Machine Learning for Dummies: Build & Use a Model Easily

At our latest Dev Meetup this month, we had the pleasure of welcoming Nikolay Demirev, Principal Software Engineer at Progress (Telerik). He shared his experience in integrating Machine Learning into his ride-sharing platform – Tripinfy, which he created in 2017.

Nikolay is a graduate of Geo Milev High School of Mathematics and Natural Sciences in Stara Zagora and holds a degree from the Technical University of Sofia. He has been working at Progress for over 13 years as part of a team developing software components and libraries. He has extensive experience in various technologies, including Web, Mobile, Desktop, and Embedded.

In 2010, he founded the first Facebook group for ride-sharing in Bulgaria, which later led to the development of the Tripinfy platform. Since its launch, the platform has facilitated over 150,000 trips. 

During the meetup, Nikolay demonstrated how and why he integrated Machine Learning into Tripinfy, showcasing that anyone – even without prior knowledge of ML or AI – can train a functional model with just a few clicks. Thanks to Microsoft’s ready-made tools, training and using an ML model proved to be easy and accessible for everyone.

The meetup took place in a friendly atmosphere, where participants exchanged knowledge and contacts. We were delighted to see so many new people joining in and exploring the potential of Machine Learning without needing programming experience.

We look forward to discovering the topic of the next Dev Meetup!

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Second Crypto Meetup at The Lodge Coworking Space: A Look at the Future of Web3

On March 6, the second Crypto Meetup was held at The Lodge Coworking Space in Stara Zagora, led by Boyan Klisurov – an expert with years of experience in the digital world and Web3 technologies. The event attracted both avid enthusiasts and people who are just entering the world of blockchain and cryptocurrencies.

During the event, Boyan Klisurov talked about his journey through the digital ages – from mIRC and Facebook to Web3 and AI. The main topic was the evolution of the Internet, examining the differences between Web1, Web2 and Web3, the role of blockchain networks and the importance of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and the Internet Computer for the future of the digital economy.

After the presentation, participants had the opportunity to test their knowledge through a fun Quiz with prizes. The evening continued with informal conversations, exchanging ideas and building new partnerships.

We are happy to support the growing blockchain community in Stara Zagora and believe that events like this help to develop the digital ecosystem in the region. Stay tuned for the next Stara Zagora Crypto Meetup – keep an eye on our website so you don’t miss it!

The new season of events at The Lodge kicks off with an AI theme

The new event season at The Lodge Coworking Space kicked-off with a strong start – Artificial Intelligence (AI). On October 4th, we had the pleasure of hosting a special guest, Boncho Valkov, who shared his experience and knowledge in the field of AI in the event “Artificial Intelligence for Everyone – How to Utilize Some of the Most Popular Tools in Everyday Life.”

Boncho has been a programmer for over a decade. He graduated from Telerik Academy in 2013 and holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. Furthermore, he completed his master’s degree at FMI (Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics), specializing in Artificial Intelligence.

Boncho introduced the most well-known tools and applications in the field of artificial intelligence and provided with concrete examples of how we can integrate AI into our daily lives. 

. He demonstrated how to generate car sales contracts, compare products, prepare for successful job interviews, and research specific business scenarios. These were just some of the many examples that he discussed. He also demonstrated how we can generate images based on predefined parameters.

The event was organized with the assistance of our partners from Mentormate, who contributed to the pleasant atmosphere and provided refreshing beverages for the participants.

Many exciting events are coming in the next weeks. If you are also interested in the world of technology, IT, and entrepreneurship, don’t forget to follow our profiles on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn to stay informed about upcoming lectures, discussions, and training sessions that we offer. Join our active community and learn with us.

THE LODGE HOSTED THE ENTREPRENEURIAL TRAINING ABLE WEEKEND ACTIVATOR

From June 2nd to 4th at The Lodge Coworking Space hosted the two-day entrepreneurial training for people aged between 19 and 35 years ABLE Weekend Activator. It was organized by ABLE (Association of Bulgarian Leaders and Entrepreneurs), together with the Municipality of Stara Zagora and our partners from eDynamix. 

Within 48 hours future entrepreneurs with ideas for social projects or their own business worked on different cases and ideas and with the help of experienced mentors they had the opportunity to improve them to a real working version. 

The 27 participants, divided into 5 teams, had to do their projects, which were presented at a closing ceremony in front of a jury at Zahariy Knyazheski Regional Library.The members of the jury were Rositsa Raykova – Head of the Municipal Investments  Department , Dora Radeva – Compliance Officer at Edynamix, Violeta Nadeva, Program Director for Business Entrepreneurship at the America for Bulgaria Foundation, Rositsa Petrova -Home of Wool Founder  and Assoc. Prof. Dr. Atanas Georgiev – Dean of the Faculty of Economics at Sofia University. 

