Montreal Python

Check it out!
The Introduction to Python Workshop is next Wednesday!

• Date : Wednesday, 2012 January 25th at 6:00 PM
• Place : McGill, Arts building, room 260

Bring your laptop and try to have Python and iPython installed before the workshop.
Installation procedures and all the information on this workshop are on the workshop’s wiki page :
Workshop 2012-01-25 : Introduction to Python.
If you have problems with the installation, Montréal-Python team will be able to help you at the very beginning of the workshop.

A workshop in French with similar content will be held at UQAM the previous Monday.
All the information on the workshop in French at UQAM:
Atelier 2012-01-23 : Introduction à Python.

Be there or be square!

Pythonistas, grab your pants firmly! We’re really happy to announce the first Montréal-Python monthly event of 2012 : Knickers Khaki.

After the flaws of the stock market these recent years, we’re in right to ask :

• What’s Python place in this maelstrom?
• Does our favourite language can change the world and help us keep our AAA rating?
• Into wich company or startup invest?

We’ll may not answer all these questions but we’re proud to invite you on January 30th, at Montréal-Python 27, Finance special edition.

The meeting will be held at UQAM, room SH-R810, Sherbrooke building on 200 Sherbrooke West.

Here’s the program of the evening :

• 6:00 PM : Opening
• 6:20 PM : Annoucements
• 6:30 PM : First salvo (Flash presentations)
• 6:50 PM : Pause
• 7:00 PM : Main presentations
• 9:00 PM : End of evening at Bénélux

Our presenters will be :

Flash (5 mins)

• Greg Whiteside (Betabrokers), « Email as an API for simulated stock trading »

Short (10mins)

• Marc Boucher (Caisse de dépot et de placements), « Gestion d’actifs avec Python »

Normal (20 mins)

• Hugues Demers (BullBear), « Un outil d’analyse des nouvelles de matières premières »
• Alok Mohindra, « A Hitchhiker’s Guide to Big Data & Finance for Pythonistas »

Long (45mins)

• Taavi Burns (Freshbooks), « Evolving an Internal Web Service »

The event is free and open to all. Snacks will be provided and yes, there will be again some free beer…

As always, we are really proud to have the support of our sponsors, willing to get involved in the Python community. Thanks to all of them:

• Ludia
• iWeb
• Benelux
• UQAM
• Le Site
• Savoir-Faire Linux

You’re dreaming to feel Python leather on your keyboard?
You already know its legendary softness and now want to feel the gentle power of its grasp?

Pythonista in the egg, moulting or already moving :
the Winter 2012 series of Python workshops has arrived!

This semester, Montréal-Python is offering one workshop a month :

• January : Introduction Workshop to Python
• February : Python Workshop : more advanced notions and use of Twitter API
• March : Django Workshop : building a Python web app
• April : Advanced Workshop : integration of libraries and a guest star!

The content of these workshops has been forged collaboratively by professional trainers, practionners and academics from the community. Animated by our champions, they are offered in French at UQAM and English at McGill. They’re open to all : only minimal knowledge of programming is required (e.g.: to know what a variable is). You also need to bring a laptop to follow the exercises.

These workshops are independent : to attend one, no need to attend the formers. But to progress on the Pythonic Way, to follow them all is better than following one. When to start? “Now is better than never.” — Zen of Python

INTRODUCTION WORKSHOP TO PYTHON

• language : English
• when : Wednesday, January 25th, 6:00 PM
• where : McGill, Arts building, room 260
• trainer : Mathieu Perreault

The programme :

• Running Python
• Variables and Arithmetic Expressions
• Conditionals
• File Input and Output
• Strings
• Lists
• Tuples
• Sets
• Dictionaries
• Iteration and Looping
• Functions
• Objects and Classes
• Modules

The room of this workshop is sponsored by : the Network Dynamics lab.

To follow this workshop in French, read the French version of this post in order to know the exact place and date:
Lire cette annonce en français

OH! OH! OH! Monday, December 19th, 6 days before christmas, Montreal-Python is inviting you to their last 2011 meeting, at UQAM, Sherbrooke building, room SH-R810, 200 sherbrooke west.

The event is free and even though we can’t serve a four course meal, snacks will be provided. Once again, there is some rumor about a free beer…

Schedule of the evening:

• 6:00pm Opening
• 6:20pm Announcements
• 6:30pm First salvo (flash presentations)
• 6:50pm Break
• 7:00pm: Second salvo
• 7:30pm: Christmas party at Benelux!

Our jolly presenters will be:

Flash Presentations (5 mins):

• Gabriel Tremblay “Tachyon, sloppiness is bliss”
• Putra Manggala “NetworkX, a package for the creation, manipulation, and study of the structure, dynamics, and functions of complex networks”
• Heri Rakotomalala “#MTLStartupTalent Join a startup: it might not be easy, but it’s worth it!”

Presentations (20mins)

• Alexander Kress “We use Python throughout our projects to run BDDs using Freshen, both for the APIs and UI.”
• Sophie Leroy “Par-delà l’Invisible, un projet de la SAT, une exposition artistique en réalité augmentée sur un iPhone avec un backend Django, ainsi qu’un site web interactif.”
• Andy Frances “How Do You Solve a Problem Like Santa Claus: Prototyping Join Patterns with Stackless.py” (example video)

As always, we are really thankful to have such motivated an amazing sponsors. Thanks to all of them:

• Ludia
• iWeb
• Benelux
• UQAM
• Le Site
• Savoir-Faire Linux

Python Jobs: Free Software enthusiasts are hiring in Montreal!

