Silicon Valley NEDians Sponsoring Free Software Bootcamp in Pakistan

[RiazHaq]

Silicon Valley NEDians Sponsoring Free Software Bootcamp in Pakistan

Pakistan has seen several boot camps started in recent years to respond to growing demand for practical tech training in the country. Two of...

www.southasiainvestor.com

Pakistan has seen several boot camps started in recent years to respond to growing demand for practical tech training in the country. Two of my fellow NED University alumni in Silicon Valley - Saeed Kazmi and Idris Kothari - are "helping an initiative in Pakistan with a company xLoop Digital (www.xloopdigital.com), to provide advanced software Bootcamp training to fresh grads in computer science and engineering". Idris and Saeed are senior NEDians who graduated from our alma mater in early 1970s. I have personally known them since the early1980s when I first arrived in the San Francisco Bay Area. Both have solid track records as successful tech entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley. Here are excerpts of their email sent to me on the subject:

"The training center is located in Karachi . The first batch started in November 22. Currently, we have about 50 developers under training in two tracks -1. Cloud Native Software Development, 2. Data Sciences/Engineering. The Bootcamp training is provided by www.emeritus.org , a U.S. based company. This is a 16-week program that includes 12 weeks of technical training provided by live on-line, U.S. based instructors, and 4 weeks of soft-skills training. ..... Most of these bootcamps are free of cost however few charge a nominal fee of PKR 10,000 + for every month. In U.S. such Bootcamp costs around $15,000, however we are offering it for free. The only requirement is passing our entry test. We also provide pickup – drop transportation to students...... .The first batch graduated recently, and we are looking to outsource the talent in the U.S. These developers are ready to be interviewed by interested clients".

​

Skills Taught at Typical Coding Bootcamp. Source: DICE

What is coding boot camp? It is a technical training program designed to teach the programming skills that employers are currently looking for. Technology is constantly changing. It is important for those looking for work in the tech industry to continue to learn and update their skills. Coding boot camps offer short, intensive training courses to help employees and job candidates to meet the needs of employers. They fill the gaps in skillsets of new college graduates to enhance their employability.

Not all boot camps are alike. It is important to do due diligence before signing up for a boot camp. Some of the questions that come to mind when choosing a boot camp are: 1. How long is the program and how much does it cost? 2. What is its job placement record? 3. Is there a verifiable estimate of the average earnings of its graduates? 4. What is unique about the boot camp you are considering signing up for? How does it compare with other tech bootcamps?

Let me conclude by quoting Nate Swanner's sound advice on selecting bootcamps: "Remember, there’s no timeline for starting your journey, and nothing saying you must attend a bootcamp to learn tech. What matters is your drive and enthusiasm: two things you just can’t learn in a bootcamp".

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

Unprecedented Tech Boom in Pakistan

NED Alum Raises $190 Million to Challenge ARM's Dominance

Pakistan Broadband Subscriptions Pass 100 Million

NED University Ranked Among World's Top 200 For Impact

Pakistan's Computer Services Exports Jump 26% Amid Coronavirus Lockdown

Pakistan Gig Economy Among World's Fastest Growing

NED Alum Sells Silicon Valley Company For $7.5 Billion

Pakistan's Demographic Dividend

Over a Million Pakistani University Students Enrolled in STEM Education

State Bank Targets Fully Digital Economy in Pakistan

NED University Alum Raises $100 Million For His Silicon Valley Fintech Startup

Digital Pakistan: Broadband Penetration Reaches 90% of 15+ Population

E-Commerce in Pakistan

2021: A Banner Year For Pakistani Tech Startups

NED Alum's AI Startup Startup Named Most Innovative at RSA Conference

Karachi-Born NED Alum Leads Mercedes' Entry into Electric Vehicle Market

AI Research Funded by NED Alum at His Alma Mater

Riaz Haq's Youtube Channel

PakAlumni: Pakistani Social Network

Silicon Valley NEDians Sponsoring Free Software Bootcamp in Pakistan

Pakistan has seen several boot camps started in recent years to respond to growing demand for practical tech training in the country. Two of...

www.southasiainvestor.com

 

[RiazHaq]

Pakistan earned US$ 1,523.280 million by providing different Information Technology (IT) services to various countries during the first seven months of the current fiscal year 2022-23.

