20 Oct 2015
We are starting islooJS, a meetup for Javascript enthusiasts based in Islamabad!
Today I am with the efforts of Sakina and Creanyx starting an Islamabad based meetup for JavaScript developers. The purpose is to bring the creative heads under one roof once a month to share ideas and help the JavaScript Community in general.
To start with I have created an animation for islooJS landing page using SVG and CSS.
See the Pen islooJS (SVG) by Shakeel Shafiq (@thirdknife) on CodePen.
This will be once a month meetup and will be hosted at local cafe’s in Islamabad. More details will be posted on the webist islooJS.
14 Jan 2015
How JavaScript is changing the face of Biology and Information
JavaScript has played a major role in web development in recent 5-10 years or so. We have seen too much development in Browser technologies including HTML5 and CSS3. But that’s not just about it, JavaScript has played a major role in server side development too. With the emergence of node.js and its advantages it has taking good chunck of web developers stack.
Writing JavaScript has many advantages, first it also runs the same on client as well as server side and second its an evenet based programming so you can take great advantage of it’s event based nature.
I strive daily to work towards better life on earth and space. For the part of earth I am working in the field of BioSciences, specifically Bioinformatics. Bioinformatics is the science of managing information realated to biology so that biologist can make better descision related to their work in molecular biology or biochemisty. Bioinformatics is a very intersting feild for me because it bring great computational challanges to solve in the domain of complexity and optimization.
I am currently working on a tool which helps search genes data and its position on a paticular gene. I am currently working with !BioJs a JavaScript based library which you can use both at the client side and server side. It has complete set of functions for the development of Biologist Information System which can be DNA allignment, trees or chromosome diagrams. The developer community is great and if you hang out on IRC at #bioinformatics they are really helpful and friendly.
Links:
10 Oct 2014
This blog post is about an opensource Lingo game.
One of the vivid memories from my childhood was growing up watching the TV game by the name of Lingo (a.k.a Bingo). I liked the game show because it was a test of not only intellegence but also mindfulness. Even today if I watch that show it takes me back to those days and I can recall all my memories.
I wanted to play that game online but didn’t find one in JavaScript. So I created my own as one of my opensource projects. I invite the JavaScript community to contribute to my opensource game.
The development stack at the moment is very basic. Its just the Express App with few jade templates. I will write a blog post about every new feature I add. Currently it only allows the user to type in 5 words and it will tell you what letters are correct and what are misplaced and what are not inculeded in the original word to guess.
Green : Letter is correct and in place
Red : Letter is not correct
Blue : Letter is in the word but its in a different place
Current demo url
Git Repo
14 Sep 2014
I attended JSConf EU 2014
When year 2014 started I put a point in my 101 checklist that I will be attending JSConf EU 2014. I have been working with JavaScript since 2011 and I am impressed by the community. The people I have been closely looking were Maciej Małecki and Marak and many others.
I was quite moved when I saw this 2013 JSConfEU video. That looked awesome right? :) So I did purchase my JSConf EU 2014 ticket in June and started working on my visa processing.
Happily I got my visa at the end of August and I was ready to go for Berlin. This was my first trip to Europe so I was super excited to meet new places and people. I am art fan as well, so Belin had too much to surprise me.
A lone range :) lol
I landed Berlin on 10th September 2014 and this was the day one CSS Conf EU was closing and they had invited all the JSConf EU attendees to the closing dinner and late night party. I checked into the hotel and set my self for CSSConf EU closing. It was held near RadialSystem V where JSConf EU 2014 had to be held and it was also near my hotel so it took some foot power.
When I entered the venue, I looked straigt at Paul Campbell who I recognize from the JSConf 2013 video. I rushed straight to him and introduced my self. Paul was very nice and he acted as a host and we went for dinner together. He introduced me to his friends and that was all fun. I meet someone from sweden and some from korea.
After dinner Paul excused and I went back near the Berlin river where every one was hanging together and having a bit of chat. There I met people from Norway, English (talked about football :) ), France, Belgium, and Scotland. The chitchat went till midnight until my nerves refused to sit more. I excused the participants and left the venue.
I woke up early on Saturday morning for the JSConf EU 2014, It was 5 minutes of walk from my Hotel so I did reach quite in time. At the entrance we were given JSConf mugs and T-Shirts. The start of the conference was quite unique as they did a musical intro which was completely written in JavaScript.
The ambiance of the whole room was amazing, I felt really good sitting beside the best developers in the Javascript community. The talk by carter was also great as he shared his experince about how to oorganize events and listen to the community.
Out the halls all the event sponsors had their stalls. Facebook, Google, Badoo and Linino showing there newest hardware. Goodies were being distributed there.
Here is the list of my favourite talks during the event:
The party after the conference was held on a boat, We went together straight to the boat after the conference ended and had fun talking with wide range of developers and non-developers.
This was the most amazing experince of a conference I had in my life.
Links:
20 Apr 2014
This blog post the experience I got from organizing NASA Space Apps Challange 2014 Islamabad edition.
I have had interest in Space Sciences since 2009 when first my college teacher told me about meteor shower. I was up all night that night and I was hooked to it after then. I am a computer science graduate and I wanted to mashup both sciences so that I can work on my passion.
I applied to host Space Apps 2014 in November 2013, and got a go ahead in January. I started planning for the event and organinzing the team. I contacted my university from where I graduated that I wanted to organise the event, which I was granted.
We got GitHub as the event Sponsor. They sent us Stickers with rocket printed on it. We custom printed 50 T-shirts do distribute among the attendees. Finally the date came and the event started and attendees reached the venue.
6 teams were formed and 6 problems were solved during the 48 hours Space Hacking. Final judging were done by Dr. Waqas Qazi, he works at Islamabad Space Institute.
LeapBot was the solution that was nominated for Global Awards Finalist. You can see the decleration here.
Links: