Grid Computing

**❗️IMPORTANT❗️ Please register only on Luma: [https://luma.com/tjrvpd6v](https://luma.com/tjrvpd6v)** ​ In this session, we’ll walk through building a real product landing page — the kind you’d actually ship for a startup, side project, or portfolio. Starting from a Figma design, we’ll move all the way to production-ready code using modern AI tools like Cursor and MCP. ​This is a practical, honest look at how modern designers work closer to real product delivery. ​ ​🧠 **What we’ll cover** ​• Turning Figma designs into reusable code components • Translating a design system into clean, consistent code • Adding subtle motion and interactivity • Where AI fits into a modern design-to-code workflow ​No laptop needed — this is a guided, walkthrough-style session focused on learning and inspiration. ​ 📅 **Date & Time:** January 27, 6:00 PM 🎟 **Entry:** Free ​ ​🎙 **Speaker:** ​[Nima Tahami](https://www.linkedin.com/in/nimatahami/) is a product designer, builder, and educator with 15 years of experience turning ideas into shipped products. He has taught 18,000+ students worldwide through best-selling Figma courses and is currently building CueClip, an AI video editor, while helping teams bridge the gap between design and code. ​ ​👥 **Who should join:** ​• Mid+ product designers • Design-minded engineers and builders • Anyone curious about AI-powered product workflows ​ ​📅 **Agenda:** ​6:00 PM — Doors open 6:30 – 6:45 PM — Event intro 6:45 – 8:00 PM — Main session with Nima 8:00 – 9:00 PM — Networking ​ ​✨ Come for the learning, stay for the conversations. Friendly, practical, and community-driven — we can’t wait to see you.

*Games Schedule* Wednesday Event: - 1 / 3 NLH - 3 / 5 NLH - $500 Free Roll Thursday Event: - 1 / 2 NLH - Deep Stack - Min 100 - Max 1000 - $500 Free Roll Friday Event: - 1 / 3 NLH - 1 / 3 PLO - $500 Free Roll Saturday Event: - 1 / 2 NLH - Deep Stack - Min 100 - Max 1000 - $500 Free Roll Sunday Event: - 1 / 3 NLH - 2 / 2 PLO - $500 Free Roll Monday Event: - 1 / 3 NLH - 3 / 5 NLH - $500 Free Roll

Happy January NYPGrs! For this quarterly IN-PERSON get together we are booked at the Trio Bar in the North York Novotel Hotel, for Tuesday, January 27th from 5pm to 10pm for drinks, snacks, catching up and comparing notes with our circle of very scientific friends new and old!! We know there are a lot of members who live too far away to attend this informal gathering, but if you can make it, we’d love to see you! We’ve moved the time back to 5pm for people who can come earlier but can’t stay late.. We'll be there at 5pm waiting for you!! The in-person attendance limit is 20 with a waitlist..so if you’ve RSVPd and can’t make it after all, it will be appreciated if you can change your RSVP accordingly. If you have a question ahead of time, plz send Betty a Meetup message. So, NYPG members..whether you come early or later, we look forward to seeing you who can make it in person, on Thursday, January 27th from 5pm to 10pm for an evening of cheer and catchup! Betty and Mohsen +++++++++++++++++ About the North York Physics Group (NYPG) NYPG was established in 2007 and now has almost 2,000 members. Our monthly virtual meetings provide a venue for learning from members and guest academics and scientists. We also have video lectures covering on all aspects of Physics. Our quarterly In-Person meetings are for touching base and catchup for those who can attend personally.) We encourage our members to submit presentations or help us find great Physics presenters, whether they be professional academics, post-grads, or just physics enthusiasts. Within our 3 hour +/- meetup, each member gets to learn and discuss many aspects of Physics. And then there's the No Holds Bar for more informal discussions. The only "formal" qualifications you need to join is a sincere personal desire and enthusiasm for Physics; to keep yourself informed and to courteously share your insights. **BTW**: Some members have asked if we will be going back to in-person regular meetings. That would be nice, but, many of our attendees are at too much of a distance, or prefer not travelling, so the virtual meetings work well. However, we are looking into possible hybrid meetings, meaning that an appropriate, free meeting space with reliable internet service is a must. In the meantime, we are having quarterly in-person informal meetings just to meet and catchup. We hope to see you at our next one!! Mohsen and I would like to thank our Organizing Team: Linda, Dan, Larry and Aaron for their past and present dedicated support of NYPG. Thank you TEAM! Betty and Mohsen.

