here if you don’t see any slides above.

About the Speaker – Rohit Srivastwa

Rohit is a well known security evangelist, having an expertise in hacking, cyber crime investigation and IT infrastructure management.

He is actively involved in advising and assisting several military agencies, law enforcement personnel, media, corporate and Government bodies. He provides coaching and training to the Police department of Pune, Mauritius and Malaysia on the related subjects. He is also a visiting faculty at Asian School of Cyber Laws, Symbiosis and many other institutes.

Rohit is also the founder of ClubHack, a community to provide a platform to the security experts across the globe to come together, and to spread security awareness amongst laypeople.

Apart from ClubHack Rohit has been involved in many large scale projects in the field of IT infrastructure management & security. In his last assignment Rohit was Director Technology at Commonwealth Youth Games (2008) where he headed the technology division and delivered the complete technology of games. After that he was Director Technology and Network Operations for Commonwealth Games Delhi (2010).

POCC Meet: Taking your startup to the next level, with Vilas Kelshikar – 19 June

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What: Pune OpenCoffee Club meeting on Taking your startup to the next level, with Vilas Kelshikar.
When: Saturday, June 19th, 4pm-7pm
Where: TaaraGo Center, A4, Ashiayana Park, Above FabIndia, North Main Road, Koregaon Park
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all to attend. No registration required.

Pune OpenCoffee Club - POCC Logo
POCC is an informal group of the Pune Startup ecosystem. It contains more than 1500 people who either have their own startups, or want to start one, or provide some service (or funding) to startups. Click on the logo to find all punetech articles about the POCC

Taking your startup to the next level

Mr. Vilas Kelshikar is an IIM-Ahmedabad Alumnus with 30+ years professional experience – wherein he held progressively responsible positions in reputed companies engaged in diverse product-lines/sectors (including Education / Training, Hospitality, Real Estate Services, Trading ) in Gulf, Africa and India.

Vilas has hands-on experience in diverse functional areas including Strategy, Joint Ventures, Sourcing, Setting-up, Turn-around, Expansion, Project Finance, Feasibility Studies, Sales & Mktg, HR, etc.

He can also talk about the possibilities of Pune companies exploring business opportunities in Gulf and African countries. If people are interested, he can talk about country profiles, business practices, currencies, establishing/doing business, SWOT analysis, etc.

Vilas is Currently based out of Muscat.

Thanks to TaaraGo for hosting the event. Please visit TaaraGo.com for event updates in Pune

TechMarathi Event: Trends in Java; How to type in Marathi – 19 June

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What: TechMarathi kickoff lecture, featuring technology trends with Harshad Oak, and introduction to typing in Marathi using Baraha, Quillpad, Google Transliterator, and Lipikaar
When: Saturday, 19 June, 4pm-7pm
Where: Symbiosis Institute of Computer Studies and Research, Atur Centre, Model Colony. Map.
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all. Register here

TechMarathi is a special interest group of PuneTech and focuses on bringing the latest tech information to students and professionals in Marathi. Click on the logo to see all PuneTech articles about TechMarathi
TechMarathi is a special interest group of PuneTech and focuses on bringing the latest tech information to students and professionals in Marathi. Click on the logo to see all PuneTech articles about TechMarathi

Trends In Software Development For The Java Platform.

Harshad Oak is the founder of Rightrix Solutions & editor of http://IndicThreads.com and the author of 3 books and several articles on Java technology. For his contributions to technology and the community, he has been recognized as an Oracle ACE Director and a Sun Java Champion.

Harshad will talk in Marathi about what the next 5 years have in store for the Java Platform

How to type (email, blog, doc etc.) in Marathi?

Mandar Vaze has 15+ years of experience in IT industry. He is currently working as Senior Module Lead at Avaya India. Mandar will talk about how to type in Marathi using Baraha, or Quillpad, or Google Transliterate

Using Lipikaar to type in Marathi

Lipikaar is a Pune-based startup that takes a very different approach to typing in Marathi. It uses a “sms-style” typing rules, and they claim this is much easier for people who are not very comfortable with English, compared to the other styles of marathi typing.

Neha Gupta and Praman Shetye of the Lipikaar team will talk about the how and why of Lipikaar.

About TechMarathi

http://TechMarathi.com is a forum that aims to bring all information about software technology in Marathi to technology professionals who are still more comfortable with Marathi than English. The website contains articles that are translations into Marathi from sources all over the world, and also original Marathi content. TechMarathi also holds technology events where the primary language is Marathi.

