Cloud Infrastructure

**Venue:** Riverbank House, 2 Swan Ln, London EC4R 3AD **Please note:** 1\. 🚨🚨🚨 A valid photo ID is required by building security\. 🚨🚨🚨 2\. This event follows the [NumFOCUS Code of Conduct](https://numfocus.org/code-of-conduct). Please familiarise yourself with it before attending. If your RSVP status says "You're going" you will be able to get in. No need to show your RSVP confirmation when signing in. If you can no longer make it, please unRSVP as soon as possible. **Code of Conduct:** This event follows the NumFOCUS Code of Conduct. Please get in touch with the organisers with any questions or concerns. As always, there will be free food and drinks, generously provided by our host, Man Group. **Main Talks** 1. **SVD-ROM: Reduced Order Modeling of huge arrays using the Singular Value Decomposition** - **David Salvador-Jasin** We present SVD-ROM, an open source Python package to perform Reduced Order Modeling (ROM) of very large arrays using the Singular Value Decomposition (SVD). Despite the high dimensionality of datasets typically encountered in real-world scenarios such as fluid dynamics or weather & climate, these are typically low-rank: there are a few dominant patterns that explain the high dimensionality. The SVD is a useful dimensionality reduction technique for such systems, and has the advantages of being explainable and computationally efficient. SVD-ROM enables the application of SVD-based machine learning methods such as Principal Component Analysis (PCA), Proper Orthogonal Decomposition (POD) or Dynamic Mode Decomposition (DMD) on massive datasets. We employ Dask for parallel and out-of-core computation, Xarray for labelled N-dimensional arrays, and data formats such as Zarr and NetCDF for chunked storage of large arrays. We have developed SVD-ROM keeping user-friendliness in mind, exposing a Python API that enables the straightforward application of methods such as pre-processing, model fitting, reconstruction and forecasting. Additionally, Dask makes code portability across laptop, HPC clusters or cloud straightforward, enabling the user to run SVD-ROM on different computational environments with minimal changes. The development of SVD-ROM has also resulted in multiple contributions to PyDMD, the most popular open source Python package for the application of DMD. In this talk we show how we can fit a DMD model to a global weather dataset tens of GB in size and produce an accurate sub-seasonal forecast (6 weeks ahead) on a laptop in just a few minutes. 2. **From Zero to HyperPod: Cutting Infrastructure Complexity for Distributed Model Training on AWS** - [Anton Nazaruk](anton.e.nazaruk@gmail.com) Training state‑of‑the‑art models often stalls on two pain points: GPU availability and infrastructure complexity. In this 40‑minute, practitioner‑level session, I will demystify the fastest, most cost‑effective routes to dedicated NVIDIA H100 and B200 clusters on AWS. We will compare EC2 On‑Demand, Spot, Savings Plans, EC2 Capacity Blocks, and the new SageMaker Training Plans with HyperPod, showing where each shines for research, production training, and massive fine‑tunes. A live demo will provision a 256‑GPU HyperPod, walk through distributed‑training set‑up with Deep Speed + PyTorch, and showcase built‑in checkpointing and automatic node recovery. Attendees will leave with: 1) a decision framework for picking the right reservation model, 2) reference Terraform and CDK snippets to launch clusters in minutes, and 3) cost‑optimisation tips that have saved our clients up to 35% versus unmanaged fleets. Biggest focus on practical architectures, benchmarks, and war stories you can apply the next day. **Lightning Talks** 1. **Agentic, Agentic AI for Personalized Care — Lessons and Challenges from Holisticare.io - Mojtaba Kargar** 2. **Mapping the International PyData Community featuring Web Scraping and Data Wrangling - [Hugh Evans](https://www.linkedin.com/in/hugh-evans-dev/)** \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\- **Logistics** Doors open at **6.30 pm** (get there early as you'll need to sign in with building security). Talks start at **7:00 pm**, with drinks afterwards from **9:00 pm** at The Banker (EC4). We have reduced capacity for this event, but there will be plenty of people to discuss data science questions with. Please unRSVP in good time if you realise you can't make it. We're limited by building security on the number of attendees, so please free up your place for your fellow community members. If you want me to trim lightning talks down to two or shorten any abstracts, say which ones.