Visit our Royal Lunch'n'Learn Toastmasters Hybrid meeting, meet people and develop your communication and leadership skills. At today's meeting we will be discussing how "Taste Travels" and how it can contribute to the lives of others. This is a HYBRID event and so you can choose to join us in person, or online. We would like to encourage you to join us at noon! Reach out to us to receive the WebEx link or to reserve your seat. **What to expect:** Find out first-hand what it means to participate in a club meeting. * Watch as one of our members delivers a Prepared Speech. * Learn and practice how to think fast on your feet with an impromptu Table Topics session. * Witness how to give and receive constructive feedback to help encourage and build confidence with our members. Practice the skills you need to communicate with confidence and excellence. Experience a club meeting with Royal Lunch'n'Learn Toastmasters. It all starts with a fun club environment where you will learn and practice together—to grow individually. Contact us to get the Webex link. Get yourself back in gear this January and we can help you get started in moving forward. We meet in person (Hybrid meetings) at RBC Wellington Square on the 2nd and 4th Tuesday of the month (check for variations in our schedule). Plus, all our meetings are online which is super accessible! Guests are **free** to join us for their first three regular meetings - **contact us** to schedule your visit or ask us anything! contact-3648173@toastmastersclubs.org

***This is a ticketed event, please register on [luma](https://luma.com/27b9w1n5) to reserve your spot.*** [​](https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathrin-gardhouse-988691175) Kathrin Gardhouse presents her draft paper on how liability insurance could function as a form of private regulation for frontier AI, translating catastrophic risk into enforceable safety standards rather than box-ticking compliance. The talk outlines a proposed “minimum insurability pathway” for AI developers and explores whether and how a narrow, restrictive insurance mandate could meaningfully reduce catastrophic AI risks while complementing public regulation. ​​**Event Schedule** 6:00 to 6:30 - Food and introductions 6:30 to 7:30 - Presentation and Q&A 7:30 to 9:00 - Open Discussions ​​If you can't attend in person, join our live stream starting at 6:30 pm via [this link](https://www.youtube.com/@Trajectory-Labs/live). ​​This is part of our weekly **[AI Policy Tuesdays ](https://luma.com/trajectory-labs?k=c)**series. Join us in examining questions like: * ​​How should AI development be regulated? * ​​What are the economic and social implications of widespread automation? * ​​How do we balance innovation with safety considerations? * ​​What governance structures are needed for safer AI?

In modern Java applications, distributed systems are everywhere, and so are failure modes. But how do you know when your cluster is fragile, or if it’s on the brink of breaking? This talk dives into practical observability and resiliency techniques for distributed Java environments. We’ll highlight key patterns, failure signals, and metrics that matter, backed by a live demo using Hazelcast, Chaos-mesh, Prometheus, and Grafana. You’ll learn: Core Patterns – Leader election, partitioning, replication Metrics That Matter – Backup count, member count, JVM health, Golden Signals Failure-Aware Design – Resilience patterns, chaos testing principles Live Demo – Deploy a working cluster, simulate node failure, and explore metrics to observe how data integrity holds as the system nears its fault tolerance threshold Ideal for Java developers, architects, and SREs, this session blends theory, tools, and real-world failure scenarios to help you build distributed systems that stay online—even when things go wrong. **About the venue** Free Times Cafe has bistro-style seating and a full food and drink menu. Please consider helping to support the venue by planning to have supper during the talk. **Speaker Bio** Joe Sherwin is a Principal Solution Architect at Hazelcast with 22 years of experience in the design, development, and implementation of application systems within multi-tier distributed computing environments. Working with clients such as Vanguard, Fannie Mae, Federal Reserve Bank, Citi Group, Bear Stearns, Fixed Income Clearing Corporation, Comcast Corp, Webster Bank, Gartner Group, The Hartford Life Company, IBM Global Services, Mass Mutual, Lincoln National Financial Corporation, Bank of America, and Barnes & Noble Online Group, Mr. Sherwin has been instrumental in the development of large-scale mission-critical E-commerce, insurance, and financial systems. He has experience architecting & implementing solution using CORBA, RMI, Java EE compliant distributed Object architectures, in-memory high transaction/low latency solutions using Hazelcast IMDG®, GemFire, Ehcache & Oracle Coherence, and solutions deployable on IaaS or PaaS platforms like Cloud Foundry, Amazon Web Services, Rackspace or Heroku.

Eventbrite Link: **[https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/694505453507?aff=oddtdtcreator](https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/694505453507?aff=oddtdtcreator)** **Get groovy with Funky Fridays! Toronto's comedy party starts at 8 PM. Unwind, laugh, and kick off your weekend in style!** Dive into the comedic groove every Friday at 8 PM! Experience the funky vibes of Toronto's top comedians at Backroom Comedy Club. Join us for a night of uproarious laughter, good times, and the perfect start to your weekend. Secure your spot for an unforgettable evening filled with funky fun and stand-up brilliance!

