I was honored to visit the Data Platform Summit 2017 and get to speak at the event. Since this was in India, on the other side of the world (12 hours from Denver in time zones), I took an extra week of vacation with my family before the event. India was amazing and we all enjoyed the trip. It’s a culture shock for a US guy that lives in a rural area, but I really enjoyed the experience overall. Traffic, however, was a shock.
The event was fun, and well attended. It was held in a conference center in Bangalore, with quite the entrance for everyone walking in each day.
There was also a large display at the parking lot.
The schedule was interesting for me, with lots of commitments. I tend to speak 2-3 times at most events, but here I had a pre-con + 5 other sessions. Granted, 3 were shorter ones, but still, that’s a lot.
There were normal, 75 minute sessions, which are what most other conferences schedule. However, alongside these were 30 minute sessions, which were held in a number of smaller rooms. Some were open talks, which are lectures. No screen, no computer. Others were chalk-talks, where a whiteboard was available, but again, no slides/computers.
The idea was that we’d just talk about a topic and answer questions from the audience. I wasn’t sure how the Indian attendees would respond. In some countries, people are very quiet and shy. In others, they don’t hesitate to ask questions. That meant I had to prepare an outline, which was similar to other talks. The good thing was no demos. The tough thing is that I need to be able to explain things without the crutches of images and code.
Everything went well, and I am thankful for the opportunity to present. I don’t know if I’ll get the chance to go back, but I certainly would if the stars align.
