1---
 2date: '2019-10-15'
 3subtitle: 'Pretty fun weekend, I''d say'
 4title: 'PyCon India 2019 wrap-up'
 5url: 'pycon-wrap-up'
 6---
 7
 8I'm writing this article as I sit in class, back on the grind. Last
 9weekend---Oct 12th and 13th---was PyCon India 2019, in Chennai, India.
10It was my first PyCon, *and* my first ever talk at a major conference!
11This is an account of the all the cool stuff I saw, people I met and the
12talks I enjoyed. Forgive the lack of pictures---I prefer living the
13moment through my eyes.
14
15Talks
16-----
17
18So much ML! Not that it's a bad thing, but definitely interesting to
19note. From what I counted, there were about 17 talks tagged under "Data
20Science, Machine Learning and AI". I'd have liked to see more talks
21discussing security and privacy, but hey, the organizers can only pick
22from what's submitted. ;)
23
24With that point out of the way, here are some of the talks I really
25liked:
26
27-   **Python Packaging - where we are and where we're headed** by
28    [Pradyun](https://twitter.com/pradyunsg)
29-   **Micropython: Building a Physical Inventory Search Engine** by
30    [Vinay](https://twitter.com/stonecharioteer)
31-   **Ragabot - Music Encoded** by
32    [Vikrant](https://twitter.com/vikipedia)
33-   **Let's Hunt a Memory Leak** by
34    [Sanket](https://twitter.com/sankeyplus)
35-   oh and of course, [David Beazley](https://twitter.com/dabeaz)'s
36    closing keynote
37
38My talk (!!!)
39-------------
40
41My good buddy [Raghav](https://twitter.com/_vologue) and I spoke about
42our smart lock security research. Agreed, it might have been less
43"hardware" and more of a bug on the server-side, but that's the thing
44about IoT right? It's so multi-faceted, and is an amalgamation of so
45many different hardware and software stacks. But, anyway...
46
47I was reassured by folks after the talk that the silence during Q/A was
48the "good" kind of silence. Was it really? I'll never know.
49
50Some nice people I met
51----------------------
52
53-   [Abhirath](https://twitter.com/abhirathb)---A 200 IQ lad. Talked to
54    me about everything from computational biology to the physical
55    implementation of quantum computers.
56-   [Abin](https://twitter.com/meain_)---He recognized me from my
57    [r/unixporn](https://reddit.com/r/unixporn) posts, which was pretty
58    awesome.
59-   [Abhishek](https://twitter.com/h6165)
60-   Pradyun and Vikrant (linked earlier)
61
62And a lot of other people doing really great stuff, whose names I'm
63forgetting.
64
65Pictures!
66---------
67
68It's not much, and I can't be bothered to format them like a collage or
69whatever, so I'll just dump them here---as is.
70
71![nice badge](/static/img/silly_badge.jpg) ![awkward
72smile!](/static/img/abhishek_anmol.jpg) ![me
73talking](/static/img/me_talking.jpg) ![s443 @
74pycon](/static/img/s443_pycon.jpg)
75
76C'est tout
77----------
78
79Overall, a great time and a weekend well spent. It was very different
80from your typical security conference---a lot more *chill*, if you will.
81The organizers did a fantastic job and the entire event was put together
82really well. I don't have much else to say, but I know for sure that
83I'll be there next time.
84
85That was PyCon India, 2019.