Big Data

Zagreb language and culture exchange meetup. Chat in many languages, meet new people and plan adventures together. **Hey everyone!** ✨ Whether you’re just in town, been here a while, or live around the corner, **Small Friday International Zagreb** ([SFIZ.FUN](https://sites.google.com/view/smallfridayinternationalzagreb)) is your go-to for laid-back summer hangs, language swapping, and good times with great people. 📍 **Where?** The Beertija, Pavla Hatza 16 🕗 **When?** Thursdays, every other week from 8PM ✨ Totally FREE - just grab a drink (support the bar’s rockin’ vibe 🍺🎸) ✨ Open to everyone - all ages, all vibes, all language levels 💬 What to expect? 🗣️ **Language Exchange** \- English\, Croatian\, Spanish\, French\, German\, Italian\, Ukrainian\, Russian… you name it🗣️💬🌐 🌍 **Cultural Vibes** \- Locals\, expats & travellers sharing tips & stories🌍🎭 🏺 🤝 **New Connections** \- Real convos\, real laughs\, real mates🤝✨🤗 🍷 **Weekend Planners** \- From hikes to gigs to fests\, let’s plot adventures🍻🏔️💃 🌟 **Why now?** Zagreb is a summer gem, chilled but buzzing, with shady parks, open-air concerts, food festivals, and a mountain just up the road. And with the city half-empty and the sun doing bits, there’s no better time to meet cool folks and swap cultures 🌆🎶🍦 And the best part? **[The Beertija](https://beertija.com/)** our HQ, isn’t just a bar, it’s the spot. Iconic beer garden, leafy terrace, good music, chill crowd. 😌🌿🎵The energy here is just right. ✨🌳🎧 Top tip: turn up early, keep it moving, catch someone’s eye, and dive into convo - it’s how all the magic starts 😉💫 No pressure, just rock up and join the crew. 💖Let’s ditch the screen, grab a drink, and meet the world!💖 See you on Small Friday! 🍻 **SFIZ Crew** P.S. Spread the word https://sites.google.com/view/smallfridayinternationalzagreb 🔎 **How to Spot Us** New here? Best trick is to swing by right at the start, that’s when it’s easiest to find the crew and jump straight in, or ask the bar staff about the event ✨ Need quick updates or can’t see us straight away? No worries, our [WhatsApp group](https://sites.google.com/view/smallfridayinternationalzagreb/faq/sfiz-whatsapp-guide-keeping-it-fun-and-respectful) is where you can ask quick questions. 💖 #ZagrebGlobalMingle 💖

**Looking for some creative company? Let’s write together! ☕💻** Why create all alone? Bring your laptop, notebook, pen and paper, or whatever project you're currently working on—non-writing projects are absolutely welcome too! **Here is our plan:** * **Meet & Chat:** Grab a coffee and settle in. * **Focus Block:** 30 minutes of quiet, uninterrupted time to make progress on our own projects. ✨ * **Talk Writing:** Discuss our creative journeys, share experiences, and play a couple of fun writing/brainstorming games. * **Socialize:** Hang out and connect with fellow creatives. Come for the focus, stay for the community. Can't wait to write together. Kat is a teacher and theater director. She has written for NYTHEATRE and Battle Creek Enquirer. Formerly based in New York City, she is currently traveling and bringing her meetups here to learn alongside the local community.