After a tense and lively discussion the jury selected the winning team – Blacktrace Security. They presented a project aimed at combating cybercrime. 

The team will be supported with 5 consultations from professional experts to continue successfully developing the idea. 

 

We are glad that we were part of this entrepreneurial adventure and managed to support another wonderful initiative in our city!

RAILS GIRLS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN STARA ZAGORA

On May 19th and 20th The Lodge Coworking Space hosted the first edition of the free workshop that targeted women with little to no experience in the field of programming and technology Rails Girls Stara Zagora. It was part of the first big technology festival in Stara Zagora – Zara Tech Spring. The organizer of the edition in Stara Zagora was IT Stara Zagora Assosiation, and the general sponsor of the event was the company Siteground. 

The main goal of Rails Girls was to encourage women to take their first steps in technology, by giving them basic knowledge of programming and showing them that it is an exciting, fun, interesting and very useful skill. 

During the edition in Stara Zagora 20 ladies of different ages made their first contact with technology and learned the basics of web programming. With the help of the experienced mentors Vladislava Karataneva, Plamena Manolova, Vladimir Radkov, Dimitar Papazov, Ivan Gyokov, Ivan Dinchev and Plamen Kostov they created their first web applications. 

On the first day the participants learned more about the main building blocks of a website and learned the basics of HTML and CSS. 

On the next day they discussed the basic terms and concepts in programming and web applications and with Ruby code they made their first web applications. 

In the course of the event the ladies learned more about the work of programmers and received valuable tips on how to start a career in the field. 

The next edition of IT training for ladies is coming in autumn. This initiative has already been implemented in over 200 cities around the world.

OVER 70 PARTICIPANTS ON THE CHESS TOURNAMENT “THE LODGE”

On March 26, 2023, The Lodge Coworking Space turned into a real arena of clash of strategic thinking of chess players. For the first time, together with An Passan Chess Club, we held a Chess Tournament The Lodge. It was attended by over 70 participants from Stara Zagora, Plovdiv, Kazanlak, Yambol, Sliven, Radnevo and other cities, who demonstrated enviable skills.

Participants were divided into two separate groups – adults and children born after 31.12.2010. The requirement for both Bulgarian and foreign chess players, was to have a maximum ELO for classical and rapid chess not greater than 2200.  There were clear rules and regulations for organizing the competition. 

The competition was really intense and provoked the thinking and skills of young and old. First place in the tournament for adults was for Martin Peev from Stara Zagora. There were cash prizes for him and the other seven best performing chess players from the prize fund of the tournament, provided by our partners from eDynamix. 

The best chess player among the children turned out to be 11-year-old Alexander Atanasov from Yambol. He won with maximum points and received a special cup and prize, which were handed out by another partner of the tournament – Rotary Club Stara Zagora. 

The first three prizewinners in each age category received medals and material prizes. All children who participated in the Chess Tournament The Lodge were presented with encouraging gifts, provided by eDynamix. 

We would like to thank all the participants who became part of this great event, filled with many positive emotions! We hope it will be the first of many more successful chess tournaments organized by us. If you are interested in chess or have friends who want to become part of the community – follow us on social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram) and look forward to the upcoming events of the local chess community.

WORDPRESS MEETUP IN STARA ZAGORA

On February 16th, at The Lodge Coworking Space we took the first step towards creating the WordPress community of Stara Zagora! 

On a special evening dedicated to the most used content management system in the world, we managed to gather various WP enthusiasts not only from the city, but also from Sofia, Plovdiv, Kazanlak and Dimitrovgrad. 

The guest lecturer at the event was Nikolay Krastev, who is closely related to the platform – he supports the community with organizing events, translations of core, themes and extensions and more. 

The topic he presented was “Everything about WordPress – history, community, ecosystem, opportunities and ways to contribute”. He talked about the history of WordPress from the birth of the platform to the present day, as well as about the ecosystem behind it. Nicky also shared what the possibilities to contribute to the development of the open source platform are and at the same time outlined what is ahead of us in the future. 

After the lecture we had a discussion about specific projects and businesses. 

Our friends from SuperHosting.BG were partners of the event again and contributed a lot to the pleasant atmosphere after the meeting. 

It turned out to be a really great event, which we hope is just the beginning of many more upcoming Meetups. 

 

If you are interested in WordPress or have friends who want to become part of the community – follow us on social networks and stay tuned for upcoming events of the local WordPress community.

