65 posts tagged with "ai"

🌟 Incredible day at She Codes Australia Sydney workshop yesterday at Microsoft Reactor! A huge shout-out to Kate and her team for putting together this amazing event, bringing so many women into the world of tech. 💻

The day was filled with inspiration, especially the powerful stories shared by the guest speakers: Catia and Laura. Catia started her journey with a teacher degree, took a gap year traveling to 50+ countries, speaks four languages, and now manages major clients around the world at Insight 🌏. Laura began with a vet degree, pursued her passion for math and statistics, and has now grown into a Data Science and AI Area Lead at Commonwealth Bank.

The energy in the room was electric, with two rooms filled with passionate participants and mentors, all working together to inspire and empower.✨

It was my first time mentoring at SheCodes, seeing so much talent, collaboration, and enthusiasm was truly inspiring! Lovely to see Catia, Ollie, Angela, Nilesh, Lisa, Athena in the room.

Looking forward to the next event and continuing to support women on their tech journey! 🚀

An amazing session from AKS product team about the new features of Azure Kubernetes Service at Microsoft Reactor Sydney tonight! It's an insightful presentation and demo from Justin on running open source LLMs in AKS using the AI toolchain operator (KAITO) - a perfect blend of AI and Kubernetes in action!

Fantastic opportunity to hear directly from the team. Great to see Simon and Jorge and the visiting product managers Brian and Kaysie for such an engaging event. Read more about KAITO: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/aks/ai-toolchain-operator

Great pizzas too! 🍕

Lucky! 🍀 My AzureAI and CosmosDB hackathon project was a winner (honorable mentions) and featured on the Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB Dev Blogs ! A few weekends of hard work truly paid off! ✨

This AI hackathon had over 9,500 developers world-wide engaged with Azure Cosmos DB and Azure AI services, making it one of the most popular on Devpost, ranking in the top 0.2% of all Devpost hackathons. 🔥

📢 Checkout my "LEGO Robot AI" and other winner's projects in this blog: "Meet the Winners | Microsoft Developers Azure AI & Azure Cosmos DB Learning Hackathon".

🚀 EPIC 'Excitement day' at Kmart Australia Limited HQ! Insight hosted two sessions of hands-on labs with the fantastic Kmart team, diving into the wonders of GitHub Copilot. The energy was off the charts! From seasoned pros to adventurous coders, everyone was excited to see how copilot could boost our day to day coding experience. We explored C#, Java, Node.js, React, Terraform and even classics like COBOL and BASIC! 💻

A huge shoutout to Duane G. Sachin Walia for making this event such a blast, and Microsoft GitHub for making it happen. The excitement in the room was contagious, and we can't wait to see how Copilot will boost efficiency and ignite innovation! 💡

Our Year 7 & 8 team is diving deep into the past with our project for the FIRST LEGO League Submerged season! We're developing BlueBerry, a deep-sea rover designed to explore the ocean floor 🌊 and uncover ancient civilizations lost to time. Rover BlueBerry will help identify and analyze submerged ruins and artifacts, bringing marine archaeology into the future.

What Makes "BlueBerry" Special?​

• Eco-Friendly Design: We're committed to minimizing our rover's environmental impact on delicate marine ecosystems.
• Real-World Potential: We aim for BlueBerry to be a tool for professional marine archaeologists, aiding in real discoveries.
• AI-Powered Discovery: BlueBerry uses AI to recognize archaeological finds and send real-time data to researchers on the surface.

Preparing for Competition & Seeking Expert Advice​

As we gear up for the regional competition, we're fine-tuning BlueBerry's design and capabilities. We'd love insights from LinkedIn experts—whether in robotics, AI, or marine archaeology.

• What challenges should we expect with underwater exploration?
• How can we enhance BlueBerry's AI for more accurate artifact detection?

3D Model and Landscape​

We've designed a 3D model and are ready to print it!

We also uploaded the model to GPT-o1 for suggestions, and the improvements are incredibly futuristic!

