We are happy to announce that Jake VanderPlas is a keynote speaker for PyCon India 2019!

Jake VanderPlas is a long-time user and contributor to the Python data science ecosystem, and author of the Python Data Science Handbook. An astronomer by training, he currently works as a software engineer at Google in Seattle, WA. Recently, his efforts have been focused on data visualization tools, particularly the Altair and Vega-Lite libraries.

He can be reached at his twitter handle: @jakevdp.

PyLadies @ PyCon India blog series consists of articles that share the experiences of women who have been a part of previous PyCon India conferences. In this blog post, we talk to Aroma Rodrigues, who did a talk at PyCon India 2018.

Aroma Rodrigues

Aroma Rodrigues is an alumnus of National Institute of Technology Warangal and is currently working as a software engineer for JP Morgan Chase & Co, Mumbai. Her talk on Demystifying Terms and Conditions using NLP in Python at PyCon India 2018 was both informative and enthralling. Read on to find out more about her Python journey and her experience of being a part of PyCon!

PyLady: How would you describe your journey into the world of Python?

Aroma: I started learning Python of my own accord in my third year of college. Till then I had coded web applications for the college registrations/websites, done basic courses in C++ and just learnt Java. I took a specialization on Coursera; it was free back then. It is a very popular course by Dr Charles, who also incidentally spoke at the PyCon 2018 in Hyderabad. It was a pretty hand on course and had specific assignments designed to help a person understand the nuances of coding in Python. The capstone or the final project associated with this specialization was an end to end system to make a crawler, load data, clean up data and visualize it. At the insistence of one of my college seniors, I tried out a few Machine Learning examples off Kaggle, took the learning course on the site and some others on Coursera. My latest was the Neural Networks specialization by Andrew Ng. I used Python in my previous workplace as a scripting language. I used it to automate test cases, create sanity check scripts and basically automate a lot of manual processes, and all of this was not a part of my deliverable tasks. I also used Python for certain POCs (Proof of Concept projects) involving AWS Athena and Alexa. In my current workplace, Python is the primary language of the stack I work in. Python I believe is a very simple language. I also think that once a programmer is comfortable with say two/three languages and the basic concepts of computer problem solving, switching languages and syntax is not a big problem. I love Python's ease, all the open source libraries and features that already exist that make it a very handy language to use for a variety of purposes.

PyLady: Could you tell us a little about your motivation of submitting a CFP and the experience of giving a talk at PyCon India?

Aroma: One summer morning, my inbox was inundated with emails because of the GDPR regulations imposed by the EU. This made me think, as a citizen of India, or rather any other country out of the EU, what protection weren't we getting? What exactly were we agreeing to when we were clicking on the "I agree with these terms and conditions" button without reading any of them? Because terms and conditions are in principle a legal contract, NLP was the way to go about it. I chose Python because it already had a lot of support/features/libraries for NLP. My main motivation was to find likeminded individuals and helm an open source project because I realized over some time that my project would need more effort than what I could put in. Unfortunately, my workplace (which changed over the months from the PyCon 2018 event) does not allow it's employees to contribute to open source without vetting the project, and this one wasn't approved as it would defy their no-compete clause. My experience when presenting was a little let down as we had a few technical difficulties playing the slides. This also meant that I was swamped by people once I'd come down. So, I got to meet a lot of interesting people. Some people had very different perspectives to what I was trying to achieve and all those ideas are something I've been waiting to try out. I would also rather this project be open source because I don't want to see it monetized, I don't want the world divided in haves and have-nots when it comes to understanding legal agreements based on their financial buying power.

PyLady: How do you think attending conferences like PyCon India has helped you?

Aroma: The first conference I ever attended was GDD in Bangalore. The fact that I got to speak at one is something precious personally. I got to meet so many prominent personalities in the world of Python there. A conference is where some of the first features of a library, or an application are first unveiled. Apart from this very technical knowledge, the authors, creators and others involved in the projects are generally present there personally. Some projects presented end with a call to contribute, which apart from being a good resume point also adds to your experience and is sort of your first step into the world of open source. The diversity of perspectives when approaching a problem, not only help you in your professional life but also personal, sometimes. It's literally ground zero for the attendants to try out their networking skills and build some relationships. All the job fairs and the goodies are an added bonus.

