Software Innovation

AI assistants are getting more capable. The question is how we build effective workflows around them. At DevDay London, [Lucy Joyce](https://www.linkedin.com/in/lucy-joyce-597485166/), [Ash Shakrani](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ash-shakrani/) and [Arun Kurian](https://www.linkedin.com/in/arun-mathew-kurian-39b8aa5a/) will explore harness engineering through the lens of a payment integration. From requirements and design through to implementation, they’ll demonstrate why context alone isn’t enough for successful AI-assisted development. Drawing on real-world experience, they’ll show how engineering harnesses, reusable context, standards, and validation workflows help teams move beyond experimentation and build reliable, scalable AI-assisted development practices. **This session will unpack:** 🎯 Why “more context” isn’t the answer on its own 🎯 What engineering harnesses are and how they create reliable feedback loops 🎯 How standards, workflows, and validation reduce AI-generated rework and technical debt 🎯 Practical techniques teams can adopt immediately to improve AI outcomes 🗓️ **Save the Date:** 2nd July, 2026 📍 **Location:** Sahaj Software, 1 Quality Court, London, WC2A 1HR 🕕 **Time:** 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM (BST) The evening will feature: 🎤 **One engaging talk** with Q&A 🤝 **Plenty of time for networking** over free pizza and non-alcoholic drinks Don’t miss this chance to learn, connect, and share with fellow tech enthusiasts. 👉 Please click the link below to register. https://sahaj.ai/events/harness-engineering-in-practice-from-requirements-to-implementation/

Register: [https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ljc-meetup-at-neo4j-smarter-search-with-spring-ai-and-neo4j-tickets-1991379537804](https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ljc-meetup-at-neo4j-smarter-search-with-spring-ai-and-neo4j-tickets-1991379537804) LJC Meet-ups is a series of events, aimed at giving all Community members an opportunity to present at an LJC event. We're excited to invite you to our next Meetup, co-hosted with **neo4j**! Join the London Java Community for an evening of technical talks, networking, and knowledge sharing hosted by Neo4j. This month’s meetup explores two of the hottest areas in modern software development: integrating Generative AI into Java applications and deploying Machine Learning models within Java ecosystems. Whether you’re a Java developer, architect, data engineer, or simply curious about the latest innovations shaping our industry, this session will provide practical insights and real-world examples from experienced practitioners.

**Please register on [Eventbrite](https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ljc-meetup-at-neo4j-smarter-search-with-spring-ai-and-neo4j-tickets-1991379537804) to join this event.** **About this event** We're excited to invite you to our next Meetup, co-hosted with neo4j! Join the London Java Community for an evening of technical talks, networking, and knowledge sharing hosted by Neo4j. This month’s meetup explores two of the hottest areas in modern software development: integrating Generative AI into Java applications and deploying Machine Learning models within Java ecosystems. Whether you’re a Java developer, architect, data engineer, or simply curious about the latest innovations shaping our industry, this session will provide practical insights and real-world examples from experienced practitioners. **SPEAKER 1** **Akmal Chaudhri**, Neo4j Title: Smarter Search with Spring AI and Neo4j Abstract: In this session, we'll walk through a Spring Boot app that integrates Spring AI with Spring Data Neo4j to build intelligent search over real Goodreads book data. We'll cover how to set up a Neo4j vector store, generate embeddings via OpenAI and expose results through a REST API. We'll also explore how graph search and vector search work together and what it takes to configure and connect these pieces in a Spring application. If you've been wondering how to bring GenAI capabilities into your existing Spring stack, this talk offers a practical, code-first look at how it all fits together. Bio: Akmal is a technical leader and evangelist with extensive experience across databases, AI and developer enablement. Specialised in technical writing, education and community strategy, he has a proven ability to translate complex technology into clear, engaging narratives that inspire learning and adoption. He is a regular international speaker, published author and contributor to thought leadership in data systems, AI and developer education. **SPEAKER 2** **Matt Scott**, CTO, Nimbus Pay & **Alex Callinan**, Data Scientist, Nimbus Pay Title: Integrating Machine Learning models with Java Abstract: This presentation walks Java developers through the full journey of integrating machine learning into their applications. It then weighs up the pros and cons of two practical deployment paths. Matt Scott bio: Matt is a cloud-native architect and fintech leader with over twenty years building secure, scalable payment platforms, including containerized JVM-based systems. As CTO of NimbusPay Technologies, he designs cloud-agnostic card issuing solutions, with deep expertise in Java architecture, distributed systems, and DevSecOps. Alex Callinan bio: Alex is a Data Scientist at NimbusPay Technologies, where he builds and ships machine learning models into production. He's passionate about bridging the gap between trained models and the real-world applications that put them to work. This event is organised by RecWorks on behalf of the London Java Community. The London Java Community is sponsored by Hazelcast, Neo4j, Redis, and Discover