**Running and Building Azure Functions with Modern .NET** Azure Functions have changed a lot recently. In this talk, we’ll start with Azure Functions Flex Consumption—what it is, how it compares to other hosting options, and when you should actually use it—followed by a quick demo. We’ll then shift to the developer side, looking at what’s new in .NET 10 for Azure Functions, including Central Package Management and the new SLNX solution format, with practical demos. **Speaker: Callon Campbell** Callon Campbell is an Azure Architect, Developer and Microsoft MVP in Azure. With over 25 years of experience, he's been developing enterprise applications for web, desktop, mobile, and cloud-native applications using Microsoft Azure, .NET, ASP.NET, and SQL Server. He's passionate about learning new technologies and sharing his experience with fellow peers in the community. Callon is also the organizer of “Canada’s Technology Triangle .NET User Group” in Kitchener, Ontario. Callon can be reached on Twitter via [@Flying_Maverick](https://x.com/flying_maverick/), and has a blog at [https://TheFlyingMaverick.com](https://TheFlyingMaverick.com). **Schedule:** 6:00 - 6:30 - Meet 'n Greet with Pizza and Pop 6:30 - 6:45 - Introduction and Welcome 6:45 - 7:45 - Main Presentation 7:45 - 8:00 - Closing and Prize Draw (You're not going to want to miss this prize!!) 8:00 - ? - (Optional - whoever would like to join) Continue our conversations at Bar 6ix, 201 City Centre Drive (3 minute walk) **Where to Find Us** Room 204 in the Hazel McCallion Central Library. 2nd Level. **Parking** There is a parking garage under the library. Parking is free from 6PM on.

Eventbrite Link: **[https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/769813120767?aff=oddtdtcreator](https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/769813120767?aff=oddtdtcreator)** **Friday Comedy Showcase of Toronto's best comedians** Elevate your Friday nights with the city's comedy elite! Join us at 10 PM for a hilarious showcase at Backroom Comedy Club. Experience top-tier stand-up, guaranteed laughs, and an unforgettable start to the weekend. Reserve your spot now for a night of comedic brilliance and good times!

​​**Important registration information: ​​To participate in this event, please join [Apart Research's Discord Sever](https://discord.gg/Bu7h9qZJ) prior to the start of the hackathon.** ​​This hackathon focuses on building that missing infrastructure. You'll have one intensive weekend to create verification protocols, monitoring tools, privacy-preserving compliance proofs, or coordination systems that could enable enforceable international cooperation on AI safety. ​**Top teams get:** ​**💰 $2000 in cash prizes + Fast track to:** * ​**Your Next Job at [Lucid Computing](https://lucidcomputing.ai/)** * ​**The MIRI TGT Fellowship** * [​](https://apartresearch.com/fellowships/:QfRYyF7d7)**[The Apart Fellowship](https://apartresearch.com/fellowships/:QfRYyF7d7)** ​​You will work in teams over one weekend and submit open-source benchmarks, detection tools, scenario analyses, monitoring tools, or empirical research advancing our understanding of AI trajectories. [​​​​​​Trajectory Labs](https://www.trajectorylabs.org/), the jamsite, provides a comfortable and spacious coworking space along with coffee, tea, and other refreshments (meals not provided, but there are many nearby options). Other locations will also be taking part!

