Women Who Code Connect 2017 Conference - San Francisco

On April 29 Autodesk Forge had the pleasure of participating in the Connect 2017 Women Who Code conference at Twitter headquarters in San Francisco. We had packed classes with great engagement and lots of questions. It wouldn’t have been possible without the Women Who Code team, the attendees, and the following women at Autodesk:

• Aradhana Vaidya, Senior Customer Success Engineer (@aradhanav)
• Sharmila Phadnis, Product Line Manager
• Shiya Luo, Developer, Engineer Project Quantum (@shiyaluo)
• Lauryn Porte, Software Engineer (@laurynaporte)
• Hannaha Lee, Full-stack Software Engineers (@hleetwin)
• Seema Padalkar, Forge Solutions Expert (@spadalkar)
• Catherine J. Lee, Senior Data Scientist (@catherine_l33)
• Ankita Singh, Senior Data Analyst (@anki_mickey)
• Aishwarya Balamukundan, Fusion360 Business Development @helloaish
• Liz Garcia, Autodesk Exchange Learning Strategies (@fabulizg)
• Jennifer Kinavey, Autodesk Recruiter (careers.autodesk.com)
• Stephanie Wells, Autodesk University (@AutodeskU)
• Nelle Sacknoff, Forge Product Marketing Manager (@nellesacknoff)

For those that didn’t get to attend, this blog post has the session recaps, including links to videos, slides, and code samples.

Session 1: Make your own Pokédex with the Pokéapi & Node/Express!

For those unfamiliar with the world of Pokémon, a Pokédex is an encyclopedia containing metadata (such as names, skills, and evolutions) about the hundreds of monsters that inhabit the Pokémon universe. In this workshop, Hannaha Lee and Lauryn Porte showed attendees how to use the extensive dataset from Pokéapi to create their own Pokédex with Node and Express. Lee and Porte covered the fundamentals of APIs and RESTful routes, explaining what they are, why they matter, and how to use them.  

Focus and Key Takeaways

• Overview of fundamentals of APIs and HTTP get requests
• A general understanding of APIs and CRUD
• Use open source API with Node and Express
• Demonstrate value/accessibility of APIs across a variety of fields
• Provide basic structure for a portfolio project
• Build confidence with JavaScript and APIs
• Provide slide deck and resources for further learning
• Customize their own Pokédex!

Resources

• Link to session slides
• Watch on Periscope
• SF OpenData Registered Business Locations API
• SF OpenData Recreation and Park Department Info
• Google Maps API

Session 2: Developing 3D Visualization Apps (with a little IoT and Creativity)

Led by Sharmila Phadnis and Shiya Luo, this session showcased Internet of Things (IoT) demos and 3D visualization with the Autodesk Forge Viewer. Sharmila and Shiya described how our customers are leveraging Forge and walked attendees through some code samples.

Focus and Key Takeaways

• Hands-on examples of Autodesk Forge API solutions
• Understanding of WebGL
• Visualization and Viewer demos

Resources

• Link to Session Slides
• Watch on Periscope
• Git Repo Link
• Dotty IoT Demo Video
• Dasher 360 Visualization Research Project Main Web Page

Session 3: Harnessing the Power of Customer Feedback

In this age of continuous product releases, customers are global, always connected, and increasingly impatient. As Aradhana Vaidya explained during her session, to stay competitive and deliver features that are relevant, product teams need a continuous feedback loop. The idea is to understand customer needs, identify market trends, and then respond to the input by adjusting requirements, prioritizing, and building again. Vaidya shared how this is being done at Autodesk as the company transitions from a traditional desktop company to offering cloud services.

Focus and Key Takeaways

• The only way to stay ahead of the game is to build the right product by giving your customer what they ask for
• Participants gained empathy for their customers and a renewed way of looking at product development

Resources

• Link to session slides
• Watch on Periscope