SOLD OUT (sorry!) Hello all! For our next outing, we're heading to the Institute of Contemporary Art for one of their amazing film screenings. Meet at 6PM just inside the front entrance for a 6:20 start to the film. Amid the unrest of the West Bank, a confrontation between Noor, a Palestinian teenager, and Israeli soldiers prompts his mother to revisit her family’s long tradition of resilience. Her recollections stretch back to the Nakba of 1948 and flow into the present day, revealing how courage is shaped by loss, exile, and survival. In Dabis’ film, history and memory intertwine to form a restrained yet deeply affecting meditation on displacement and shared humanity. This Preview screening is followed by a Q&A with director Cherien Dabis. **This is a ticketed event.** Please purchase your tickets here: https://ica.art/films/preview-all-that-s-left-of-you-q-a The screening will take place in Cinema 1. It has step free access from The Mall and is accessible by ramp. There is one wheelchair allocated space with a seat for a companion. All seats are hard back, have a crushed velvet feel and they do not recline. Seat dimensions: W42 x D45 x H52 Arm rest either side of the seat dimensions: L27 x W7 x H20 Ticket information: All tickets that do not require ID (full price, disabled, income support) can be printed at home or stored in email. For aged-based concession tickets (under 25, student) please bring relevant ID to collect at the front desk before the event.

**Welcome to Networx London!** Are you a **MedTech professional**, digital innovator, or **IT leader** looking to connect with others shaping the future of **healthcare, technology, and business**? Join us for a relaxed and engaging evening designed for **innovators, leaders, and changemakers** across **MedTech, HealthTech, Digital Health, Biotech, and IT-driven healthcare sectors**. Whether you're a **product leader, developer, clinical engineer, IT manager, investor, marketer, healthcare consultant, or aspiring founder**—this is your space to meet like-minded people, exchange ideas, and spark new opportunities. We start at **6:30 PM** with a warm welcome and light icebreakers to get conversations flowing, followed by **open networking all evening**. No formal pitches—just real connections, fresh ideas, and meaningful relationships in a friendly, laid-back setting. 📍 **Venue: The Refinery Regent Place, Warren St** Located in the vibrant Regent Place area, The Refinery offers a stylish yet welcoming atmosphere perfect for networking and socializing. With its modern interiors, spacious layout, and relaxed vibe, it’s an ideal spot for after-work drinks and professional gatherings. Just a short walk from Warren Street station, it provides the perfect setting for meaningful conversations and new connections in a chic but unpretentious environment. Come join us, grab a drink, and grow your network—one great conversation at a time. 📅 **Event Schedule** **18:30 – 19:00 \| Welcome** Kick off with a warm intro and fun icebreakers to set the tone. **19:00 – 19:30 \| Meet & Greet** Mingle and network in an open, friendly setting. **19:30 – 21:30 \| Informal Networking** Free-flowing, informal networking all evening—no sales, no pressure. Just authentic connections with amazing people. 💡 **Why Attend?** **🤝 Build Valuable Connections** – Network with business leaders, investors, and professionals across London. **🚀 Unlock New Opportunities** – Discover potential partners, collaborators, or clients. **📈 Stay Informed** – Gain insights into the latest trends in tech, finance, startups, and entrepreneurship. This event is perfect for anyone seeking to expand their professional circle, grow their business, or gain fresh perspectives from a dynamic mix of professionals. 👥 **Who’s coming?** This event is ideal for digital entrepreneurs, IT professionals, tech innovators, marketers, investors, product managers, creatives, and anyone curious about the future of digital transformation and technology. 🎟 Tickets & Entry To avoid the venue getting overcrowded and ensure everyone enjoys an amazing night, we've introduced a small ticket price to keep things running smoothly. **Limited spots!** Register today and hit **Follow** for updates on future weekly events. 📸 **Event Photography** Please note that photos and videos may be taken for promotional purposes. **Note**: Proof of ID required for alcoholic beverages. 18+ only. 🔗 \*\*Join our WhatsApp group to connect before and after the event:\*\*👉 [https://chat.whatsapp.com/GisOCaIiMeKEehV5Lv7qxg](https://chat.whatsapp.com/GisOCaIiMeKEehV5Lv7qxg "https://chat.whatsapp.com/GisOCaIiMeKEehV5Lv7qxg")