TechMarathi was started by Nikhil Kadadi and Pallavi Kelkar and is a Special Interest Group of PuneTech.

vodQA Nite: The testing spirit – event for QA professionals – 10th June

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What: vodQA Nite, an event for the software testing industry
When: Thursday, 10th June, 5:30pm
Where: ThoughtWorks Technologies, GF-01 and MZ-01, Tower C, Panchshil Tech Park, Yerwada. Map
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all to attend. Register here

vodQA Nite: The testing spirit

Thoughtworks Pune presents vodQA Nite – THE TESTING SPIRIT! – an event for the software testing industry to strengthen the QA community by sharing and learning new practices and ideas.

‘vodQA Nite’ offers a unique opportunity to interact with people who are equally passionate about software testing and continuously strive to better the art. The format of ‘vodQA Nite’ is scheduled such that each speaker will have 10-12 minutes to present followed by a couple of minutes of “open” discussion with participants. The topics covered in this workshop will be appropriate for any level of testing experience.

Connect with like-minded peers, and gain insight from industry practitioners.

Please note : This is a free to attend event. Register as an attendee here.

Who should attend?

Quality analysts and testing aficionados who want to interact with the testing community. This is also relevant to those interested in the nuances of test automation and how testing works in an Agile environment.

If you have any queries, email vodQA-Pune@thoughtworks.com

Tech events in Pune this weekend – 4 & 5 June

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There are a number of interesting tech events in Pune today and tomorrow. Here is a brief overview of each. All of these events are free, and no registration is required.

PLUG Meet – Presentation on Unicode by G Karunakar

Tomorrow, Saturday, June 5, 4pm-6pm, 7th Floor, SICSR, Model Colony,

The Pune Linux Users Group’s monthly meeting happens on the first Saturday of every month, from 4pm to 6pm at SICSR, Model Colony. This month, the agenda includes a talk by G Karunakar on Unicode. Linux CD/DVDs will also be available at the meeting for anyone looking to install linux.

This is a great place to meet open source enthusiasts in Pune

For more details, see: http://plug.org.in

Mentoring Workshop on clean energy financing in Pune

Today, Friday, June 4, 10am-1:30pm, 1st Floor, Hotel Le Meridien

Private Financing Advisory Network (PFAN) is a multilateral, public-private partnership initiated by the Climate Technology Initiative (CTI) and funded by USAID. PFAN seeks to identify clean energy projects at an early stage and act as a project financing coaching and consultancy service to facilitate financial closure of such projects. After establishing dedicated in-country networks in China, Indonesia and Philippines, PFAN has now launched its services in India.

This workshop will introduce Indian clean energy entrepreneurs and stakeholders to the PFAN initiative and how they can leverage this platform to connect with investors and avail pro-bono mentoring services.

Agenda:

9.30 pm: Registration
10:00 am: Welcome Note, Suneel Parasnis, Team Leader – Clean Energy Finance, Contractor, USAID ECO-Asia Clean Development and Climate Program
10:10 am: Introduction to CTI-PFAN, Kavita Kaur, Country Manager – PFAN India, Contractor, USAID ECO-Asia Clean Development and Climate Program
10:30 am: MOU Signing – IT Power India and IndiaCo Ventures
11:00 am: Investor’s Expectations out of Business Plan â Rahul Patwardan, Vice Chairman and Managing Director, IndiaCo Ventures
11:30 am: Tea/Coffee Break
11:45 pm: Promoting Clean Energy – R.Chandrasekhar, CEO, IT Power
12:15 pm: Components of a Good Business Plan âSuneel Parasnis, Team Leader, ECO-Asia
1:00 pm: Panel discussion
1:30 pm: Lunch

For more details see: http://www.cti-pfan.net/

PuneCleanTech meet: Energy Efficiency – Opportunities and Challenges

Tomorrow, Saturday, June 5, 11am, Venture Center, NCL Innovation Center, Pashan Road

The new gee-whiz technologies such as solar, wind, geothermal, biofuels et cetera take all the limelight these days. But the fact remains that they are still a miniscule part of our energy mix and will remain so for the foreseeable future. A far bigger opportunity, however, exists all around us. There is enormous potential for making the conventional energy generation, distribution, storage and utilization much more efficient than what it is.

What is this opportunity? Where is it? How does one find it? How big is it? What can be done about it? How can it be addressed? Does anyone address it today? How do they do it? What qualifications do they need to do it?

