Spreading the MozFire!

My experience with Mozilla started with FSMK camp last year, for the first time I came to know that we can do something for Mozilla. I remember it was Galaxy and Abhiram that came in the camp and introduced us to the FOSS side of it.

I started looking for tutorials and stuff so that even I can start doing something for the community , at that time I was not that exposed to IRC so eventually I landed up bugging  Abhiram on how to contribute code he tried to help me a lot,

But not to any of our success , I still didn’t start contributing , I remember it was Viggy who told me to start looking into the code base and that rang a bell for me. No sooner did he tell me this than I began looking through the code and one week down the line I began working on a patch.

After a month it got accepted , I cannot put that happiness in words , form then to now I have been fixing bugs and looking into different issues.

Last week I got a chance to go on behalf of Mozilla and spread the word in PACE Mangalore. Mangalore has been all about Love, Food and Learning for me. Thank you Abhiram for giving us(Abraar and Me) this opportunity , I really loved the whole experience. Thank you Shreelaksmi Ma’m your home and family is one of the best people I ever met.

PACE conducts this annual event called Bytestruck to encourage school kids towards FOSS and help them know more about technology which in my opinion is an amazing job. Event was really well organized. Abraar gave them a really nice intro and carried out the session brilliantly , I tried assisting him on doing all things well .
I would really like to thank the PACE team Praful, Sahil, Manisha, Rameez, John and all  others who all I didn’t mention you made my first visit to Mangalore memorable.

Peace out! And Keep Rocking the Open Web!

KICKSTARTERS

On 4th of this month we the Jnaapti team planned a small workshop to get 9th and 10th standard kids to get them started with programming . We visited Florence Public School and it was really a pleasant  experience to see such fresh minds exercising their mind.

I was really amazed to watch them approach the problems we gave them, we have a rigid mind and we are really bad at thinking out of the box and that is because we have been taught rather conditioned to go in one direction.

But these kids they never knew this problem so they have a very different approach to these problem and I learnt about 7 new ways to approach the famous N-Queens problem.

Then came my favorite part “LABY” its a game which teaches programming in a fun way, so the whole idea is to make an ant to reach the door. There are various obstacles that needs to be handled and you know what you are going to use for that ?  CODE what else but its super fun to do that and we could see that in those kids. I learnt a lot that day like how will you explain conditionals , I am telling you it is not as easy as it looks.

Thanks to Gautham Sir, Shreelaksmi ma’m and Abraar for getting me this opportunity to do something this amazing , hope we will do more of such programs.

DGPLUG SUMMER TRAINING

This is  a place where you learn how to do stuff, I got to know about summer training when I was going through Twitter feeds. Bhibhas and Sayan tweeted about it and I thought why not give it a try. And now when I look back I made a wise decision joining it. Training generally take place over IRC so anyone can attend it irrespective of where are they from who are they and what is there background. I met a lot of amazing people I got to realize that how much more I need to do.

I started the training as a newbie , I tried to attend as many sessions as possible and most importantly I tried to implement what ever I learnt. I made amazing friends and found peers who can look into my code and we can have a discussion about issues. We had sessions form Kushal which was not only challenging but also fun.

We even had a session from mbuf which was enthralling and makes you ponder over your existence. He is one gem of a person. Sayan use to take class on python and basics of web development, he is one of the person whom I have bugged a lot and I still do but he has never given up on me.

Once a while there are guest sessions from people who are contributing to the upstream, these session actually motivate you towards contributing because they make you feel that all these that you are doing is not without a reason.

At the end people stop attending session I don’t know the reason but actually the doubles during the end because then only comes the real reason for the whole training. The end turns the trainees into contributors and that feeling cannot be converted into words. This training has not only taught me technologies but has given a direction to my life. Thank You DGPLUG.

                                                              गुरु गोबिंद दोऊ खड़े, का के लागूं पाय।
                                                                 बलिहारी गुरु आपणे, गोबिंद दियो मिलाय॥

Kabir tries to explain the importance of a good teacher in this Doha. I have had a few Gurus in my life, my mother being the first one, she taught me how to talk to others, how to respect others and many other life skills. In school I had many teachers but no Gurus, you might be thinking that this guy is crazy he is saying he had teachers but no Gurus. Well, the difference between Guru and a teacher is , Guru looks after your holistic growth.

I want to take today’s opportunity to talk about my mentors Gautham Sir and Lakshmi Ma’m. My association with them dated back to FSMK industrial training camp 2014 in short FSMK Summer Camp 2014. They were covering web technology and Jnaapti came to take JavaScript session that time. The way Gautham Sir took the session , it just blew me off.The motivation he gave us and the path he took to share the knowledge with us was different yet amazing , I became a fan at that time only. Jnaapti gave a free 30 days course on JavaScript and me being a fan didn’t want to loose any opportunity to learn from my hero hence I registered for the course.

JVC accounts were given to all of us and  Laksmi Ma’m war our coach for that course. I was so excited that I was clocking 20 hours of work which included college , travel and JVC. In between the course Ma’m said we have a surprise for whoever complete the course fastest, I somehow anticipated it will be an internship. “Working under the guidance of Gautham Sir”, that is  a dream come true for me. I can’t let that go so I tried harder to complete the course and I completed it. Ma’m asked me to send my resume to her (which is still pending :P). Then there were exams and I lost touch with Jnappti, I somehow gave exams and then pinged Ma’m on Hangout.

Ma’m said that you cannot take things for granted and the internship is over. I cannot put into words how bad I felt but then she told me that she was trying to teach me the importance of opportunity. Then I went to meet them at Jnaapti Home. I was scared and nervous but they are one of the most friendly people on earth. Finally I met Gautham Sir and Ma’m in person.

I can go on and on talking about various incidents and trust there are millions of those now. The best part is everytime I am talking to Sir , I am  gaining knowledge . It’s  like even he is talking to me about a very off topic discussion he is imparting me with knowledge , he is helping me to become a better person. He throws you challenges that you know you can’t but hr knows you can do it, it’s like a leap of faith. You just have to put your trust in Sir and just put your best foot forward. It is all about trying  and trying, he teaches you perseverance. He tells you it’s not about technology , it’s not about how much knowledge you have because you will never have enough. The whole point is, “Never give up!”

Our discussions have extreme points from future of computing to StartUp culture. He tells me about how your ideas shouldn’t be shallow enough. Your start up won’t succeed if you are shallow about it. He tells me the importance of putting your soul in your code. The videos we talk about, my favorite once are The Blue Shirt Guy and Randy Pausch . Both of those people saw world in different way and so do Sir. Whenever I feel low or I am happy I talk to him about it and he make sure that he brings me to the ground. He is my inspiration , he is one among those who I look upto, a friend, a mentor and a guide.

With Jnaapti I have grown a lot , I learnt a lot of things from analyzing personalities to learning how to learn. Ma’m on the other side is the sweet one. I can open my heart up and tell her whats bothering me and most of the time I don’t even have to say a word She like my mother knows it. She is a friend which I have so I am never alone. She pulls my leg whenever I come late and she joins me while pulling someones leg. She has taught me a lot , how to speak , how to express, what to say and when to say and most importantly how to convey things.

RDK sir is just awesome, he is one of the humblest person I met, he is a great friend , we crack most impossible jokes and discuss things which are really crazy.

For me It has been an amazing journey with Jnaapti, a lot of things has happened and Jnaapti is a second family for me because people care about each other here. The work is challenging and fun, it might look impossible at first but you just have to look beyond that.

Jnaapti a place where amazing happens. Thank you Sir and Ma’m for making me a part of this.