Open Heart Meditation Sessions with Amrita Rani (Live in-person and online on selected Thursdays via Zoom) You are warmly invited to join the Open Heart Meditation Sessions with Acharya Amrita Rani — a living space of awakenings and direct experience. These sessions are created both for beginners and seasoned practitioners who wish to deepen their meditation practice, stabilize awakening, and walk the path of enlightenment with guidance and support. Whether you are new or experienced, each gathering offers a grounded structure to help you build consistency in daily practice and grow in confidence on your spiritual path. At the heart of Open Heart teachings is direct recognition. Through the Two-Part Formula and precise meditative guidance, you are supported in shifting from self-based mode into selfless awareness, again and again, until cessation of suffering takes place. A central and deeply transformative practice in Open Heart is guru yoga. Through guru yoga, the practitioner directly connects with awakened awareness through devotion, transmission, and experiential recognition. With the help of this profound method, one recognizes their true selfless ease, the natural, effortless state beyond space and time. Alongside guru yoga, the sessions include insight meditation (Vipashyana), tantric methods, dynamic concentration, trauma-healing techniques, and foundational practices such as Bodhicitta prayers. Each session includes guided meditation, space for questions, reflection, and personal support. Rani’s meditation sessions are held live on Zoom on selected Thursdays from 18:30 to 20:00 (CET). Recordings may be available for continued integration and practice on her YouTube channel, The Sweetness of Enlightenment. Participation fee: 15 € per session Please make your payment in advance via PayPal before joining, to Rani’s PayPal account: kaisaeskeli@gmail.com Upcoming Thursday Sessions for Summer Season: 4.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 11.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 18.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 25.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 2.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 9.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 23.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 30.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) Zoom link for all sessions: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89766267672 Open Heart ashram (meditation center) is located in Zgornje Gorje, Slovenia. If you feel called to join in person, please email Rani at kaisaeskeli@gmail.com. Welcome all! Visit our home page for more information www.openheartofallbeings.com

Zagreb language and culture exchange meetup. Chat in many languages, meet new people and plan adventures together. **Hey everyone!** ✨ Whether you’re just in town, been here a while, or live around the corner, **Small Friday International Zagreb** ([SFIZ.FUN](https://sites.google.com/view/smallfridayinternationalzagreb)) is your go-to for laid-back summer hangs, language swapping, and good times with great people. 📍 **Where?** The Beertija, Pavla Hatza 16 🕗 **When?** Thursdays, every other week from 8PM ✨ Totally FREE - just grab a drink (support the bar’s rockin’ vibe 🍺🎸) ✨ Open to everyone - all ages, all vibes, all language levels 💬 What to expect? 🗣️ **Language Exchange** \- English\, Croatian\, Spanish\, French\, German\, Italian\, Ukrainian\, Russian… you name it🗣️💬🌐 🌍 **Cultural Vibes** \- Locals\, expats & travellers sharing tips & stories🌍🎭 🏺 🤝 **New Connections** \- Real convos\, real laughs\, real mates🤝✨🤗 🍷 **Weekend Planners** \- From hikes to gigs to fests\, let’s plot adventures🍻🏔️💃 🌟 **Why now?** Zagreb is a summer gem, chilled but buzzing, with shady parks, open-air concerts, food festivals, and a mountain just up the road. And with the city half-empty and the sun doing bits, there’s no better time to meet cool folks and swap cultures 🌆🎶🍦 And the best part? **[The Beertija](https://beertija.com/)** our HQ, isn’t just a bar, it’s the spot. Iconic beer garden, leafy terrace, good music, chill crowd. 😌🌿🎵The energy here is just right. ✨🌳🎧 Top tip: turn up early, keep it moving, catch someone’s eye, and dive into convo - it’s how all the magic starts 😉💫 No pressure, just rock up and join the crew. 💖Let’s ditch the screen, grab a drink, and meet the world!💖 See you on Small Friday! 🍻 **SFIZ Crew** P.S. Spread the word https://sites.google.com/view/smallfridayinternationalzagreb 🔎 **How to Spot Us** New here? Best trick is to swing by right at the start, that’s when it’s easiest to find the crew and jump straight in, or ask the bar staff about the event ✨ Need quick updates or can’t see us straight away? No worries, our [WhatsApp group](https://sites.google.com/view/smallfridayinternationalzagreb/faq/sfiz-whatsapp-guide-keeping-it-fun-and-respectful) is where you can ask quick questions. 💖 #ZagrebGlobalMingle 💖

\*\*\*\* Practice Foreign Languages with Native Speakers \*\*\*\*\* === \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* at the Language Conversation Table \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* === \*\*\*\* Practice Foreign Languages with Native Speakers \*\*\*\*\* === \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* at the Language Conversation Table \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* === The caffe Cukeraj provides us with a back-room reserved just for this event, where we get to practice Croatian and other languages three hours for free.The entrance is free, but to be sure that Domenico will continue to host us, please have at least one drink when you're coming.at Cukeraj, Petrinjska 61See you soon!P.S. IF U HAVE ANY PROBLEMS FINDING THE PLACE BE FREE TO CONTACT THE ORGANIZER: +385953913346 \*\*\*\*\* Vježbajte Strane Jezike sa Izvornim Govornicima \*\*\*\*\* === Za organizaciju događaja se ne mora nista platiti. Radi korištenja prostora u kafiću (koji se nalazi u dvorišnoj zgradi) , bilo bi poželjno kad bi svatko naručio barem jedno piće. Nedjelja 18:00 - 21:00 sati Cukeraj Petrinjska 61

