Dev@CGI Congress

Keynote: The Potential of Quantum Technology - Laurens Feije, QuTech

Quantum technology has already influenced the world more than people realize. From medical applications like MRI to everyday applications like lasers and the ever decreasing size of computer chips. However, a new quantum revolution has started with the development of quantum computers and quantum internet.

Laurens Feije, PhD student at QuTech, will tell you how these new quantum technologies can change your life. From breaking current day encryption using algorithms on a quantum computer, to using the quantum internet to create fundamentally secure communication.

Keynote: Responsible Tech – Martin ter Horst, Thoughtworks

Our planet and society are facing huge challenges. The wheels of change are in motion, but they might just not be moving fast enough. Technology will play a huge role in what the future will look like: solving the big problems, causing new ones, or a combination of both. What can we do to steer that in the right direction? 

As developers, we carry a not to be underestimated responsibility. The decisions we make and actions we take in our day to day work may potentially affect thousands, if not millions or billions of people as well as society as a whole. In this talk Martin ter Horst and some of his Thoughtworks colleagues will dig into why responsible tech is so important, the state of responsible tech in global enterprises according to recent MIT research and most importantly, what we, developers, can do to contribute to a fair, ethical and equitable (tech) future.

Top 5 algorithms you should know - Mats Donselaar, CGI

Algorithms in general are just a set of rules for a computer to follow in order to solve a specific problem. However, what makes an algorithm a good algorithm?

In this presentation, Mats highlights five iconic algorithms ranging from intuitive to almost magical. By looking at what these algorithms do and which problem they attempt to solve, Mats discusses what makes an algorithm good or bad. The best solution is not always the most accurate or fastest one, and instead typically depends on the situation.

The goal of the presentation is partially to educate or remind the audience about the workings of some iconic and commonly used algorithms. The other part of the presentation is to show that understanding your problems well and being creative are often times more important.

Clean software architecture - Ludo Visser, CGI

This talk is inspired by the book “Clean Architecture” by Robert Martin, but it is not a book review. Instead, Ludo is going to discuss the basic principles clean software architecture and how those help to deliver robust and maintainable software. Ludo will share some examples of how he has applied these principles in his work and how that helped him. However, he will also share some examples of where he didn’t adhere (completely) to those basic principles and what the consequences were. The goal is to provide some guidelines for (beginning) software architects on how to keep your architecture “clean”.

Next generation styling with design tokens - Stefan van Oss, CGI

Ideally a Design System is entirely driven by variables, so that all values can be managed in one central place. No more hardcoded values, designers can easily update values, without the need of a serious development effort by all feature/app teams.

A big Dutch bank had to take the step to change from a design system using public global variables to a new flexible token architecture. Stefan would like to share their challenges and solutions to create and migrate to the next generation styling system with design tokens

Introduction to the Rust ecosystem – Jurrian Fahner, CGI

This presentation will be an introduction into the magical beautiful world of Rust. It will dive in the properties and features of the Rust language (but no life coding, due to limited time). As well how rust manages memory management in relation to C and garbage collected languages. Further Jurrian will go into the enthusiasm of large companies like Microsoft, Google, AWS and Cloudflare.

The tools like rustup, cargo, and rustc will be explained, what their role is and what is needed to know to get started (on a CGI laptop). The end result will be a minimal base to get started with the Rust language after this presentation and know where to look for information.

Unify smart IOT techniques to create something that looks simple - Fedor Kauffman & George Zachiotis, CGI

Of course you can send information through the internet to your phone. And of course you can use a camera to detect shapes. And of course there are open source software libraries that structure and monitor the business logic. And of course we can show how to unify it all.

It’s a story of combining knowledge and having fun while developing an impressive technical solution to create a simple looking application. Come and watch Fedor Kauffman & George Zachiotis show you the use of OPENCV, the Robotic Operating System, MQTT and Unity3D to control a virtual train.

Loving to code – or the life and experiences of an open-source developer - Jeroen Claassens, CGI

Jeroen will give you his perspective of the life and experiences as an open-source developer. Talking from his own experiences you will get to follow his journey in open-source development. Getting a peak into what open-source development is and highlights of some of the projects that Jeroen currently is working on. As well as some of the challenges around open-source development and how those challenges can be overcome.

You will also get an introduction to how you can get into open-source development yourself. Jeroen is convinced that any developer should try their hand at open-source development, and hopefully by the end of the presentation you will be convinced as well!