Hello and welcome to our special joint meetup between **Cloud Platform Engineering London**, **Cloud Platform Engineering Leaders**, **Data & AI Leaders**, **AWS AI UG**, **Azure AI UG**, and **GCP London**. This crossover event brings together platform engineers, cloud architects, data and AI leaders, SREs, engineering managers, technology executives, and practitioners exploring how AI is reshaping modern cloud platforms, developer workflows, business transformation, and enterprise engineering. This is a special **Community Stack ecosystem event**, bringing together several of our cloud, platform, and data-focused communities for an evening of practical talks, senior technical discussion, and cross-community networking. A huge thank you to **[Arrows](https://www.arrowsgroup.com/)** for hosting and sponsoring this event, and for supporting the growth of the cloud, platform engineering, data, and AI community in London. Speakers and sessions: **Get a High Return-on-Investment from AI Business Transformation** **Nora Balla, Founder and AI Business Transformation Lead, Add Velocity** Nora Balla is the founder of Add Velocity, an AI-native business transformation and implementation consultancy. Nora has gained extensive experience across investment products, business transformation, finance operations, and regulated asset and wealth management environments. Previously a freelancer, she now operates in a collaborative delivery model, helping organisations scale AI and automation solutions in complex business settings. Her experience includes finance transformation at Harley-Davidson, reporting process improvements in commercial real estate funds, and supporting the Aladdin implementation at Royal London Asset Management. In this session, Nora will explore how organisations can achieve a stronger return on investment from AI business transformation. The talk will cover the opportunities and high-value use cases, the real risks organisations need to manage, the skills required for the agentic era, how to define and measure success, and practical tips for improving efficiency when working with AI systems. **Agents in the Fastlane** **Ryan Cormack, Principal Engineer, Motorway** **Luke Marrai, Engineering Manager, Motorway** Motorway has used traditional AI and machine learning for years to enhance and improve its systems. But how can those years of learning be applied to build the next generation of agentic systems for users? In this session, Ryan Cormack and Luke Marrai from Motorway will explore how they are enhancing the functionality of Motorway’s platform to provide more accurate search results for dealers looking to acquire stock through the online marketplace. The talk will cover how Motorway is using **AWS AgentCore** to run its agentic systems, and how evals are being used to ensure the system performs as expected. Ryan Cormack is a Principal Engineer at Motorway, the UK’s leading used car marketplace, where he leads technical strategy and drives AI-powered transformation across the engineering organisation. With over 14 years of experience building and scaling systems on AWS, Ryan specialises in turning architectural best practices into practical engineering outcomes, from cloud modernisation programmes to the adoption of agentic workflows and AI-native developer tooling. Luke Marrai is an Engineering Manager at Motorway, supporting engineering delivery and helping teams build effective, scalable technology for one of the UK’s leading automotive technology platforms. Agenda: **18:00** — Arrival, refreshments and networking **18:30** — Welcome and introduction **18:35** — Get a High Return-on-Investment from AI Business Transformation — Nora Balla **19:00** — Break and networking **19:20** — Agents in the Fastlane — Ryan Cormack and Luke Marrai **20:00** — Networking **20:45** — Close **Join us on June 11th:** We are also hosting the **Cloud Native & Open Source AI Conference** on **June 11th in London**, bringing together a fantastic line-up of speakers across AI, cloud-native, open-source, platform engineering, leadership, and modern infrastructure. You can view the full speaker line-up and event details **[here](https://www.communitystack.io/conferences/cloud-native-london)** **About the communities:** This event is jointly hosted across **Cloud Platform Engineering London**, **Cloud Platform Engineering Leaders**, **Data & AI Leaders**, **AWS AI UG**, **Azure AI UG**, and **GCP London**. Together, these communities form part of the **[Community Stack ecosystem](https://www.meetup.com/pro/generative-ai-uk-community/)**, bringing together technical practitioners, leaders, partners, and organisations across cloud, platform engineering, data, AI, and open technology. We are always keen to hear from speakers, hosts, sponsors, and community partners. If you would like to speak, sponsor, or host a future event, please reach out to **[Ethan Sumner](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ethansumner404/)** via LinkedIn. This event follows the **[Community Stack Code of Conduct](https://www.communitystack.io/code-of-conduct)** and **[Privacy Policy](https://www.communitystack.io/privacy-policy)**, ensuring a respectful, inclusive, and welcoming environment for all attendees.

