Communities, networking and developer culture

1.3.2024
Communities,
networking, and
developer culture
Juha-Matti Santala,
Turku ❤ Frontend
hamatti.org GDSC TUAS

1.3.2024 hamatti.org GDSC TUAS
Congratulations!

"The value of another's
experience is to give us
hope, not to tell us how or
whether to proceed"
Peter Block, "The Answer to How is Yes"

Hi, I'm Juhis!
Community builder and web developer
Studied CS and Stats in Uni Turku, never finished
Worked in San Francisco, 🇺🇸; Berlin, 🇩🇪 and around
Finland
I write a weekly tech/community/life blog at
hamatti.org

A few communities
I'm involved in
running

Turku ❤ Frontend
Developer community for people interested in
frontend development
Started in 2015: over 50 events, over 500 developers
and designers, and 26 partner companies
We organize monthly meetups during academic
year (Sep-May)
Open for everyone and free to participate in
https://turkufrontend.fi

archipylago
Python community for everyone interested in
Python
Started in January 2024 so very new but built on
top of great communities that came before us
Meetups on odd months, sprints on even months,
social gatherings sprinkled in the middle
Open for everyone and free to participate in
https://archipylago.dev

Koodiklinikka
Finnish online community for everyone in
the IT industry
Discussion mostly in Finnish but we
welcome discussion in English too
~6500 members
I've been an admin there for a few years now
https://koodiklinikka.fi/

Why be active in
communities?

An opportunity to
learn from others and
share your knowledge
and experiences

"Do not be afraid of being the newbie;
embrace it. Ask those questions, and
make those suggestions. In the worst-
case scenario, you will learn. In the
best-case scenario, everybody learns."
https://marijkeluttekes.dev/blog/articles/2024/02/08/you-can-be-a-beginner-and-also-a-speaker-blogger-or-participant/
Marijke Luttekes

"If you don’t attend the event, there’s no
chance of serendipity. An unexpected
insight, from a talk you might have
avoided or a conversation in the hallway,
where a new approach to a long running
problem presents itself."
https://andycroll.com/ruby/why-go-to-a-rails-or-ruby-conference/
Andy Croll

Networking helps with
finding a job as you’ll know
more people in the industry
and they know you

"In addition to making friends, these
communities are also a great way to build
professional relationships. The industry is
so networked (people, not wires) and
getting to know people outside your job
can have a huge impact in your career."
https://hamatti.org/posts/developers-guide-to-communities/
Juhis

It’s a lot of fun!

Many ways of
being involved

Participate or
volunteer at local
meetups

"Volunteering at Slush was a new and very
interesting personal experience. I learned a lot
about how such massive events are brought to life,
the processes happening behind the curtain, the
technological advancements that are happening in
tech as of right now and much much more.."
https://metropoliabiz.
fi
/2018/12/11/my-journey-through-slush/
Veso Varik

Writing blog posts
and participating in
the blogosphere

"Personal websites are a
great place to experiment
and learn web development
skills"
https://matthiasott.com/articles/into-the-personal-website-verse
Matthias Ott

"Writing and publishing
forces you to solidify and
clarify your thoughts"
https://cagrimmett.com/2022/04/26/why-blog/
Chuck Grimmett

"There's something magical about constructing
a narrative/explanation/argument and writing
it down. It forces you to make sure the ideas
you are trying to get across cohere and follow
each other, and it allows you to see your own
thinking from a third-person point of view."
https://www.sheenaoc.com/articles/2024-02-06-why-i-write
Sheena O'Connell

"Build a body of work: it takes time to
have a blog full of great stuff that can
be referenced when applying for jobs
or conferences or when someone
asks something for the nth time"
https://hamatti.org/posts/you-should-start-a-blog-today/
Juhis

Speaking in
meetups and
conferences

"Speaking is hard work. But, it's the kind
of hard work that is *good*. It requires you
to dive deeper into the topic and to think
more deeply about it. Along the way, you
will likely learn new things and discover
new insights."
https://twitter.com/reverentgeek/status/1110568292597579776
David Neal

Contributing to
open source

"There's More to Open
Source than Code"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgFtVshbAec
Ramon Huidobro

"Your contributions, your
learning, they add up over time. If
you have a public log, that adding
up is visible and you can use it"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOZWF86TGmo
Carlton Gibson

Sidenote:
Hallway tracks

Hallway track
Everything that happens outside the
organized program
Discussions with people on the
hallways, during breaks, over breakfast
or lunch, at the afterparties and so on
(aka the Best Part)

"Snowball rule: For every year
you have attended an event,
you should try to meet that
many new people each day."
https://ericholscher.com/blog/2017/dec/2/breaking-cliques-at-events/
Eric Holscher

About that
fun stuff

Other communities in
Turku you can join

Aurajoki Overflow
- all things software dev
- meetups
https://meetabit.com/
communities/aurajoki-
overflow
TurkuSec
- information security
- meetups and
workshops
turkusec.fi
Turku Wordpress
- WordPress
- meetups
https://
www.meetup.com/turku-
wordpress-meetup/

Turku.ai
- AI and ML
- meetups
https://
www.meetup.com/
turku-ai/
Twig the Code
- women in tech
- meetups and
workshops
https://
twigthecode.com/
TurkuMobile
- mobile dev
- meetups
https://meetabit.com/
communities/
turkumobile
CNCF Turku
- cloud, kubernetes
https://
www.meetup.com/
Kubernetes-Turku/

Syntax Error
A monthly newsletter about debugging.
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Thanks!
https://hamatti.org
https://hamatti.org/slides/gdsc-tuas-2024.pdf
https://syntaxerror.tech

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