We're excited to learn and grow from your feedback! Follow our journey as we bring history to life, one dive at a time. 🌊

It was an incredible GitHub Copilot Hackathon with the amazing developers from Serko in Auckland! The passion and energy in the room were off the charts as we dove headfirst into exploring the potential of GitHub Copilot! 🚀 From supercharging our coding workflows to discovering how AI can elevate our development game, this hackathon truly showcased the future of dev innovation.

GitHub Copilot, Microsoft's AI-powered coding assistant, was the star of the day, sparking excitement as developers explored its potential. From optimizing complex code structures to generating intelligent suggestions, Copilot proved to be a game-changer for boosting productivity and creativity in development.

The atmosphere was electric with collaboration and creativity as teams worked together to push the limits of what AI can do for coding. Participants came with unique perspectives, and it was amazing to see how their diverse backgrounds fueled some truly innovative ideas. Whether we were optimizing workflows or discussing new ways to streamline repetitive coding tasks, the energy in the room showed just how much potential AI has in transforming the way we develop software.

As we look ahead, it's clear that today was just the beginning. The potential of GitHub Copilot and AI-driven tools in development is immense, and we're only scratching the surface. From increased productivity to smarter, more efficient coding solutions, the future of development has never looked more exciting!

We are back at Microsoft Brisbane office again for our second Azure AI App in a Day workshop.

Ready to build the next million-dollar app in just a day? 💡 We've just completed our second AzureAIAppInADay in Brisbane Microsoft office. Rakesh Lakshminarayana and I had so much fun leading the workshop, and we're glad to see more participants make it to the end - some of you without even a dev background! It's been amazing to keep the momentum going. A big thank you to Tricia Read and Ross Johnson.

In this workshop, we got hands-on with AI app development, RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation), prompt engineering and built a chatbot using CosmosDb for MongoDb. With the power of Azure and OpenAI, we're helping organizations bring their AI ideas to life!

Excited to see what incredible apps come next! Our Insight team is around to help.

I recently presented and co-hosted an Azure AI App in a Day workshop in Microsoft's Brisbane office, surrounded by 40+ developers who were just as excited as I am about learning AI and building innovative apps. It was an action-packed day, full of coding and collaboration, where we explored the possibilities of using AI in real-world applications. We dove deep into various Azure AI services, learning how to integrate machine learning models, natural language processing, and more into app innovations.

The workshop was not just about learning theory, we spent most of the time writing code together, which made it both engaging and practical. Everyone was there to push their limits and see how they could apply AI to solve real-world problems. There was a real sense of community and shared passion, which made the learning experience even more enjoyable.

During the session, I had the chance to share our own LEGO AI app with the group. This app, which we've built using several Azure AI services, helps students by providing them with AI-generated coding solutions for SPIKE Prime robots. It was great to show how AI can be used in education and robotics, two fields that are close to my passion. The feedback I received was incredibly positive. People were excited about how AI could be used in such practical, hands-on ways to empower the next generation of students and engineers.

Sharing the LEGO AI app also sparked some meaningful discussions. We talked about how AI can be integrated into everyday life, not just in high-tech or corporate environments, but in educational settings where students are learning to code, solve problems, and think critically. Developers were intrigued by the idea of using AI not only to build complex systems but also to inspire young minds. It was a reminder that AI has the potential to impact more than just technology - it can inspire creativity and learning in new ways.

One of the biggest takeaways from the workshop was the idea that the best AI app ideas often come from your passions. Whether it's education, robotics, or something completely different, finding an area you care about can lead to the most impactful and rewarding projects. When you're passionate about a subject, you naturally want to find better ways to improve or innovate, and that's where AI can really shine.

As I left the workshop, I was energized by all the new ideas floating around the room. It was a great reminder that AI is not just about data and algorithms. It's about creativity, innovation, and making life better in ways big and small. So, when you're looking for your next AI app idea, look to the passions in your life. You never know how AI might help turn your interests into something truly innovative.