PyLady: Any advice to fellow PyLadies?

Aroma: I believe that there is a huge gap when it comes to women and men, in general, even in today's world. For most of us technologists, it started with the girls to boys’ ratios in our colleges. It increases further as you go from being a mere technologist to a senior executive member. And that is exactly where all the decisions are taken, that's who most governments defer to, that's where the directions our lives may take are sometimes taken. This also means that around half of the population of the world is barely represented by their own when such decisions are taken. For this gap to close it is imperative that our ideas be heard.

So, my advice to you as technologists is to apply to events as such, not just to attend, but also speak. Work on your own great ideas, they do not need to be polished and "scrum ready", a small level implementation works. I've observed that women have a very different view of the world, generally a "greater good" perspective. These ideas if ever implemented would lead to the closure of the gender gap that has existed in the human world for centuries.

Lack of inclusion, diversity are not just societal problems, they are also technology problems. The fact that we, being women, are technologists today would also mean that we are one of the privileged few in this world, at least for our gender. Empowering the rest can also be a technology-based problem statement. I've been given this platform, and I feel blessed to have it, looking forward to sharing it with y'all in the near future.

The vision of PyCon India 2019 is to create an inclusive environment that promotes knowledge sharing and diversity in thoughts and ideas. If you're interested to attend, give a talk/workshop or present a poster at PyCon India 2019, please visit: in.pycon.org

The vision of PyCon India 2019 is to create an inclusive environment that promotes knowledge sharing and diversity in thoughts and ideas. To quote

We would like to ensure that the conference approaches everyone with respect, and that we resolve differences peacefully. In particular, we will proactively extend our invite to women, provide support for students, and ensure that people with disabilities feel welcome at the conference.

Along those lines, we would like to offer the following facilities for women to welcome their participation:

• For parents travelling with young kids, childcare services will be provided at the venue for kids aged 5 years or below. If you want to avail childcare for your kid, please mark the checkbox for the same in the ticket registration page.

• The organizers will arrange a Kids Corner with games, entertainment and activities for kids of age 5 to 12. If you want to avail Kids Corner for your kid, please mark the checkbox for the same in the ticket registration page.

• A separate room will be available for mothers of very young kids for breastfeeding.

• The above mentioned facilities are available only for the conference days Oct 12th and Oct 13th, 2019. If there is sufficient demand we will consider extending this to the workshop day and devsprint as well.

• On the second day of the conference, a PyLadies Lunch will be hosted, which is focused on the discussion regarding the challenges, problems, solutions, and experiences among the women in technology.

• PyCon India 2019 takes the experience of the attendees in the conference very seriously. We are committed to providing a positive, harassment-free conference experience for every women participant. We hope the spirit of the Python community will transcend to create an harmonious experience. We have a strong Code of Conduct to set the right expectations and a Reporting Guide to effectively handle any issue that might arise.

  Our team will be happy to help you and assist you to feel safe during the duration of the event.

• You may want to bring a companion/caregiver with you who will not be attending the conference. They may just accompany you because you are travelling from afar or you have an young kid for whom would prefer your own caregiver. In such essential cases, you can email us at tickets@in.pycon.org and we will help you through the necessary details.

As stated in the vision of PyCon India 2019 team, we would like the conference to be as inclusive as possible. Here are a few things we can assure our physically challenged / neuro-divergent attendees, to ensure they have a comfortable and safe environment to connect with the Python community.

Content

• We will ensure our website in.pycon.org is accessible, and that our website follows accessibility guidelines.

• We will ensure that announcements (like speaker details, schedule, etc) that we circulate before the conference, is accessible.

• We will avoid the presence of blinking text, glaring colors in the announcements.

• We will ensure that sign boards are designed with good contrast between background and foreground, so that it is visible clearly.

Registration

• For those who cannot use our ticketing platform, an alternative booking mechanism through NEFT transfer will be provided. Please contact tickets@in.pycon.org

• During the registration, you can specify if you have a disability. We will contact you directly to find your needs. We will accommodate requests on a best efforts basis.