Savoir-faire Linux team is looking for two Python Web developers.

Conditions:

• Ready to program in Python full-time, in agile mode
• Want to join a team with more than 30 experienced developers
• Can identify Richard Stallman and Linus Torvalds on a photo

You can apply online via this address:

http://www.savoirfairelinux.com/en/careers/2011060701-web-python

Montreal-Python and the UQAM Computer Science Student Association (AGEEI) are proud to present their very first French open attendance Django Workshop.

Last week, we introduced Python through a dynamic workshop and we will now dive head first in web development using the Django Python framework.

You only need to have a basic knowledge of the Python language in order to participate (if you have assisted to our first workshop, you’re good to go).

The evening will be animated by Davin Baragiotta of Agence Universitaire de la Francophonie (AUF) and will be split up in two parts:
* Web development with Python and Django: an overview of a typical project architecture
* Street Hockey League: we will be working on a little sample Django project

The workshop will be next Thursday, on December 1st at the Sherbrooke building of UQAM, room SH-R810 from 6h30pm to 9pm.

More info can be found about the event at:

http://montrealpython.org/r/projects/workshop-uqam-2011-12-01/wiki

Pizza, coffee and soft drinks will be provided.

We would like to thank our sponsors: Ludia and Savoir-faire Linux for helping us organize this event.

Please bring yourself, a laptop and your sense of humor!

Please have Python 2.7 (or >= 2.5) and Django 1.3.1 installed.
For installation instructions : http://montrealpython.org/r/projects/workshop-uqam-2011-12-01/wiki

If you bump into any issue during the installation, don’t panic, we will be in room SH-R810 starting at 5:30pm to help you setup your laptop for the workshop, whatever OS you are running.

To register, please confirm your presence on our guest list:

http://guestli.st/79653

Tomorrow is the Montréal-Ouvert Hackathon and we will play with plenty of open data. Don’t forget to register on the eventbrite page, there are still some places available:

http://montrealouvert.eventbrite.com/

At our last meeting, we came up with 3 different projects. Feel free to join us on these projects or to start your own one. In the mean time, here is a brief description of what we would like to do:

Air and Water Quality

Create an automated twitter feed that will publish alerts on bad
environmental conditions on the island of Montreal in real-time by
monitoring air and water quality information published by the city.

Montréal Photos 2.0

Improve Montrealphotos.org with semantics information by crowd sourcing.
Those information include more accurate geotags and datetags, links to
relevant websites (wikipedia?) and tags. And then make it social!

Recreation Montreal

Centralized all the informations about the different recreation activies available in Montreal and then, allowing the citizens to enjoy their pools, their ski trails and all what they need to have fun in their city in a pythonic way.

For Hacks and glory

How does a developer change the world? One function at a time. This December the Notman House gives you a chance to join likeminded others and hack for a greater good.

The event is Random Hacks of Kindness and it will be hosted this December 3rd and 4th.

On the first day, Montreal participants will be presented real-life problems by representatives of Médecins Sans Frontières and the LIRNEasia think tank. Once a problem chosen, your team will then have two days to create a solution.

In this feat you will not be alone. Thousands of people world wide will be participating in 30 sister events along with you. Participants in other cities will work on solutions to the problems of their community or their organization.

Here in Montreal, I (Dimitry Zolotaryov) am looking for team-mates to represent Montreal-Python. Developers, designers, engineers and social media people are all welcome. Send me a message if you’re interested in being part of an enthusiastic team: dimitry@webit.ca.

This is your chance to hack for good. Won’t you accept the challenge?

Register Here: http://mtlrhok.eventbrite.com/?srnk=1
Event Page: http://www.rhok.org/event/montr%C3%A9al-canada

Past Problems: http://www.rhok.org/problems

Let me tell you a story… Two years ago, I embarked on this great adventure starting a company, raising high my Python sword and slashing all the challenges that I would face during my journey.

This feeling that warms you up when someone finds your code so useful that they will pay money for it is amazing.

Starting a company is much more than that though; it’s the opportunity to talk to people and to use your empathy to figure out what they really want; it’s the opportunity to decide all by yourself what kind of crazy new software development methodologies you’re going to use; it’s the opportunity to write code that is 100% tested — or not waste anytime on those stinking tests that only slow you down; it’s the opportunity to take the the phone and to learn the hard way how to close a sale (a skill that will serve you well for years to come in many aspects of your life, from negotiating a business deal to dating).

Starting a company is stressful, yes, but it’s a lot of fun.
Founder Fuel is an exciting local initiative that gives an average of $20k to new startups and helps them grow by nurturing them with skilled mentoring and a very influential network of contacts.

In the four months of the program, the companies are are expected to grow from essentially nothing into usable and marketable products.

The first round of startups presented their products last Tuesday during the demo day, and it was very exciting to see how far many of those went during such a short time.

The second round is now open to applications, and you have until January 7th to submityour startup idea. In the first round, not a single startup had a strong Python presence.

Will we see more Python companies this time?

Let’s try to make it happen!