In this FLL season, we decided to take our chatbot project to the next level. On top of helping us with coding for the LEGO SPIKE Prime, we wanted to explore if we could add all the season documents into the chatbot to help with research and navigating through the rules of the robot game. The idea was to make it easier for our team to access and understand the challenge, rules, and guidelines, all in one place, through a simple conversation with the bot.

To do this, we downloaded all the essential documents: PDFs, excel spreadsheets, PowerPoints from the FIRST LEGO League website. These documents contain all essential information about the Submerged season, including robot game rules, mission details, and field setup instructions. We then uploaded everything to our Azure storage account, which made it easy to connect the documents with our chatbot.

Using Azure, we linked the chatbot with the documents so it could answer questions related to the robot game rules and season guidelines. For example, if we needed to know what specific missions required or how points were awarded, we could ask the chatbot, and it would pull the information directly from the official documents.

The setup process on Azure turned out to be more straightforward than we anticipated using Azure AI Studio. Azure provides great tools for building, training, and deploying AI models, and we were able to get our chatbot running smoothly in a short amount of time. It was a valuable learning experience to see how cloud-based AI services like Azure work in real life. With this setup, our chatbot became a research assistant, helping us quickly reference complex rules and documents during our robot strategy sessions.

We are also keen on responsible AI during our learning. This season, we had sessions with students on AI bias and responsible AI use, which were critical in shaping how we approached this project. We taught the students that while AI can be incredibly powerful, it's also important to recognize its limitations. It's not just about getting the right answer; it's about understanding how the AI processes information and ensuring it's providing accurate and unbiased responses.

We talked about how bias can creep into AI models, especially when the data or documents they rely on are incomplete or misinterpreted. By being cautious and ensuring we used the chatbot as a support tool rather than the sole decision-maker, we are ready to explore AI's potential responsibly.

We're excited to continue using our chatbot for coding, research, and game strategy while keeping in mind the lessons we've learned about using AI. Our team is ready to dive into the Submerged season with confidence, knowing we have the tools and understanding to make the most of AI without losing sight of what's most important: learning, teamwork, and innovation.

In the new Submerged season of FIRST LEGO League (FLL), we are continuing our journey of using AI to help us learn, innovate, and make robotics more accessible to everyone. Our team took the initiative to build a chatbot using Microsoft Azure (with lots of helps from coaches) and publish an app that anyone can use, free of charge. This was a big step toward creating a more inclusive, cost-effective way for young engineers and coders to get the most out of AI.

One of the challenges we faced when using tools like ChatGPT is that they often require users to create an account, and there are costs associated with using advanced AI features. This creates a barrier for many students and teams who might not have access to these resources. To solve this, we built a free version of our chatbot that specifically focuses on the needs of FLL participants. We locked down the scope of the questions and answers so that they only relate to the official season documents and guides for the Submerged challenge, as well as coding instructions for the LEGO SPIKE Prime 3.

The chatbot is designed to be simple and focused, giving users clear, relevant information about the FLL challenge and the Python coding required for SPIKE Prime 3 robots. Whether a team needs help understanding the mission details or figuring out how to make their robot move in a specific way, our chatbot has the answers.

One of the key skills we emphasized this season is prompt engineering. The art of asking the right questions to get the best answers from an AI. While many people assume that AI automatically gives perfect responses, the truth is that how you ask a question can dramatically affect the quality of the answer you receive. We've been teaching our team and users of the chatbot how to frame their prompts clearly and concisely to get more accurate and useful information.

For example, instead of asking, "How do I code my robot?" a better prompt might be, "Write Python code to move my SPIKE Prime 3 robot forward for 5 seconds and stop." By being specific, users can get actionable responses that directly help with their projects.

This new chatbot, combined with prompt engineering techniques, empowers young engineers to not only rely on AI for quick solutions but also to better understand how to interact with technology in ways that enhance their learning experience. We're excited to see how teams use this tool during the Submerged season and how it helps them innovate and succeed. We hope to remove some of the barriers that traditionally come with using advanced AI tools and give every FLL team a chance to harness the power of AI for their robotic challenges.