CMS Connect 2026 by Dotsquares is an exclusive event exploring modern CMS platforms, AI-driven experiences, and the future of digital transformation. Gain practical insights, real-world use cases, and expert guidance on leading platforms like WordPress, Shopify, Sitecore, AEM, and headless CMS solutions. Connect with industry professionals, explore digital trends, and speak directly with Dotsquares specialists shaping the future of digital experiences. [Register Now! ](https://www.dotsquares.com/event/cms-event)

We are delighted to announce that manifesto have kindly agreed to host the Umbraco London July Meetup at their offices in Whitechapel, and are very kindly providing us with food and drinks. **Please register and sign up in advance** so that we can give a list of attendees to reception and comply with their building regulations. [manifesto](https://manifesto.co.uk/) is a company that uses and champions Umbraco CMS, particularly within the context of digital transformation and sustainability, including being Certified B Corp. We are welcome from 18:30 onwards, we shall look to get started around 18:45. We'll finish by 21:00 when we take the conversations to a local pub. \-\-\-\-\-\- **\*\* AGENDA \*\*** **#1** **Welcome and Latest News** Peter Cooper from manifesto with Lotte, Ravi and Richard from Umbraco London **#2 Codegarden 2026: One Umbracian's Experience** John Seto will be sharing his highlights from Codegarden 2026 - what he learned, what inspired him, and what it means to be part of the wider Umbraco community. He'll also be talking about his experience of the Green Track, a community initiative encouraging contributors to travel to Codegarden by greener means, with free tickets awarded to those selected by Umbraco HQ. **#3** **manifesto RazorKit** by Nurhak Kaya and Pete Cooper At manifesto, we have created a new component-driven development experience specifically for [ASP.NET](http://ASP.NET) Core Razor and Umbraco applications. This approach allows us to develop, test, and document our UI components in isolation within a live application through an interactive preview environment, eliminating the need to navigate through the entire application flow. In this talk, we will provide hands-on details about this approach and discuss its benefits for both development teams and clients. \-\-\-\-\-\- If you realise you can't make it please be sure to change your RSVP to No in case there are people on the waiting list. \-\-\-\-\- If you would like to contribute to our meetups please in touch by email (hello@umblondon.co.uk) - we are always looking for people to give talks, or London-based Umbraco agencies to host us for the evening. Please read the [Code of Conduct](https://bit.ly/UmbLondonCodeOfConduct) for all our events.

**Moved from original date (requested by several members) due to the heat wave!** Most businesses know they have repetitive tasks, manual workflows, and administrative bottlenecks - but few know where to start when it comes to automation. In this practical introductory session, we'll explore how modern businesses are using AI, workflow automation, and intelligent agents to streamline operations, reduce costs, and free up teams to focus on higher-value work. You'll learn how to identify the best automation opportunities within your organisation, map existing processes, and build a roadmap for implementing automation without disrupting your business. We'll also demonstrate real-world examples of automated sales, marketing, customer service, finance, and operational workflows that are delivering measurable results today. Whether you're a business owner, manager, operations leader, or technology professional, this session will provide a clear framework for turning automation from a buzzword into a competitive advantage. ### What You'll Learn * Where automation delivers the biggest business impact * How to identify and prioritise processes for automation * The difference between traditional automation, AI, and intelligent automation * Common automation mistakes and how to avoid them * Real-world case studies and live demonstrations * A practical roadmap for getting started immediately ### Who Should Attend Business owners, founders, directors, operations leaders, department heads, and anyone interested in making their organisation more efficient through intelligent automation.