We’re kicking off 2026 the only way we know how - by bringing Toronto’s brightest founders, investors, and builders into one room. No fluff, just high-value connections and a first look at the year ahead. Whether you’re in the middle of a raise, building your MVP, or looking for your next co-founder, this mixer is designed to bridge the gap between "the idea" and "the venture." What to expect: Founder & Investor Mingling: We’re cutting through the noise. This is a space for raw ideas and real conversations with people who are actually moving the needle. Find Your Next Partner: Looking for a co-founder, a first hire, or just someone to talk shop with? This is where Toronto’s builders gather to swap stories and support. The Perks: Your ticket includes food (vegetarian and non-vegetarian options) and one drink to get the conversation started. Come celebrate, connect and collaborate. Let’s build something together. Agenda --- Moderators Ankur Sethi - Winner Capital (Founder and General Partner) Ankur Sethi is the Founder and General Partner of Winner Capital, a Toronto-based early-stage venture fund backing the next generation of North American consumer technology companies. He has over 17 years of experience as a consumer tech operator, having built and scaled three companies from inception to $100M+ in revenue, with one reaching a valuation above $2B. His investment the… Daria Tilikanova - Winner Capital (Startup Coach and Mentor) Daria Tilikanova is a business and startup coach who helps founders and service-based entrepreneurs build scalable businesses with clear strategy, strong positioning, and predictable revenue systems. Originally from Russia, she founded and sold two education companies before moving to Canada, where she shifted into full-time mentoring for early-stage and growing foun… Hosted By Ankur Sethi, Director Ankur Sethi is a seasoned entrepreneur and venture capitalist with over 17 years of experience building and scaling consumer businesses across technology, finance, and healthcare. He has led ventures from inception to over $350 million in annual revenue and $2 billion in valuation, combining operational excellence with a deep understanding of evolving consumer behavior. Daria Tilikanova, Co-Director Daria Tilikanova is a business and startup coach who helps founders and service-based entrepreneurs build scalable businesses with clear strategy, strong positioning, and predictable revenue systems. Originally from Russia, she founded and sold two education companies before moving to Canada, where she shifted into full-time mentoring for early-stage and growing founders. Daria has worked with 200+ entrepreneurs across tech, education, wellness, and agency-based businesses, guiding them from first clients to stable growth and team building. Alongside her private practice, she is a Venture Fellow at Winner Capital, supporting startup evaluation and founder readiness for investment. Her coaching combines business structure, mindset work, and execution clarity - helping entrepreneurs grow without burnout or chaos. Lydia Emanuel, Diana Subbotkina, Shabs Badshah, Sukanta Goswami, Inquisitive entrepreneur connecting and collaborating with earlystage ventures by investing time and energy in bringing new ideas and concepts to the market. --- Partners Winner Capital (https://winner.capital) Winner Capital is an early stage to growth stage syndicate fund investing across North America Startup Ecosystem Canada (https://www.startupecosystem.ca/) --- Startup Grind is a global startup community designed to educate, inspire, and connect entrepreneurs. We host monthly events in more than 600 cities and 125+ countries featuring successful local founders, innovators, educators and investors who share personal stories and lessons learned on the road to building great companies. Our monthly fireside chat interviews, startup mixers and annual conferences provide ample opportunities to connect with amazing startups and the people behind them, tap into a strong support network, form meaningful connections and gain inspiration for the startup journey ahead. For more information visit StartupGrind.com or follow us on twitter @StartupGrind. --- Complete your event RSVP here: https://www.startupgrind.com/events/details/startup-grind-toronto-presents-startup-grind-toronto-founder-amp-investor-mixer/.

Let’s do some coding together at a cafe! No more working alone in the weekend. Here, we write code together. And I mean together together. Not occupying-the-same-space-but-separate together. Here’s how it works: Jennifer brings her mobile app project, tells everyone that it is like Pinterest for recipes and she’d like to work on the nav bar. Paul and Chloe think Jennifer's project is fascinating, and they join the group. They gather around Jennifer’s laptop and work on the nav bar for 2 hours. Jennifer is the one typing out the code while Paul and Chloe research, brainstorm, and offer suggestions. If you’re feeling stuck on your own project or need a motivation boost, bring it to mob programming! Want to learn by watching how others code and solve problems? Join someone else’s project at this event! Oh and we love your half-done projects that you are a bit embarrassed to share. Absolutely bring those to the event! **Discord**: We use Discord to share screen & code snippets during the event. Also feel free to share your projects here before the event! https://discord.gg/Da9fZFxPfs **Event policy**: * We have 0 tolerance for harassment. * We don’t allow the projects that are not meant to be shared in public such as school assignments, interview tasks, or trade secrets. * The goal is to write code. We discourage you from pitching business ideas here, doing code reviews, or spending the whole event on planning what to do. * Please buy a drink, and tip the barista well.