**Looking for some creative company? Let’s write together! ☕💻** Why create all alone? Bring your laptop, notebook, pen and paper, or whatever project you're currently working on—non-writing projects are absolutely welcome too! **Here is our plan:** * **Meet & Chat:** Grab a coffee and settle in. * **Focus Block:** 30 minutes of quiet, uninterrupted time to make progress on our own projects. ✨ * **Talk Writing:** Discuss our creative journeys, share experiences, and play a couple of fun writing/brainstorming games. * **Socialize:** Hang out and connect with fellow creatives. Come for the focus, stay for the community. Can't wait to write together. Kat is a teacher and theater director. She has written for NYTHEATRE and Battle Creek Enquirer. Formerly based in New York City, she is currently traveling and bringing her meetups here to learn alongside the local community.

Open Heart Meditation Sessions with Amrita Rani (Live in-person and online on selected Thursdays via Zoom) You are warmly invited to join the Open Heart Meditation Sessions with Acharya Amrita Rani — a living space of awakenings and direct experience. These sessions are created both for beginners and seasoned practitioners who wish to deepen their meditation practice, stabilize awakening, and walk the path of enlightenment with guidance and support. Whether you are new or experienced, each gathering offers a grounded structure to help you build consistency in daily practice and grow in confidence on your spiritual path. At the heart of Open Heart teachings is direct recognition. Through the Two-Part Formula and precise meditative guidance, you are supported in shifting from self-based mode into selfless awareness, again and again, until cessation of suffering takes place. A central and deeply transformative practice in Open Heart is guru yoga. Through guru yoga, the practitioner directly connects with awakened awareness through devotion, transmission, and experiential recognition. With the help of this profound method, one recognizes their true selfless ease, the natural, effortless state beyond space and time. Alongside guru yoga, the sessions include insight meditation (Vipashyana), tantric methods, dynamic concentration, trauma-healing techniques, and foundational practices such as Bodhicitta prayers. Each session includes guided meditation, space for questions, reflection, and personal support. Rani’s meditation sessions are held live on Zoom on selected Thursdays from 18:30 to 20:00 (CET). Recordings may be available for continued integration and practice on her YouTube channel, The Sweetness of Enlightenment. Participation fee: 15 € per session Please make your payment in advance via PayPal before joining, to Rani’s PayPal account: kaisaeskeli@gmail.com Upcoming Thursday Sessions for Summer Season: 4.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 11.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 18.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 25.6.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 2.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 9.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 23.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) 30.7.2026 at 18:30–20:00 (CET) Zoom link for all sessions: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89766267672 Open Heart ashram (meditation center) is located in Zgornje Gorje, Slovenia. If you feel called to join in person, please email Rani at kaisaeskeli@gmail.com. Welcome all! Visit our home page for more information www.openheartofallbeings.com

**Practical Curiosity: Learning from Everyday Data** How do we actually get better at utilizing our day-to-day data? Fancy dashboards and complex models might look nice and draw attention, but that’s not where most of us spend our time. In fact those shiny outputs frequently sit unused, while the real insights are drawn from the analyst’s daily practice. Sometimes it’s as simple and as powerful as noticing that a segment is shrinking, a channel is underused, or certain links keep getting all the clicks. There’s many different places that the spark of insight can come from, but you have to keep your head in the data and know where to look. In this session, we’ll explore real-world examples of how segmentation, testing, and click behavior can uncover practical digital marketing opportunities. You’ll leave with inspiration for your own use cases, along with a few simple ways to ask better questions, spot meaningful patterns, and make smarter decisions without overcomplicating it. **About Our Speaker:** [Elaine Armbruster](https://www.linkedin.com/in/elainearmbruster/) is a Director of Digital Experience at the [American Diabetes Association](https://diabetes.org/), where she focuses on using data and insights to create smarter, more effective digital experiences. A lifelong Columbus resident, she has built her career in email marketing and the broader digital user journey, and is finding she most enjoys working in the messy middle where systems, data, and big ideas don’t quite line up yet. Thanks to our 2026 sponsors: [Clarivoy](https://www.clarivoy.com), [What Box Consulting Group](https://www.whatboxconsultinggroup.com), [Conductrics](https://www.conductrics.com), and [Piwik PRO](https://piwik.pro) More info at [cbusdaw.com](https://cbusdaw.com)