**About Session** **Advanced** **4 courts for first 2 hours** **2 courts for remaining 2 hours** **High grade tournament shuttles (speed 77-78)** **£14 (bank transfer)** Please sign up to **ONLY ONE** of the 2 concurrent Tuesday sessions (this is the 4-hour Tuesday session). Courts will be reduced to two from 8 to 10 PM Non-members should message the organizers their full-name via WhatsApp (Adrian Rabe, +447410463483) to arrange tryouts. Guests allowed but members will be prioritized over guests. Please message Committee members if you would like to add on a guest. Break the strings on 2 racquets, or break a racquet during the session and your session is *free*. Take a photo of the broken strings or racquet **DURING** the session, upload, and tag Broken Strings on Instagram to get the fee waiver. Cancellations < 24 hours before the event will be penalized the full fee. Please message organizer via WhatsApp for late cancellations or for potential slots. We will be discreetly speaking to players who may be struggling with the level of the session. **Free parking available within the school**. Note that the School will be opening and closing the gate **10 minutes before** and **10 minutes after** the beginning and end of the session. If you are locked out, please contact the organizers or other members to help let you in. Photographs and video recordings may be made during the session. Signing up to the session would **include consent for these recordings to be made and used by the club on its social media and other platforms**. **DO NOT PLAY** if you have fever, cough, colds, or other symptoms

**Welcome to NextGen Science – Medicine & Innovation Edition!** Are you shaping the future of medicine, biotech, pharma, or life sciences? This is your chance to connect with like-minded innovators, executives, researchers, and entrepreneurs. Step into an evening where ideas meet opportunity — a relaxed yet dynamic space for those driving progress in medtech, clinical research, biopharma, and medical innovation. From research scientists and medical affairs experts to founders, VCs, and rising leaders — if you’re transforming the industry (or want to), this is where meaningful connections begin. We start at **6:30 PM** with a warm welcome and light icebreakers to get conversations flowing, followed by **open networking all evening**.No formal pitches just real connections, fresh ideas, and meaningful conversations in a friendly, laid-back setting. 📍 **Venue: The Refinery Regent Place, Warren St** Located in the vibrant Regent Place area, The Refinery offers a stylish yet welcoming atmosphere perfect for networking and socializing. With its modern interiors, spacious layout, and relaxed vibe, it’s an ideal spot for after-work drinks and professional gatherings. Just a short walk from Warren Street station, it provides the perfect setting for meaningful conversations and new connections in a chic but unpretentious environment. Come join us, grab a drink, and grow your network—one great conversation at a time. 📅 **Event Schedule** **18:30 – 19:00 \| Welcome** Kick off with a warm intro and fun icebreakers to set the tone. **19:00 – 19:30 \| Meet & Greet** Mingle with fellow professionals in an open, approachable setting. **19:30 – 21:30 \| Informal Networking** Free-flowing networking all evening—no pressure, no sales. Just great conversations with high-caliber peers. 💼 **Bring Your Business Cards:** Want people to remember what you do? Bring your business cards and share your story. It’s a great way to follow up after the event. 🧠 **Suggest a Future Theme:** Is there a niche you’d love to see featured—clinical trials, digital health, regulatory trends? Add it to our suggestion sheet onsite! We're building this community with you. 💡 **Why Attend?** Connect with professionals shaping the future of medicine, biotech, pharma, and life sciences in a relaxed, dynamic setting. Discover career opportunities, meet innovative companies and startups, and exchange insights with peers across the industry. Whether you’re in clinical research, regulatory affairs, medtech, or medical innovation, this is the place to spark new ideas, find collaborators, and expand your impact. **Who Should Attend:** This event is perfect for anyone looking to expand their professional network, grow their business, or gain fresh perspectives from a diverse mix of biotech founders, pharmaceutical professionals, medical researchers, regulatory affairs specialists, healthcare innovators, investors, job seekers, and leaders shaping the future of life sciences. 🎟 Tickets & Entry To avoid the venue getting overcrowded and ensure everyone enjoys an amazing night, we've introduced a small ticket price to keep things running smoothly. **Limited spots!** Register today and hit **Follow** for updates on future weekly events. 📸 **Event Photography** Please note that photos and videos may be taken for promotional purposes. 📸 \*\*Follow us on Instagram for updates and event news:\*\*👉 [@networxldn](https://www.instagram.com/networxldn/ "https://www.instagram.com/networxldn/") 🔗 \*\*Join our WhatsApp group to connect before and after the event:\*\*👉 [https://chat.whatsapp.com/GisOCaIiMeKEehV5Lv7qxg](https://chat.whatsapp.com/GisOCaIiMeKEehV5Lv7qxg "https://chat.whatsapp.com/GisOCaIiMeKEehV5Lv7qxg")