**Join the Inaugural (GB)NUG Connect Event** *The Soho Hotel\, London \| 2nd July \| 6pm\-8\.30pm* Talks · Open Discussion · Drinks · Light Bites (GB)NUG's first event brings together two practitioners ready to share their experiences and opinions on enterprise networking. Grab a drink, connect with your peers, hear from fellow practitioners and join the conversation. **Madoc Batters, Head of Cloud & Cybersecurity at Warner Hotels**. With 25+ years building cloud, network and hybrid platforms across hospitality, telecom and finance. Madoc will be sharing his experiences driving multi-cloud migrations and applying GenAI to real-world security and cost operations. **AI Enabled networking – isn’t this what Skynet wanted in Terminator?** There is lots of talk about AI changing everything, but in this day and age what should an AI enabled network look like? What is the good and bad of this approach and when things go wrong, how can we fix them? **Duncan Bates, Solutions Architect, Fortinet** **Agenda:** 6pm: Meet for drinks and networking in the Crimson Bar 6.30pm: Hear from our speakers in Screen Room 2 7.15pm: Connect with your peers over drinks and light bites 8.30pm: Event Closes (GB)NUG is a practitioner-led, open, collaborative community for enterprise network architects, engineers, operational leaders and innovators across Great Britain. The group is independent, open and built around peer knowledge. **First event - no playbook - come and help shape what this becomes.** [Follow GB(NUG) on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/gb-nug) Supported by Alkira and Megaport.

\*Disclaimer: All are welcome. Students, professionals, non professionals, business owners, curious cats. \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\- Come along to the Corner Corner venue, located just a few minutes walk from Canada water, for a few hours to meet friendly faces, work on your personal projects, or just come and share what passion projects you are all working on. Feel free to bring your laptop, tablet, sketchbook, and notes on the day. Whether you work in Animation, Art, Design, Film, Games development, or storytelling, you are welcome to come along. We love being around diverse creatives who want an opportunity to showcase their talents. This is an excellent opportunity for those looking to socialise with like-minded people and to get friendly feedback on their work. All backgrounds are welcome to join us, even if your just curious about Animation/Art/Storytelling \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* I Look forward to seeing you there.

Struggling to find the motivation to finish that side project? Getting stuck in a tutorial hell? Or just want to code alongside fellow tech enthusiasts instead of staring at your bedroom wall? Bring your laptop, grab a coffee, and join us for our weekly **Coding Coworking Club**! Whether you are a seasoned software engineer working on a startup MVP, a bootcamp grad building your portfolio, or a total beginner learning your very first lines of Python, **everyone is welcome.** ### 🚀 Who Is This For? * **Developers & Engineers** looking for a community and a change of scenery. * **Self-taught learners & Students** who need a bit of structure and accountability. * **Technical Founders** building out their product. * Anyone who wants to chat with like-minded technical people in London! > **Hosted by Chuffed Coaching** This event is proudly put on by **Chuffed Coaching**. We’re all about helping people smash their goals, stay accountable, and build cool things. *Spaces are limited based on venue capacity, so please RSVP if you plan on coming. See you on Saturday!*

We playtest all sorts of tabletop games - strategic, silly, creative, or whatever (but not video games). Some games are almost done. Some are very early ideas. We test anything that will fit into 90 minutes. You don't need to bring a game - we always love to have new playtesters! Please let us know in the comments when you plan to arrive/leave and whether you are bringing a game or not. This helps us to plan the day better. The schedule is: 10am onwards - gathering, chatting 11am sharp - playing for 90 min ('slot 1') 12:30ish - break for food/chat 1pm sharp - playing for 90 min ('slot 2') 2:30ish - break for food/chat 3pm sharp - playing for 90 min ('slot 3') 4:30ish - finish up Often, we might hang around afterwards, to play some already-published games. We are strict on timings, so please try to arrive a few minutes before the session to limit disruption. You can just come for part of the day if you wish. The reason we have fixed timings for the 3 'slots' is to make it easier for folk to do so. Designers of all levels of experience are welcome! But if it's your first time, we ask that you don't bring a game and just spend some time learning how the group works. The group works based on reciprocation. If you expect to test your own game, make sure stay for long enough to play other games. As a general rule of thumb, you can expect to play one of your own games every third 90-minute session. So if you stay a whole day (3 sessions), you can expect to have one session to play your game(s). A good rule of thumb is that if you come all day, you will have one 90 minute session with two other playtesters in which to test your own games. It is sometimes possible to test games with more players. If your game requires 4 or more, please note that as standard you will be allocated half of a session (45 minutes). Pre-covid, we were getting unmanageable. As a result, we may have to limit attendees. This is a free-to-use venue, and we have to be mindful that other folk want to use the same space. Please note: This is an adults only event. We look forward to seeing you!