Pakistan earns $1,523 million from IT services' export

Pakistan earned US$ 1,523.280 million by providing different Information Technology (IT) services to various countries during the first seven months of the

www.nation.com.pk

This shows a growth of 2.38 percent as compared to US$ 1,487.865 million earned through the provision of services during the corresponding months of the fiscal year 2021-22, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported.

During July-January (2022-23), the export of computer services grew by 2.87 percent as it surged from US$ 1,191.575 million last fiscal year to US$ 1,225.730 million this year.

Among the computer services, the exports of software consultancy services witnessed an increase of 5.57 percent, from US$ 430.309 million to US$ 454.283 million while the exports of hardware consultancy services also rose by 158.07 percent from US$ 1.357 million to US$ 3.502 million.

The export and import of computer software-related services surged by 11.89 percent, from US$ 312.484 million to US$ 349.635 million whereas the exports of repair and maintenance services increased to US$ 1.594 million from US$ 0.770 million.

 

[RiazHaq]

The Algorithm PK has partnered with The Tech Academy, USA, to bring their affordable and high-quality coding bootcamps to Pakistan, providing a unique opportunity for individuals to learn the skills they need to succeed in the tech industry, stated a press release.

The Algorithm PK, The Tech Academy, US team up to offer pathway to high-paying tech jobs in Pakistan

The Algorithm PK has partnered with The Tech Academy, USA, to bring their affordable and high-quality coding...

www.brecorder.com

The global job market is rapidly evolving, and the tech industry is at the forefront of this transformation. With an increasing demand for tech talent, the need for skilled developers has never been more pressing.

The Algorithm PK is an innovative Educational Technology organization that trains Pakistan’s youth and workforce in world-class technology education and essential soft skills, helping them become competent, well-rounded individuals who can achieve their career goals and become an invaluable asset to any team.

The Tech Academy, USA has a proven track record of success, having trained thousands of developers across the globe. Job placement rates over 80% and graduates of their programs have landed jobs at top companies around the world such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Deloitte, Nintendo, Disney and many more with average starting salaries between USD $50,000 to $60,000 per annum.

These bootcamps are designed for the beginner and provide students with a comprehensive technology education that covers everything from coding languages and frameworks to project management and job placement training to help graduates find employment after completing their program.

The Algorithm PK takes it a step further by delivering an Essential Soft Skills Line-up that covers communication, workplace ethics and values, and study skills line-up along with the coding bootcamp to ensure Pakistani youth and workforce are ready to compete in the global tech market.

By providing affordable and high-quality coding bootcamps, individuals who previously may not have had the opportunity to learn these skills can now do so. With a curriculum that covers the most in-demand coding languages and skills, individuals can develop the skills they need to secure high-paying jobs in the tech industry.

The Algorithm PK CEO, Dr Humaira, brings a unique perspective to the tech industry with her background as a medical doctor and expertise in education, teacher training, and faculty training.

Asfandiyar Khan, the Director of Operations and Strategic Partnerships, brings seven years of experience in the game and tech industry.

 

[BHAN85]

everybody can make software, means of production cost are zero.

if USA keeps world leadership is due to they practically give software for free because it's useful to spy everybody.

 

[RiazHaq]

What is prompt engineering and why every ChatGPT user should know about it

What is prompt engineering and why every ChatGPT user should know about it

ChatGPT is a powerful generative AI model that can produce natural language texts on almost any topic, given a few words or sentences as input

www.businesstoday.in

ChatGPT is a powerful generative AI model that can produce natural language texts on almost any topic, given a few words or sentences as input



What is a prompt?

A prompt is a text or code that you provide to ChatGPT as input, along with some optional parameters, such as temperature, top-p, frequency penalty, etc. A prompt can be as simple as a question or a sentence starter, or as complex as a template or a pattern. The quality of your prompt determines the quality of ChatGPT’s output.


What is prompt engineering?

Prompt engineering is the skill of designing and creating effective prompts that guide ChatGPT to produce the best possible output for your task. Prompt engineering involves understanding how ChatGPT works, what data it was trained on, what limitations it has, and how to leverage its strengths. Prompt engineering also requires creativity, experimentation, and evaluation.