**About Session** **Advanced** **4 courts for 2 hours** **High grade tournament shuttles (speed 77-78)** **£12 (bank transfer)** Please sign up to **ONLY ONE** of the 2 concurrent Tuesday sessions (this is the 2-hour Tuesday session). Players signing up here will leave at 8 PM as the courts will be reduced to two from 8 to 10 PM Non-members should message the organizers their full-name via WhatsApp (Adrian Rabe, +447410463483) to arrange tryouts. Guests allowed but members will be prioritized over guests. Please message Committee members if you would like to add on a guest. Break the strings on 2 racquets, or break a racquet during the session and your session is *free*. Take a photo of the broken strings or racquet **DURING** the session, upload, and tag Broken Strings on Instagram to get the fee waiver. Cancellations < 24 hours before the event will be penalized the full fee. Please message organizer via WhatsApp for late cancellations or for potential slots. We will be discreetly speaking to players who may be struggling with the level of the session. **Free parking available within the school.** Note that the School will be opening and closing the gate **10 minutes before** and **10 minutes after** the beginning and end of the session. If you are locked out, please contact the organizers or other members to help let you in. Photographs and video recordings may be made during the session. Signing up to the session would **include consent for these recordings to be made and used by the club on its social media and other platforms.** **DO NOT PLAY** if you have fever, cough, colds, or other symptoms.

🚀 From Idea to Working App. Agenda: \* 18:30 \- Welcome drinks / meet and greet \| \* 19:00 \- presentation\, workshop \| \* 20:00 \- Share Demos and Wrap up and Q & A \| \* 21:00 - Social in the bar Join us for an informal evening exploring how AI is revolutionising the way we build applications. Whether you're a developer, product manager, or business leader curious about accelerating delivery, this meetup will show you practical approaches to go from concept to working software in record time. We'll introduce the spec-driven development approach that leverages AI to dramatically compress traditional timelines. You'll see firsthand how modern AI tools can transform requirements into functional applications, handling everything from architecture decisions to code generation. This isn't about replacing developers—it's about amplifying what teams can achieve and focusing human creativity where it matters most. **What to expect:** * Live demonstrations of AI-powered application development * Real-world examples of projects delivered in days instead of months * Interactive discussions about when and how to apply these approaches * Practical tips for getting started with your own projects * Time to experiment and ask questions **What to bring:** We encourage you to bring your laptop and have accounts set up with AI tools like Claude, Gemini, ChatGPT, or similar platforms. If you have a business problem or app idea you're thinking about, even better—we might tackle it together! This is a relaxed, collaborative environment perfect for learning, sharing experiences, and connecting with others who are excited about the future of software delivery. All experience levels welcome—curiosity is the only prerequisite.