• If you need a caretaker, you can specify during registration. We can have a special discounted ticket for a caretaker to accompany you.

Venue Accessibility

We have ensured the following at both the venues:

• Main entrance, meeting rooms and lunch area are wheelchair accessible.

• Ramps near the main entrance will have "No Parking" signs to ensure the way to ramps are not blocked.

• Wheelchair accessible restrooms are available at the venue.

• Doorways and important routes are at least 32 inches wide.

• Stage is accessible for wheelchair users.

• Empty spaces in front or back of halls for wheelchair users.

• Elevators in the venue where applicable have Braille markings.

• Direction signage with optional distance information.

• Proper lighting in the pathways to make the navigation easier.

• The pathways will be obstacle free. The stall owners, volunteers and attendees will be briefed on the importance, of this.

• Layout information and the session schedule, will be provided in advance.

During Session/Conference

• We will make lapel mic available for people with disabilities.

• Keep a few chairs reserved in the front for people with visual and hearing disabilities.

• The printed session schedule will also be available electronically, in large print.

• Presenters will be reminded that all slides, videos and visual demos will need to be described as part of the spoken presentation.

• Volunteers to help with slide advancement.

• Request presenters to ensure presence of Closed Captions (CC) if there is any video displayed.

Volunteers and Medical Support

• A dedicated contact number to call in case of any need or issue. We will share this with you a few days before the conference.

• Paramedics will be available at the venue. Their contact information and contact information on local doctors, hospital facilities will be provided.

• Volunteers/Office Bearers will be sensitivised to the needs of the physically challenged and neuro-divergent participants.

We hope to collect the feedback from the participants with disabilities so that any gap in facilities can be filled in future events and the best practices can be emulated.

If you have any specific needs, you can enquire at contact@in.pycon.org. We are ready to help.

Save time composing an email to convince your boss to send you to PyCon India. We got you covered.

We are happy to announce that David Beazley is a keynote speaker for PyCon India 2019!

David Beazley is an independent computer scientist, educator, and researcher living in Chicago. He is the author of the Python Cookbook (O'Reilly) and Python Essential Reference (Addison-Wesley) and has been involved with Python since 1996.

He can be reached at his twitter handle: @dabeaz.

We are glad to introduce our first keynote speaker Ines Montani.

PyCon India is a community run event. What that means is, there is no one person or organization behind the event. People who love the language come together and help in ways they can, to run the event. And here is the opportunity for you to be a part of the community.

But before you register to volunteer, there are few things you should be aware of -

• Volunteering takes time and effort, sometimes a lot of it. Online activities like handling social networks or handling registrations etc take a lot of time. So if you're volunteering, make sure you can allocate sufficient time.

• If you're volunteering for offline activities e.g. on spot registration or settings up stages or handling video recording, anything that has to be done on the venue during the event, there is a good chance that you won't be able to attend the sessions. If someone needs you, you have to be there.

• Volunteering is not a free way into the event. At PyCon India, everybody buys a ticket. Even the event organizers buy tickets. We volunteer because we love Python and PyCon, and want the event to be awesome.

If you're still interested in volunteering, here is what you should do next:

• Subscribe to the mailing list.

• Register for volunteering in this form. The corresponding workgroup lead will get in touch with you, when he / she needs support.

• You can pro-actively "Watch" the following repos for activity and track the progress being made. If you can contribute to any of the issues, please feel free to pitch-in.

  • Workgroups task tracking: https://github.com/pythonindia/inpycon2019-tasks
  • Website: https://github.com/pythonindia/inpycon2019
  • Blog: https://github.com/pythonindia/inpycon-blog
  • CFP software: https://github.com/pythonindia/junction

Hope this article has served as a starting point for volunteering. If you have any questions, please drop a mail to the mailing list, but make sure to check the mailing list archives, for answers, before posting.

Happy volunteering!

Credits: Parts of this article were derived from the 2015 article, Volunteering for PyCon India

The vision of PyCon India 2019 team is to create a responsible and inclusive framework, that brings together Pythonistas from diverse backgrounds and provides them multiple avenues to interact effectively, so that the beauty and the magic of the community can happen.