## Learn Infrastructure-as-Code (the FUN Way) — Through Minecraft 🎮☁️ **Joint Meetup: Azure CBUS × Columbus HashiCorp User Group × DevOps Columbus** What if learning Terraform and Infrastructure-as-Code didn’t feel like a whitepaper… but more like a game? Join us for a joint Azure CBUS, Columbus HashiCorp User Group, and DevOps Columbus meetup where **Mark Tinderholt** \(Principal Architect\, Microsoft Azure \| HashiCorp Ambassador \| “The Azure Terraformer”\) shows how **Minecraft** can be used as a surprisingly powerful way to understand real-world Infrastructure-as-Code concepts. In this session, Mark will demonstrate how Terraform and Azure can be used to provision, configure, and manage Minecraft servers—while teaching the same patterns you’d use for production cloud infrastructure. ### What we’ll cover * Infrastructure-as-Code fundamentals using **Terraform** * Provisioning real infrastructure on **Azure** * Applying **IaC best practices** (immutability, repeatability, versioning) * How playful environments like Minecraft make complex concepts *click* * Why learning through experimentation beats click-ops every time ### Who should attend * Developers, platform engineers, and cloud engineers * Terraform users (new or experienced) * Anyone curious about Infrastructure-as-Code but tired of boring examples * Minecraft fans who want to see it used in a totally unexpected way No prior Minecraft experience required—just curiosity and a willingness to learn infrastructure the fun way. Come for the blocks, stay for the Terraform. 🧱➡️📐 Want to be a speaker? submit your talk to our Call for Presenters!!! https://sessionize.com/azure-cbus-2026/

### 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/)

## Learn Infrastructure-as-Code (the FUN Way) — Through Minecraft 🎮☁️ **Joint Meetup: Azure CBUS × Columbus HashiCorp User Group** What if learning Terraform and Infrastructure-as-Code didn’t feel like a whitepaper… but more like a game? Join us for a joint Azure CBUS and Columbus HashiCorp User Group meetup where **Mark Tinderholt** \(Principal Architect\, Microsoft Azure \| HashiCorp Ambassador \| “The Azure Terraformer”\) shows how **Minecraft** can be used as a surprisingly powerful way to understand real-world Infrastructure-as-Code concepts. In this session, Mark will demonstrate how Terraform and Azure can be used to provision, configure, and manage Minecraft servers—while teaching the same patterns you’d use for production cloud infrastructure. ### What we’ll cover * Infrastructure-as-Code fundamentals using **Terraform** * Provisioning real infrastructure on **Azure** * Applying **IaC best practices** (immutability, repeatability, versioning) * How playful environments like Minecraft make complex concepts *click* * Why learning through experimentation beats click-ops every time ### Who should attend * Developers, platform engineers, and cloud engineers * Terraform users (new or experienced) * Anyone curious about Infrastructure-as-Code but tired of boring examples * Minecraft fans who want to see it used in a totally unexpected way No prior Minecraft experience required—just curiosity and a willingness to learn infrastructure the fun way. Come for the blocks, stay for the Terraform. 🧱➡️📐 Want to be a speaker? submit your talk to our Call for Presenters!!! https://sessionize.com/cbus-hug-2026/

## Details \#\# Learn Infrastructure\-as\-Code \(the FUN Way\) — Through Minecraft 🎮☁️ **Joint Meetup: DevOps Columbus - Azure CBUS - Columbus HashiCorp User Group** What if learning Terraform and Infrastructure-as-Code didn’t feel like a whitepaper… but more like a game? Join us for a joint DevOps Columbus, Azure CBUS and Columbus HashiCorp User Group meetup where **Mark Tinderholt** \(Principal Architect\, Microsoft Azure \| HashiCorp Ambassador \| “The Azure Terraformer”\) shows how **Minecraft** can be used as a surprisingly powerful way to understand real-world Infrastructure-as-Code concepts. In this session, Mark will demonstrate how Terraform and Azure can be used to provision, configure, and manage Minecraft servers—while teaching the same patterns you’d use for production cloud infrastructure. \#\#\# What we’ll cover * Infrastructure-as-Code fundamentals using **Terraform** * Provisioning real infrastructure on **Azure** * Applying **IaC best practices** (immutability, repeatability, versioning) * How playful environments like Minecraft make complex concepts *click* * Why learning through experimentation beats click-ops every time \#\#\# Who should attend * Developers, platform engineers, and cloud engineers * Terraform users (new or experienced) * Anyone curious about Infrastructure-as-Code but tired of boring examples * Minecraft fans who want to see it used in a totally unexpected way No prior Minecraft experience required—just curiosity and a willingness to learn infrastructure the fun way. Come for the blocks, stay for the Terraform. 🧱➡️📐

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.

**New Dojo Location!** **Draft Day Columbus** 1130 Dublin Road Columbus, OH 43215 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 topic suggestions and people interested in presenting at our monthly meetings. To this end we've set up a survey form at [https://docs.google.com/forms/d/15eBKF1nQQ2XS5gzD4rvhVRHMBEj7lJtHuA9wXupS3Uc](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/15eBKF1nQQ2XS5gzD4rvhVRHMBEj7lJtHuA9wXupS3Uc)

Our monthly PHP meetup. A virtual shindig courtesy of Zoom. Check back here for the details around 6:15 pm