Hello and welcome to our next **Cloud Platform Engineering London** meetup. This event brings together platform engineers, SREs, architects, and engineering leaders working across modern cloud platforms, internal developer platforms, reliability, and large-scale delivery. Our meetups are friendly, welcoming, and community-driven; everyone is welcome, whether you’re experienced in the space or just starting your platform journey. This session will include practitioner talks, demos, Q&A, and time for networking with like-minded peers. We run bi-monthly in-person meetups in London, so make sure to look out for future events on our meetup page. Food and refreshments will be provided for in-person events where a host venue is supporting. We are delighted to host this event in **London** on the **5th of February**. **Speakers and Sessions:** Speaker: **[Steve Fenton](https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevefenton/)**, Principal DevEx Researcher at Octopus Deploy Session Title: Platform Engineering Research Description: I'll share insights from the Platform Engineering Pulse Report and share some of the gaps between theory and reality the research exposed. Speaker: **[Sean M. Tracey](https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanmtracey/),** Founding Technologist at Mitchell Technologies Session Title: I've built a Cloud Platform, and You Can Too! Description: How do you build a cloud platform? Where do you even start with something like that? Can one person do it on their own? Well, it starts with getting a hold of a bunch of computers, and then it gets a little more complicated from there. In this talk, I'll cover everything I've learned from building fledgling.cloud - a PaaS Cloud built specifically for developers and their side-projects, and how you can build one too! Speaker: **[Immo Hüneke](https://www.linkedin.com/in/immo-huneke-27b121/)**, Expert DevOps Engineer at Zühlke Engineering Session Title: The Platform Plane - an instant software factory Description: The Platform Plane simplifies your development process, boosts productivity, and helps you deliver better software faster while integrating all your existing technology. This presentation and demo will show how Zühlke employs its Internal Development Platform to be productive from Day One of a customer project, "shift left" and let developers concentrate on developing. Instead of a building site, your new project starts off in an efficiently humming software factory environment. **Agenda (GMT / UK):** 18:00 — Welcome and refreshments 18:30 — Introduction — Ethan Sumner 18:35 — **[Steve Fenton](https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevefenton/)** 19:10 — Break 19:20 — **[Sean M. Tracey](https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanmtracey/)** 19:55 - **[Immo Hüneke](https://www.linkedin.com/in/immo-huneke-27b121/)** 20:30 — Close and networking **We are always keen to hear from:** • Speakers — case studies, engineering deep dives, lessons learned, platform stories • Hosts — organisations able to provide space for future meetups • Sponsors — support with refreshments, recording, marketing or accessibility If you would like to speak, sponsor, or host a future event, please get in touch with **[Ethan Sumner](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ethansumner404/)** via LinkedIn. You can find our YouTube channel **[here.](https://www.youtube.com/@CommunityStackHQ)** This community forms part of the **[Community Stack ecosystem](https://www.meetup.com/pro/generative-ai-uk-community/)** and follows the **Community Stack Code of Conduct**, ensuring a respectful, inclusive, and welcoming environment for all attendees.