A focused Unreal Engine coworking meetup for developers, designers, and artists to build projects, solve problems, share feedback, and collaborate in person — no talks or panels, just real hands-on game development.

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.

Where innovation meets practicality. Join us in **Columbus, OH** for our **immersive event** featuring dynamic, audience-driven demonstrations showcasing the groundbreaking features of our software. We'll cover a wide range of topics, from Manufacturing and Accounting to Inventory Management, Sales/CRM, and eCommerce, as we **delve into the capabilities of Odoo 19**. Discover how it can transform your business processes and support your journey towards digital transformation! Attend for FREE -[ ](https://www.odoo.com/r/dKG)**[Register now!](https://www.odoo.com/r/QU4)** For any inquiries, feel free to reach out to us at ellee@odoo.com

We have moved to guild.host. Look us up there. https://guild.host/events/buckeye-cocoaheads-rcavwd

Christians in Tech is a community at the intersection of faith and technology. Our meetups are designed to spark meaningful conversations, promote knowledge sharing, and encourage growth—both in your career and your spiritual walk with God. Whether you're an experienced professional or just starting your tech journey, CIT welcomes you. Our Website [https://linktr.ee/citcbus](https://linktr.ee/citcbus) Sponsors and Partners * Improving (Venue Sponsor) * Bethel World Prayer Center (Fiscal Sponsor) * Fruits & Roots (Coffee Partner)

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.

**\*\*\* We've Moved! Bold Penguin - 6555 Longshore St, Dublin, OH 43017 \*\*\*** Talk by ## [Kyle Jenkins](https://www.linkedin.com/in/kyle-jenkins/) **Unpacking Process Anti-Patterns: Lessons from Ideation to Delivery** In the fast-paced world of software engineering, processes often shape success or sow frustration. Over the years, recurring anti-patterns have emerged well-meaning practices that unintentionally create inefficiencies, stifle innovation, or harm team dynamics. These pitfalls, though rooted in good intentions, can derail projects and undermine trust when left unchecked. Through real-world examples and two decades of industry experience, this presentation unpacks common process anti-patterns across the software lifecycle. With a focus on fostering understanding, not blame, we’ll examine how flawed workflows contribute to challenges and how reversing them can empower teams to build clarity, creativity, collaboration, and trust. **AGENDA:** * See updates to parking below * Doors open at 5:30, feel free to come and hang out before! * Official start of the meeting is at 6:30pm * After the meeting is done, we will go hang out at a nearby space in Bridge Park! If you can, please sign up via meetup by noon the day of the meeting so we can have an estimate headcount for food :) We always order extra, so feel free to join us even if you don't get signed up! Thank you to Bold Penguin for providing the food and location! **Parking & Arrival:** **Parking:** Parking in Bridge Park is free. The closest lots are the Mooney Garage and the Hotel/Endres Garage. **Entry:** The doors to the office are to the right of PINS. The street level door and elevators lock at 6pm. If you arrive after that, someone should be there to let you in, else call the number posted. Take the elevator to the 2nd floor. Once you exit the elevator, turn right. \*\*\* We are a bunch of professionals, students, and geeks who are excited about Ruby programming language ([http://ruby-lang.org/](http://ruby-lang.org/)) and Rails framework ([http://rubyonrails.com/](http://rubyonrails.com/)) and the joy they have brought back to web development. Our main goal is to share the love of the Ruby and Rails ecosystems with anyone that is interested. We cater to everyone, whether a non-programmer through advanced Rubyists. * We give lectures on programming topics * We freely provide decades worth of experience * For full details of this month's meeting please visit [http://columbusrb.com](http://columbusrb.com)

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