Responsible

As much as we want to run a great conference, we would also like to take all possible steps to ensure that the impact on the environment is minimized. We will take steps to ensure that food wastage is reduced, single-use anything is avoided, and we will proactively recycle waste generated during the conference.

Inclusive

We would like to ensure that the conference approaches everyone with respect, and that we resolve differences peacfully. In particular, we will proactively extend our invite to women, provide support for students, and ensure that people with disabilities feel welcome at the conference.

Diverse

Python as a language has become an indispensible tool, not just to programmers, but to people from various backgrounds like system administrators, security researchers, test automation engineers, educators, hardware designers, doctors, scientists, mathematicians, accountants, etc. We would like to ensure that the conference reflects the diverse nature of the community itself. We believe that diversity will result in cross-pollination of ideas, knowledge, and experiences, making the conference richer, and the community stronger.

Multiple Avenues

While talks form the core of the conference, we understand people have different ways of expressing themselves. Some would be good at doing a talk, others would prefer showing a demo of their work, there will also be some others who would like to just interact by writing more code. So apart from the talks, the conference will have posters, workshops, dev. sprints, lightning talks, open spaces, and a lot more ways for people to interact, and benefit from the event.

Beauty and Magic of the Community

We all know that during the conference, people get to share their ideas and learn from others. But that benefit is just the tip of an ice-berg. There is lot more to it. People get inspired from other people's work, make new friends, reconnect with old friends, get their first job, and so on. These bonds and relationships open up doors to endless possibilities. After the conference, the world will not be quite the same place, and we are teaming up to make that magic happen!

If you are coming to PyCon India 2018 and attending conference, then please read this blog to understand some dos and don'ts along with lot of useful info.

Hope you're all set for PyCon India 2018.

Here are a few things we would like to bring to your attention.

Reaching to Hyderabad:

Please find information at https://in.pycon.org/2018/travel.html.

At the Registration Desk:

The first step is to register and collect your kit from the front desk. Please carry your ticket as the team would be looking for the registration number on it. The queues will be organized by Registration Number.

Lightning Talks:

• On each of the conference days, we are conducting lightning talks and we encourage you to participate.For those who would like to talk, please ask for the form at the registration desk and drop it in the drop box near the registration desk. Organizers might have to curate, in case of an overwhelming response. All selected speakers will be reached out to by 2:30 PM on both days.
• Of course, you are always welcome to reach out to the audience using open spaces, for further details look at [@openspaces](https://in.pycon.org/2018/open-spaces.html).

During the conference:

• Want to meet new people and learn to explore python in wholly different ways? Then don’t forget to check out the open spaces on the second floor. Please look [@openspaces](https://in.pycon.org/2018/open-spaces.html) for further details
• Please NOTE: Internet will be provided at the premises. However, due to a large number of delegates, there is a high possibility of connection or bandwidth issues. We strongly recommend you to carry your own data card/hotspot as a contingency.
• Please NOTE: Water will be provided at the premises. However, please get a water bottle to hold it during the sessions.
• In case, any of our halls are full for any particular talks, we encourage you to check out other talks/sessions. All talks are curated to keep it interesting and engaging for you. No matter where you come from. Sometimes, Serendipity works magic.
• Subscribe to the official [slack channel](https://pyconindia2018.slack.com/shared_invite/enQtNDQ3NDI0OTk5NDk0LWM0ZGE3ODEzNjlkN2MwZTEyYjhkM2YwY2MwZmFkZTQzZWZkY2ViMjhiMGFmZDY3NzFmYmRmNzI1OTE3YWQyZmI) for all sorts of announcements and communications.

Code Of Conduct

• Be kind and sensitive to the people around you and avoid any kind of offensive behavior. Sexist, racist or any other form of exclusionary or offensive jokes or excessive public swearing are not appropriate at any venue of PyCon India.
• Attendees violating these rules may be asked to leave the conference without a refund at the sole discretion of the conference organizers.
• Thank you for your consideration and help in making PyCon India a welcoming, friendly event for all of us.
• The long version is available [here](https://in.pycon.org/2018/coc.html).

We're happy and excited to have you at our conference and hope to make it a great experience for you. Feel free to contact us for any assistance.

Team PyCon India.