Hi folks! Welcome to our February Cloud Native London meetup! Join us to hear from our three great speakers and network with your fellow techies over pizza and drinks, or alternatively chat and following along on Youtube! 6:00 Pizza and drinks 6:30 Welcome 6:45 Stop Running Mystery Meat in Production (Jeroen van Erp, SUSE) 7:15 Platform Wars: The Battle Between Golden Paths and Spaghetti Pipelines (Prithvi Raj, Mirantis) 7:45 Break 8:00 Beyond Chatbots: How AI Agents and Humanoids Are Shaping a New Era (Akshya Prakkash, Urban Care Community) 8:30 Wrap up Sponsors: TechShack, Cloudsmith, SUSE See you there! Cheryl (@oicheryl) **Stop Running Mystery Meat in Production (Jeroen van Erp, SUSE)** We have all been there. You need a database or a quick node environment, so you throw FROM node:latest into your Dockerfile and deploy. It works, but you have just introduced a black box into your Kubernetes cluster. For the Developer, it’s a quick fix. For the Platform Engineer, it’s a nightmare. Most upstream images from public registries are a roll of the dice. They come pre-packed with critical vulnerabilities, unknown binaries, and bloated libraries that you didn’t ask for and definitely don’t want running in your secure environment. In a world of Zero Trust, why are we trusting random upstream maintainers with the keys to our infrastructure? *Jeroen van Erp is a technology evangelist at SUSE, specializing in the observability platform. With a rich background spanning engineering, architecture and product management, Jeroen brings over a decade of experience in the DevOps space. Before joining SUSE, he played a pivotal role as technical slliance director at StackState, where he helped shape the future of observability. As a trainer and speaker, Jeroen is known for his ability to distill complex technical concepts into actionable insights. He is passionate about solving challenging technical problems, whether through mentoring or hands-on involvement. An active contributor to the open source community, Jeroen maintains several highly starred repositories. When he’s not diving into the latest technology trends, Jeroen enjoys spending time on his mini-farm, where he cares for his sheep and shares his love for rural life.* *https://www.linkedin.com/in/jvanerp/* **Platform Wars: The Battle Between Golden Paths and Spaghetti Pipelines (Prithvi Raj, Mirantis)** Internal developer platforms promised golden paths: streamlined, reliable routes for delivering software. Yet too often, they lead platform engineers into a tangled web of YAML, Bash scripts, and tool sprawl. The true crisis today isn't implementing the idea of platform engineering but navigating through platform democracy challenges. The true Darth Vader moments in platform engineering appear when good intentions turn dark: developer experience suffers, and open-source tools quietly become villains to velocity. This session aims to dive deeper into the open-source tooling and cloud-native strategies that mitigate the platform crisis. We’ll examine how to maintain the Jedi discipline of paved paths or fall into spaghetti-pipeline chaos while chasing the perfect delivery workflow. Through real-world stories and anti-patterns, we’ll explore the light and dark sides of OSS-powered platform engineering and help you uncover who the true Darth Vader of your stack might be. *Prithvi Raj is a Community Manager & Developer Advocate at Mirantis working with the Open Source Program Office team. He is a CNCF Ambassador with 5+ years of experience who helped scale a CNCF incubating project in LitmusChaos and runs the Platform & Resilience Engineering Meetup group. He is an active member of SIG Project Reviews and currently leads community efforts for the k0s project, k0rdent, OpenSDN, and other OSS initiatives Mirantis contributes to.* *He is a co-organizer for KCD Bengaluru and previously organized Chaos Carnival, LitmusChaosCon and KCD Chennai. He was previously at Harness, ChaosNative, and MayaData.* **Beyond Chatbots: How AI Agents and Humanoids Are Shaping a New Era (Akshya Prakkash, Urban Care Community)** Chatbots introduced the world to AI, but they are only the starting point. A new wave of systems - AI agents and humanoid technologies is shifting AI from conversation to action. This talk explores how AI is evolving beyond text-based interaction into systems that can perceive environments, make decisions and operate in the real world. Drawing from hands-on experience with agent-based AI projects and robotic platforms in community and care settings, we’ll examine what makes these systems different, the challenges of trust and why this shift represents a new era for human-AI interaction. Join this session to see how AI is beginning to act, not just respond. *BSc Computer Science Hons @ UOW & Software Developer at UCC* *LinkedIn : https://www.linkedin.com/in/akshya-pv/* *Check out [https://www.oicheryl.com/cloudnativelondon](https://www.oicheryl.com/cloudnativelondon) if you're interested in speaking or sponsoring.*