HOW CAN WE MAKE AN ONLINE STORE BY OURSELVES?

E-commerce has seen a real boom in recent years. A huge number of businesses have offered online shopping opportunities. As a result of the COVID crisis the majority of companies prefer to trade entirely on Internet nowadays. 

On December 1, the marketing specialist at SuperHosting.BG and founder of stilka.com Borislav Bozhidarov will tell how we can make an online store ourselves and develop it without having a programmer or be technically literate.

During the event “How to make an online store yourself?” he will give information about what the basic principles of E-commerce are, how to test an online store for free, and to upload photos and description of the products, and how to design a successful guided selling experience. Borislav will also present the basic tools with which reports can be tracked and bills of lading for shipments can created. He will also present the main marketing strategies for attracting visitors to the store and increasing the chance of purchase.

The founder of stilka.com has been actively practising Internet methods of sales, advertising and content distribution for 7 years. He has worked for SuperHosting.BG Marketing department for almost 5 years. On a daily basis,  he tries to help Bulgarian businesses go online with the most suitable service for them.

Borislav’s personal mission is to make more and more people in Bulgaria digitally literate. The online store he owns makes orders on a daily basis. His business portfolio can be found both on the website and @stilka.home on social networks.

During the event he will also share the path that a business needs to take until it starts selling online successfully with the site.

At the end of the presentation, each participant will also receive a BONUS – a free domain for registration from SuperHosting.BG.

The event is free with advance registration at: https://forms.gle/TmzcAdztMHAm8dZb7.

MOBILE TECHNOLOGIES WILL DEVELOP DYNAMICALLY IN THE FUTURE

On November 17, an intriguing event was held at The Lodge with guest speaker Vladimir Radkov. We talked about mobile applications, their place in our lives and the possibilities for the development of mobile technologies and software solutions that will soon be the “new normal”.

In front of the participants of the event, Vladi reviewed the development of mobile devices and technologies from their creation and launch to the present moment. He talked in detail about the further development of processors, batteries, cameras and network connectivity. He also talked about all aspects of their future development – new and interesting projects that will make the devices of the future much better.

Special attention was also paid to the current topic of IoT (Internet of Things) and to what extent people will be dependent on it in the future. The idea of smart cities and homes and alternative implementations of AI (Artificial Intelligence) that are already part of our daily lives were explored. Great interest was caused by the presentation of future designs of devices that will surround us in the future. An example of this is wireless charging with IR/RF and devices such as smart rings and glasses that will be the “new normal” in an alternate universe called the Metaverse.

Vladi told more about the work of the company Neuralink and the topic “The future of brain machine interface”. Augmented Virtual Reality, LIDAR (Light detection and ranging), NFTs and Web3.0 were presented and it was discussed how they will be the basis on which the future of Metaverse will be built. The participants were introduced to the current version of the universe and the future plans for the development to the point of being an unchangeable and natural part of people’s daily life. Work, study, entertainment, recreation, social aspect, fitness, gaming and much more in the Metaverse will be an integral part of the man of the future. When asked “Can we imagine the future of the Metaverse?”, Vladimir replied: “It’s like at the moment of creating the first HTML site in the world, we can imagine the Internet as it is today.”

Vladimir told more about himself and the company (and our partner) eDynamix, where he works as the manager of the Mobile Apps Department. He shared with us his causes and his willingness to pass on his knowledge as a programmer to anyone who wants to develop in the field.

If you want to be part of future events at The Lodge and be the first to learn about all the news – do not miss to follow us on social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram) or subscribe to our newsletter.

DATA DEMOCRATIZATION – WHY IT MATTERS TO EVERYONE IN DATA ANALYTICS?

At a special event on November 3rd, two of our members presented  the topic of Data Analytics. Plamen and Stanislav, software engineers at VMware, discussed SuperCollider – Data Analytics platform for data democratization and told more about what possibilities it offers.

During the event, they reminded about the importance of the data that surrounds us, about the concept of what a Data Analytics Platform looks like, what technologies and what architecture they chose for VMware’s Data Analytics Platform, as well as demonstrated the standard BI flow of a Data Engineer Live. More about the platform itself: https://octo.vmware.com/a-best-in-class-data-analytics-platform-built-on-a-vmware-private-cloud/

Of course, there was also time for questions to the speakers. It is a great joy for us that such events are happening more and more often and above all – that we have the honor and pleasure of hosting and helping to build the IT community in Stara Zagora.

If you don`t want to miss the next events at The Lodge Coworking Space, follow us on social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram) or sign up for our newsletter below.