Lightning Talks

​On Tuesday (6/20/2017), the Leaf team gathered for a round of lightning talks given by Leaf employees. The format was as follows: Speakers had 5 minutes to present on whatever they wanted. No slide deck required.

Developer Ergonomics and
​Repetitive Stress Injuries
Chris Chalfant shared what he's learned about developer Ergonomics and Repetitive Stress Injuries. Some top tips from discussion included finding a tool to force yourself to take breaks away from the computer, proper posture (feet flat on floor, arms making an L shape when typing, knees slightly below hips), and the importance of learning keyboard shorts rather than reaching for the mouse (VIM lovers everywhere rejoiced!).

Tap here for more information 

Welcome Screen - Raspberry PI
Andrew Kaczorek gave an overview of the new software used to drive the large LCD welcome screen in our office foyer, allowing Leaf to have a custom welcome message for visitors to our office while being easily updated by office staff. The entire solution is being driven by BizPlay and a Raspberry PI.  The custom case was also 3D printed by Leaf's Scott Beardsley.

Mechanical Keyboard
Jimmy Briggs gave some insight into his passion for mechanical keyboards. Using a hands-on show-and-tell approach, he gave everyone a chance to experience the feel of a mechanical keyboard as well as the variety of switch types that are available out there.

Optimizing Unit Test Fixtures
Frederick Myers shared some of the tips that his team uses for optimizing unit tests fixtures for speed, navigation, and consistency.

"Strangify" - Slack and OpenCV
Mike Warren pulled back the curtain on "Strangify" -- our slack app that uses OpenCV to detect faces on images and replace them with pictures of our own infamous James S.

CoffeeBot - Raspberry PI
James Alexander had not one, but two lightning talks​.  The first was an overview of Coffee Bot, Leaf's in-house IoT hack to monitor our coffee usage. Using a scale and Raspberry PI, we track when coffee is made and poured with the output of various statistics going on to an RGB LED matrix display. ​

Python Tornado web framework
James' second talk was an overview of the Python Tornado web framework that James is evaluating for IndyPY Web Framework Shootout.

It was great for everyone to get together for fun as well as an opportunity to share and learn (and have some pizza).

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