Join us for an exciting deep dive into the future of Kafka architecture and the intersection of AI with data streaming! Learn how diskless Kafka is revolutionising cloud-native deployments and discover how to interact with your Kafka data using natural language. **Date and Time: 🗓️** Wednesday 4th February, ⏰ 18:00 - 20:30 PM 🕘 **Venue:** Lacon House, London WC1X 8NL, United Kingdom **Attending Brands**: OSO, Aiven, Lenses **Schedule:** 18:00: Doors Open 18:00 - 18:30: Food, drinks, networking 18:30 - 19:00: "Diskless Kafka" - Hugh Evans, Aiven 19:00 \- 19:30: “How Lenses MCP Brings AI to Kafka \| Talk to Your Data with Claude & MCP" \- Tun Shew\, Lenses\.io 19:30- 20:30pm: Additional Q&A, Networking **🎙️ \~Talk 1\~** **Talk Title:** Diskless Kafka **Summary:** Summary: Deep dive into KIP-1150 and the future of diskless Kafka, why diskless matters in cloud-native deployments, rerouting replication to object storage, and how diskless and traditional topics can coexist in one cluster. This talk explores the fundamental architectural shift that allows Kafka to leverage cloud object storage for data persistence, reducing operational complexity and costs while maintaining the performance characteristics that make Kafka the backbone of modern data infrastructure. **🗣️ Speaker 1:** Hugh Evans is at Aiven **🎙️ \~Talk 2\~** **Talk Title:** Go Faster on Kafka with AI-Assisted Engineering (Without Summoning Consumer Lag Demons) **Summary:** Are you spending more time wrestling with Kafka configurations and debugging consumer lag than shipping real-time products? The era of AI-assisted engineering is here to change that. This talk takes you on a journey through the evolution of developer tools, moving from the editor wars of the past to a seamless AI-integrated future. We will demonstrate how next-generation tools like Cursor and Claude Code, paired with the Lenses MCP server, allow you to explore, manage and debug your Kafka environment simply using natural language. Through practical demos, you will see how to design robust topic strategies, apply governance best practices and deploy streaming data pipelines using any framework of your choice in seconds. We'll explore the best ways to shift your mindset towards leveraging an AI copilot and you'll leave with a list of actionable tips to enhance your daily routine and increase your productivity with AI today. **🗣️ Speaker 1:** Tun Shwe, Lenses.io

**Never tried Grafana before? This workshop is for you!** APIs are the backbone of modern software development. They power everything from mobile apps to internal tools, but let’s be honest, reading through raw JSON or API responses isn’t the most exciting way to work with data. What if you could turn that data into clean, interactive graphs without writing a ton of custom code or spinning up a backend server? That’s where Grafana comes in! **Grafana** is an open-source data visualisation and observability platform that lets you create interactive, real-time dashboards from various data sources. It’s best known for visualising metrics from systems like Prometheus or InfluxDB, but thanks to its plugin ecosystem, it can do much more. **In this fun, beginner-friendly workshop, we’ll:** * Explore what Grafana is all about * Connect to an API using the Grafana Infinity plugin * Configure a simple query and pull the data into Grafana * Turn that data into a beautiful dashboard with different panel types **No prior knowledge of Grafana** is required as this session is beginner-friendly, but bring your **(well charged) laptops** as this will be a hands-on session!

Join OverBoard to play the brilliant social deduction game Blood on the Clocktower in person at the brand new board game cafe Otter Chaos in Brixton. If you haven’t heard of Blood on the Clocktower before it is an evolution of classic party games like Mafia/Werewolf where a hidden evil team takes on the good team by lying and killing. The good team has a few tricks up their sleeve but will have to work together to deduce who the evil doers are in their midst. **This is a beginner friendly event so no experience with the game is necessary.** Please note that a gaming cover charge of \~£5 will be payable by each attendee to the venue so that we can make use of the space. We also encourage you to buy food and drink from the bar so we are supporting the business (I can highly recommend their pizzas!) If you want to know more about the rules of the game check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-aZP47Nm9g