Highlights and Hidden Gems in SQL Server 2025 With so much emphasis on cloud data platforms and AI these days, SQL people can feel left behind by all the marketing hype. SQL Server 2025 was officially released in November of 2025, though, and contains a ton of improvements that will make our SQL Server deployments a bit faster, better, and more secure. There are even more improvements tucked into the release that never made a marketing blog or press release that you'll likely be learning about for the first time in this session! Join this session to learn about what makes your high availability a little more available, your performance a bit more performant, and your database more developer and app-friendly. Come spend an hour with SQL people talking SQL Server 2025 – the good, the "not quite ready for prime time", and the hidden awesomeness.

**Latest Dojo Location!** **Knotty Pine Brewing** 1765 W 3rd Ave, Columbus, OH 43212 We're going to try a new dojo location for a few weeks and see how it works Dojos are informal Python group study sessions where everyone interested in Python gathers to learn about Python, help others with Python, or just hang out. Everyone is welcome from Python beginners to experts. Bringing a laptop is encouraged (we'll have extension cords and power strips). If there's something you want to learn leave a comment on this invite so we can plan ahead. We're looking for speakers for our Monthly Meetups! Fill out the form if you are interested in presenting to the Python Community. https://forms.gle/ehSfUAC2WgR34Crq9

Topic to be announced. **CALL FOR SPEAKERS** Learn more: https://www.awscolumbus.com/get-involved/ **THANK YOU** *VEEAM* for hosting our meetup! To learn more about *Veeam*, please visit their website: https://www.veeam.com/ **DIRECTIONS** 8800 Lyra Dr #450 · Columbus, OH go to 4th floor. **Want to sponsor the pizza and/or bar tab?** Please contact me if you would like to sponsor this meetup's pizza and/or bar tab: angelo@mandato.com

Most people use LLMs by feel: ask a question, read the answer, decide whether it “seems good,” and move on. That works for casual use. It does not work when you are building software, automating workflows, writing important documents, or relying on AI for anything that needs to be repeatable. In this talk, we’ll look at how to improve and evaluate the inputs and outputs of LLMs using practical measurement techniques. We’ll cover how prompt changes affect results, how to compare outputs, how to build simple evaluation sets, and how math-based methods like similarity scoring can help you move beyond guesswork. This will be beginner-friendly, so even if you don't know anything about AI, you should get something out of it. However, this will be a little more technical than our intro talks. You do not need to be an AI researcher, but programmers and technically curious attendees will get a lot out of it. We’ll cover: * Why “it looks good” is not enough * How to improve prompts by changing the input, context, and constraints * How to compare LLM outputs more systematically * Basic evaluation techniques for accuracy, consistency, and usefulness * How embeddings, cosine similarity, and scoring can help evaluate results * Where automated evaluation works — and where humans still need to stay in the loop By the end, you’ll have a practical mental model for treating LLMs less like magic and more like systems you can test, measure, and improve. LOGISTICS AND PARKING: The talk starts at 7:00 PM. The first half hour is reserved for everyone to get set up and mingle. Free pizza and drinks! The cheapest parking option is to find street parking, which will only cost you a few bucks. Otherwise, park in the nearby veteran's museum lot for $8. It's highly recommended you avoid the nearby $15 garage parking.

You can sleep in on the Sesquicentennial (observed), we’re shifting to the following Friday. But join the local UX community for a chat and some biscuits to catch up. If you were in CA for Figma Config, tell us all the lines and you can tell me how I can animate an SVG without coding it by hand, and why I’d even want to. Thanks to the team at Nationwide of supporting the group.

Want to be a speaker? submit your talk to our Call for Presenters!!! https://sessionize.com/azure-cbus-2026/