Mr. Shishir Athale, founder of Sudnya Industrial Services, an energy services company, will discuss all these questions on June 5th, 11am at the NCL Venture Center (June 5th is also the Environment Day, a fitting coincidence!).

For more details see: http://punecleantech.com/energy-efficiency-opportunities-and-challenges/

POCC Meet: How to build a great startup team

Tomorrow, Saturday, 5 June, 4pm-7pm, 4th Floor, SICSR, Model Colony

The initial stages require only a handful of core team-members (3 to 5). These few are crucial to the success of the startup product or service. Finding these people, is one of the primary challenges facing startups today. Chetana Mehta will tackle a whole bunch of questions related to this topic. Chetana Mehta, ex-VP HR at GS Lab helped grow Persistent Systems, GS Lab when they were at a similar stage has offered to cover some aspects of nurturing and training teams.

For more details see: http://punetech.com/how-to-build-a-killer-startup-team-pocc-event-5-june/

How to build a killer startup team: POCC Event, 5 June

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Update: The slides the Chetana used for her talk are now up on slideshare:

How to build killer teams | Chetana Mehta

What: Pune OpenCoffee Club meeting on How to build a killer startup team, with Chetana Mehta, ex-VP HR at GS Lab
When: Saturday, June 5, 4pm-7pm
Where: Symbiosis Institute of Computer Studies and Research, Room #407, 4th follor, Atur Centre, Model Colony. Map.
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all to attend. Register here

How to build a killer startup team

(event description by Santosh Dawara)

As tech startups will identify, the initial stages require only a handful of core team-members (3 to 5). These few are crucial to the success of the startup product or service. This idea extends to startups in other domains as well.

Chetana Mehta, ex-VP HR at GS Lab helped grow Persistent Systems, GS Lab when they were at a similar stage has offered to cover some aspects of nurturing and training teams.

Pune OpenCoffee Club - POCC Logo
POCC is an informal group of the Pune Startup ecosystem. It contains more than 1500 people who either have their own startups, or want to start one, or provide some service (or funding) to startups. Click on the logo to find all punetech articles about the POCC

From my own experience, startup hires are only getting younger (freshers, 1 to 2 yrs of experience). These candidates don’t have the big-company mindset and are willing to take on a no-name startup.

I would like to explore the following challenges:

  • How do you nurture these few to take on ownership of diverse areas and cope with the uncertainties of a startup?
  • How do you set them on a path where they can take charge of their own effectiveness and learning?
  • How do you encourage teamwork and confidence in team members in the capabilities of others?
  • Another key challenge is how do you convince this core team to work for you for not just the money, but above all for a common vision or goal and the fulfillment of kick-starting a profitable venture.
  • Does equity even work here or is it misplaced? With students, they expect immediate returns rather than wait 8+ years for an IPO.

As the startup gains traction and moves on to the next level, the challenges are different. As Navin called out when interviewing Druva CEO:

  • How does a startup scale up hiring and training high-quality personnel?
  • How do you scale the corporate and / or engineering culture you have so carefully built?

Look forward to hearing about how you build teams and the challenges you are facing.

References:

Relevant excerpt from Druva CEO’s PuneTech interview:

What is their (Druva’s) primary challenge currently?

Jaspreet says that they want to build a high-quality, world-class product, and for that he needs lots of high-quality, world-class people. While theyâve obviously managed to build a team like that which got them so far, they need many more such people in the coming days, and thatâs a significant challenge. He says that it is difficult, if not impossible to find âreadymadeâ world-class talent here (even when âworld-classâ salary and/or equity is offered!). Instead, he feels that the only approach that works is to find individuals (whether freshers or industry veterans) who have the right attitude and potential and then nurture them into the required shape.

(As an aside, wed like to point out that is a pattern. Pretty much every startup we talk to mentions hiring of high-quality people as one of their primary challenges. This is a problem that needs a solution, and I’m hoping that some entrepreneur in Pune is looking at this as an opportunity.)

About Pune OpenCoffee Club

Meet with other entrepreneurs, investors, startups, advisors, (and anyone else) from Pune, India in an informal setting.

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Overview of HTML5: CSI Pune Lecture – May 31

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What: CSI Pune lecture on HTML5 by Swarraj Kulkarni, Principal Architect, Cognizant, Pune.
When: Monday May 31, 2010, 6pm-7:30pm
Where: 1st Floor Lecture Hall, I2IT (International Institute of Information Technology), Hinjewadi
Registration and Fees: Free for CSI members and students, Rs 100 for others. Register here and pay on the spot.