### Tools in your AI's Toolbox : An introduction to MCP Servers The generative AI revolution has unlocked unprecedented capabilities, but the next frontier is agency: empowering models to interact with, query, and act upon the world. The current challenge is the “N x M integration problem,” where every AI model requires a custom, brittle integration for each external tool or data source. This approach simply doesn’t scale. How can we give an AI access to our sales leads, code repositories, or IoT devices in a standardized, secure, and reusable way? This session introduces Anthropic’s Model Context Protocol (MCP), the open-source framework designed to solve this challenge and become the universal connector—the USB-C port—for AI. MCP standardizes how AI models discover and use external tools, moving beyond simple function-calling to a robust, client-server architecture. We will dive into how this open protocol is creating a new ecosystem for building powerful, context-aware AI agents. Join this session for a developer-focused introduction where you will learn how to: Understand the core concepts of the open-source Model Context Protocol and its architecture. Utilize pre-built, open-source MCP servers to instantly connect AI to tools like Git, Slack, and databases. Build a custom MCP server to securely expose your own proprietary data and APIs as tools for any compliant AI. Move beyond bespoke integrations and contribute to a standardized, collaborative, and open ecosystem. Stop building one-off connectors and start building intelligent agents. This session will give you the practical knowledge to leverage MCP and create the next generation of AI that doesn’t just talk, but does. Want to be a speaker? submit your talk to our Call for Presenters!!! [https://sessionize.com/azure-cbus-2026/](https://sessionize.com/azure-cbus-2026/)

I love my job and one of the main things I do is help customers get going with any of the data technologies at Microsoft. Right now there are a lot of my customers asking about Microsoft Fabric. It's hard to weave across all the shiny new options across the Fabric landscape, let alone figure out where it fits into your organization. In this session we'll focus on answering one question - how can I get data into Fabric? We'll talk through the "it depends" options and see some of the options in live demos.

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

**People Analytics 101: Making Sense of Compensation Data** Compensation data is one of the most widely used and widely misunderstood forms of people analytics. The session will cover where compensation data comes from, including market pricing data, internal payroll data, and benchmarking sources, and how companies think about structuring and analyzing that information. We will explore how compensation data is leveraged to set salary ranges, manage internal equity, support hiring and retention, and align pay with business strategy. A portion of the session will address common data challenges and limitations, such as market noise, inconsistent job matching, and incomplete datasets, while keeping the primary focus on practical use rather than technical depth. The session will also look ahead at where the space is going, including the growing impact of pay transparency laws, expanding pay equity requirements, and emerging regulations in the US and Europe that require organizations to report on gender and pay gaps. The goal is to give attendees a clear mental model for how compensation analytics works today and why getting it right is becoming increasingly critical. (note: we are back at Rev1 this month!) **About Our Speaker** [Alex Moore](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexscottmoore/) is the founder of [Moore Cooperative](https://moorecooperative.com/), where he advises organizations on compensation strategy, pay equity, and people analytics. His work focuses on helping organizations like the Ohio Supreme Court design, analyze, and communicate compensation systems that are data-informed, defensible, and aligned with organizational goals. Alex lives in Granville, Ohio and has three little kiddos. More info at [cbusdaw.com](https://cbusdaw.com)

Join members of the local UX and Digital Design community for a casual monthly breakfast. There _might_ be a little snow, but there _will_ be effectively infinite serve-yourself coffee, so it evens out if you ask me. Just a reminder, while the other locations are great too, we’re at the Lane Ave one this time.

Bring your Raspberry Pi, Arduino, microcontroller, or any other electronic project and join fellow electronics makers for a night of creativity and collaboration! This session is open forum to share your current projects—whether complete or in progress, it’s all interesting! Whether you’re deep into embedded systems, exploring new ideas, or just getting started, you’ll find a welcoming space to collaborate, share, and get inspired. This session will be at the Worthington Park Library in the Olentangy Meeting Room.