PyCon UK 2017!

I spent the last few days at PyCon UK, and thought I'd write a post about my experiences there. It was my first time at the conference and I thoroughly enjoyed it, as you can probably tell from the liberal number of exclamation marks scattered through this post.

I gave a talk!

On the first day of the conference I spoke about Python As a Second Language. The organisers put me in the Biggest Room so I had to fight off some pre-talk nerves, but I was glad to have the chance to do it and got some lovely feedback afterwards. Thanks again to Emma Gordon for encouraging me to give it a go and push my comfort zone! Doing a talk on Thursday also meant I was free to enjoy the rest of the conference without worrying, which I definitely recommend.

For those who are interested, a video of my talk is now up on YouTube!

I went to talks and workshops!

The conference was full of great talks and sessions, so this is just a small sampling of what I particularly remember enjoying. Of course, I'd like to give a shout-out to my colleagues Emma Gordon and Jan Chwiejczak who respectively gave the very silly and fun Python Spelling Bee, and a (very oversubscribed) workshop on Python Bytecode & lavishly illustrated talk on the Art of Testing.

• Unsafe At Any Speed Rae Knowler made some great points about dangerous library defaults, illustrated with scary examples from the wild. I'll be sure to use PyYAML.safe_load() rather than load() from now on...!

• Shaping the World David McIver's keyote was thought-provoking and fascinating, not just about software, but ethics, history and human interactions - the sort of thing Stuart Wray would probably enjoy.

• Docs or it didn't happen! I was encouraged to join the Documentarian Club by Mikey Ariel, who gave an inspiring talk about why good documentation is so important.

• Software's Seven Deadly Wastes Jez applied the Toyota Production System's 'Seven Wastes' concept to software engineering beautifully - pleasing my manufacturing engineering heart and giving me some food for thought.

• Circumnavigating the Antarctic with Python and Django A fascinating talk that cast a light on the challenge developing with no (or a very patchy) Internet connection. What, no googling for StackOverflow posts?! Carles and Jen managed data for 22 scientists on a trip circumnavigating the Antarctic, and built them some useful tools as well like an intranet 'Facebook' and web portal to enter their latest data.

• The micro:bit talks I discovered from the team at the micro:bit foundation how the BBC micro:bit is being used by teachers and for STEM outreach. It's a great project and it sounds like it's already having a lot of success getting kids into learning to code in an accessible way.

• Choo choo! All aboard the Data Train! It turns out there is a lot of open data available from TfL and National Rail about train movements in the UK. The talk went by quickly but I'll definitely be rewatching to get inspiration for my next project!

• Lightning Talks One of the highlights of the conference was the range of lightning talks at the end of each day. Among much else they gave me a great brownie recipe, book recommendations and a moment of meditation calm. A particular favourite was the children's lightning talks - they were so confident speaking about their projects, it was lovely to hear.

The nice thing about PyCon UK is that they video all of the talks in the Assembly Room, so I'll be able to go back and watch the ones I missed over the next few weeks, and learn more from the ones I went to.

I didn't take part in many workshops as I was busy manning the CMR stall (we were one of the sponsors so were giving away some free trinkets). I did really enjoy Alex Chan's A Plumber's Guide To Git workshop - I think it really helped unpack the inner workings of Git for me. At the end I started to understand what's going on 'under the hood' when I git add and git commit and it's really neat.

I got swag!

As well as this snazzy pair of Python socks as a thank-you for giving a talk, I also picked up a free BBC micro:bit delightfully packaged in a sweetie-bag and enjoyed playing with it. For such a small bit of kit is has a surprising range of functions, including an accelerometer, 25 LEDs with variable brightness, two buttons and some I/O. I look forward to using it for embedded projects!

I met new people!

One of the best things about PyCon was a chance to meet people using Python from around the UK (and further afield). It was inspiring to see how the language is being used by all sorts of folks. Everyone was friendly and welcoming, and it was a great place to give a talk. I also got the chance to spend more time getting to know people I already was acquainted with from CamPUG, the Cambridge Python Users Group, and had some really interesting discussions.

If anyone is thinking of going but isn't sure if it's for them, I'd really reccomend giving PyCon UK a try - the environment is relaxed and friendly, and the organisers try hard to make everyone feel welcome and included. I'll definitely be coming back next year!