Click on the logo to see all PuneTech posts about CSI Pune
Click on the logo to see all PuneTech posts about CSI Pune

HTML5

HTML5 is the next generation of HTML, to reduce the need for proprietary plug-in based Rich Internet Application (RIA) development technologies such as Adobe Flash, Silverlight, JavaFx, etc. The new version will have capabilities of HTML v4.0 plus additional features like DOM management, offline storage database, document editing, drag-drop, etc. This talk will be focused on salient features of HTML5 and how it will influence the next generation RIA development process.

This lecture is useful for all IT professionals and students especially for those, who are seeking to have deep penetration in web and internet related activities in years to come. HTML 5 is probably going to be tomorrow’s mainstream platform for web development – so this lecture is surely going to be an eye opener!

About the Speaker – Swarraj Kulkarni

Swarraj has more than 17 years of experience in the IT industry. At Cognizant, he is working as a Principal Architect for BFS-Technology Consulting Group. BFS (Banking & Financial Services) is at the centre of any activity whether it is a commercial or manufacturing. BFS has a very vast array of direct activities and derived activities. Multiple technologies get involved in these services. Being an Enterprise Architect, he focuses on multiple technologies, architecture patterns and enterprise adoption of upcoming technologies including Web 2.0, SOA, etc.

He has been closely following Web 2.0 in general and its adoption in enterprises to solve business problems.

Call for speakers – IndicThreads conference on Cloud Computing

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IndicThreads, the Pune-based organization that is best known for its annual Java conference that happens in Pune, is now diversifying and holding conferences on other areas of technology. The next conference is on Cloud Computing, and will be held in Pune on 20 and 21st August.

indicthreads logo small
The call for papers is out and the deadline for submissions is 31st May – actually, it’s a call for speakers – because you’re only required to submit an abstract now, and a slideshow just before the conference. Submitting entries to conferences like this is, we believe, a good way for Pune’s tech professionals to get visibility for their work, and a good way to get into a paid conference without having to pay the fees. Hence, if you’ve done any work in cloud computing, or virtualization, or Software-as-a-Service, or if you know enough about one of the related fields to be able to give an overview talk, you should submit an abstract.

For IndicThreads’ previous conference (on software quality assurance), we had given a list of reasons why you should strongly consider being a speaker at that conference. You should re-read that post, because most of the reasons continue to apply.

Suggested list of topics

Topics include but are not restricted to the following, stated in no particular order –

Diagram showing three main types of cloud comp...
Image via Wikipedia
  1. Cloud /Grid architecture
  2. Cloud-based Services and Education
  3. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
  4. Software as a Service (SaaS)
  5. Platform as a Service (PaaS)
  6. Virtualization
  7. High-Performance Computing
  8. Cloud-Delivered Testing
  9. Cloud Lock-in vs. Cloud Interoperability
  10. Multi Cloud Frameworks & APIs
  11. Monitoring Cloud Applications
  12. Data Security & Encryption On The Cloud
  13. Elastic Computing
  14. Cloud Databases
  15. Private vs. Public Clouds
  16. Cloud Scalability
  17. Cloud Analytics

Submission

Submit your entry here.

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Demo Talk on “R” – software for analyzing and visualizing data – 29 May

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What: Demo talk on R – free software package for analyzing and visualizing data, part of Bhaskaracharya Pratishthana’s lecture series for promotion of open source Math software
When: Saturday, 29 May 2010, at 3pm-4:30pm
Where: Bhaskaracharya Pratishthana
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all to attend. No registration is required.

Bhaskaracharya Pratishthana is a Pune-based research and educational institution for Mathematics. It regularly has free educational lectures that encourage use of open source software packages for mathematics. Click on the logo to go to its website.
Bhaskaracharya Pratishthana is a Pune-based research and educational institution for Mathematics. It regularly has free educational lectures that encourage use of open source software packages for mathematics. Click on the logo to go to its website.

Overview of R

R is a programming language and software environment for statistical computing and graphics. The R language has become a de facto standard among statisticians for the development of statistical software,and is widely used for statistical software development and data analysis. R is an open source software package and is a part of the GNU project.

Abstract of the Talk

This talk will attempt to introduce R, CRAN and http://www.r-project.org/ to non-specialists by a non-specialist. Appreciation of the Package-diversity that is available within R – framework for analyzing and visualizing DATA of all kinds will be the main goal.

Simple Examples drawn from the vast R-literature will be used for this purpose. The aim is to feel the characteristic easy R-style, even in practically useful important tasks.

PuneCleanTech meet: Energy Efficiency, Opportunities & Challenges – 5 June

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What: An overview of the opportunities and challenges in the area of conventional energy efficiencies, by Shishir Athale
When: Saturday, June 5, 11am
Where: Venture Center, NCL Innovation Park, Pashan Road. Map: http://bit.ly/VenCen (To reach Venture Center, go past NCL towards Pashan, pass the cricket ground adjacent to NCL and then you’ll find NCL Innovation Park / Venture Center on the right hand side.)
Registration and Fees: This event is free for all to attend. Free seating on First Come, First Seated basis only
Further Info: Contact Harshad Nanal (harshadnanal@gmail.com), Anil Paranjape (amparanjape@gmail.com)

Energy Efficiency – Opportunities and Challenges

PuneCleanTech is a special interest group (SIG) of PuneTech focusing on clean tech. Click on the logo to go to the PuneCleanTech website for more details
PuneCleanTech is a special interest group (SIG) of PuneTech focusing on clean tech. Click on the logo to go to the PuneCleanTech website for more details

The new gee-whiz technologies such as solar, wind, geothermal, biofuels et cetera take all the limelight these days. But the fact remains that they are still a miniscule part of our energy mix and will remain so for the foreseeable future. A far bigger opportunity, however, exists all around us. There is enormous potential for making the conventional energy generation, distribution, storage and utilization much more efficient than what it is.

What is this opportunity? Where is it? How does one find it? How big is it? What can be done about it? How can it be addressed? Does anyone address it today? How do they do it? What qualifications do they need to do it?

We are fortunate to have Mr. Shishir Athale enlighten us on all these questions on June 5th, 11am at the NCL Venture Center (June 5th is also the Environment Day, a fitting coincidence!). Shishir is one of those very few intrepid entrepreneurs, who have the guts to get into this very tough market, where he has been painstaking building his company called Sudnya Industrial Services. Sudnya is an ESCO (Energy Services Company) which identifies energy efficiency improvement opportunities for clients, often putting their own money on the line, getting paid only if those savings materialize (now you know why this business is not for the faint-hearted!) Besides guts, this business also needs a rare mix of capabilities: engineering, project planning, management, finance, marketing all rolled into one. It will be exhilarating walking Shishir’s journey (while safely holding his hand 🙂 on this tough trail.

Before Sudnya, Shishir spent many years at Thermax and other companies, getting trained on many engineering skills in heat and co-generation fields that ultimately culminated into Sudnya. Before Thermax, he managed plants for CPG companies where he often implemented energy saving projects, sometimes achieving 25% energy savings.

Shishir is well recognized as a trainer for energy managers by none other than FICCI. He was on CII’s sub-committees on Cogeneration and Energy End-use Efficiency and on an MNES Committee for evolving a National Policy on Bio-mass Based Cogeneration. He is a qualified Lead Assessor for ISO 9000 certification and has undergone training in India and abroad. He qualified as a Certified Energy Auditor in the first examination conducted by the BEE in 2004.

Shishir is a graduate in Chemical Technology and now resides in Pune.

As always, seating is limited, no reservations and strictly on a first-come, first-seated basis.

About PuneCleanTech

PuneCleanTech is a special interest group of PuneTech focusing on Clean Technologies. It is an awareness, education, and networking platform to showcase Clean Technologies developed and used in and around Pune, one of the largest Industrial hubs in India. The network brings together technology professionals, entrepreneurs, students, policy makers, investors, and citizens interested in Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy, Waste management, Water Management, and Environmentally-Friendly Design/Development/Delivery Alternatives to Traditional Products and Services. Those interested in this area are urged to join the PuneCleanTech mailing list, Anil Paranjape (amparanjape@gmail.com) with support from PuneTech and NCL Venture Center.

About NCL Venture Center:

Venture Center – a CSIR initiative – is a not-for-profit company hosted by the National Chemical Laboratory, Pune. Venture Center strives to nucleate and nurture technology and knowledge-based enterprises by leveraging the scientific and engineering competencies of the institutions in the Pune region in India. The Venture Center is a technology business incubator specializing in technology enterprises offering products and services exploiting scientific expertise in the areas of materials, chemicals and biological sciences & engineering.

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