Why is prompt engineering important?

Why should you care about prompt engineering? Because it can make a huge difference in your experience with ChatGPT and other AI models. With prompt engineering, you can:

Achieve better results: Prompt engineering can help you get more accurate, relevant, coherent, and diverse outputs from ChatGPT. For example, if you want ChatGPT to write an article about the benefits of adopting rescue pets, you can provide a detailed prompt that specifies the word limit, the tone, the focus points, and the structure of the article.

Save time and money: Prompt engineering can help you reduce the number of trials and errors you need to do to get a satisfactory output from ChatGPT. This can save you time and money, especially if you are using a paid service or API. For example, if you want ChatGPT to generate a table of 10 suggestions to improve a text, you can use a sequence prompt that provides ChatGPT with options and examples.


Explore new possibilities: Prompt engineering can help you discover new ways to use ChatGPT for various tasks and domains. You can use prompt engineering to create your own applications, such as question-answering systems, conversational AI agents, sentiment analysis tools, and more. You can also use prompt engineering to learn from ChatGPT itself by asking it for tips and tricks.

How can you learn prompt engineering?

There are many resources available online that can help you master this skill. You can start by reading some guides and tutorials on prompt engineering for ChatGPT or taking some courses and certifications on this topic. You can also learn by trying out different prompts on ChatGPT playgrounds or APIs, comparing the outputs, and tweaking the parameters until you get what you want.

 

[RiazHaq]

Is becoming a ‘prompt engineer’ the way to save your job from AI?
With the rise of generative AI tools, a new role is suddenly in demand


https://www.ft.com/content/0deda1e7-4fbf-46bc-8eee-c2049d783259


When the World Economic Forum predicted a few years ago that artificial intelligence would cause seven million job losses, the great and the good of Davos were able to wring their hands about the human cost of progress while feeling certain that they would be left unscathed. Automation might, they believed, take out office drones and administrative roles but not management gurus or software engineers.

That comfy confidence has been shaken in recent months by a new wave of “generative AI” tools. Apps that can create pictures, video or prose good enough to pass as authentically human. At the moment one in particular has captivated Silicon Valley. Hailed as the smartest chatbot ever made, ChatGPT can generate high-school essays, software code or marketing strategies within seconds, all from a few words of a “prompt”. Social media timelines have been filling up with people trying out the technology. “This used to be my job,” tweeted one former Meta manager, after ChatGPT had churned out a plausible take on Instagram’s product road map.

ChatGPT’s results are not always reliable or accurate. Nonetheless, all of a sudden, AI has the creative classes and middle-management squarely in its sights. But fear not, Davos-goers. The WEF predicted that AI would not only kill jobs but create them. And one such role that has emerged with the rise of generative AI is the “prompt engineer”.

This job description sees writing the prompts necessary to get the best responses from AIs as a skill all of its own. Wrangling ChatGPT requires a deeper understanding of how AI works — hence “engineer” — as well as domain expertise, be that coding, marketing or homework. An online marketplace called Promptbase has already sprung up, where prompt engineers can sell their carefully crafted instructions for image-generation tools such as Midjourney. For a couple of bucks, you can buy pre-written templates for “cute robotic animal pictures” and “3D game renders”.

AI entrepreneur Colin Treseler, co-founder of Supernormal, is one of those looking to hire. “You have to find ways to talk to the model to get the correct output,” he says. The problem is there aren’t many people doing this job yet: I found only a handful on LinkedIn.


On first mention, prompt engineering sounds like a comforting bedtime story for knowledge workers, in which preparing for the future involves little more than messing about with ChatGPT and posting the results on Twitter. Lots of the tech elite have spent the last couple of weeks doing little else anyway. But Basil Safwat, design lead at AI start-up Adept, thinks I am being a bit too cynical. “There is genuinely a need for people who are slightly ahead in their understanding of this new material,” he says, which he says is still in its “raw state” today.

Indeed, the very notion of a prompt engineer reveals the biggest shortcoming of these new AIs: they aren’t quite smart enough yet for just anyone to be able to use them successfully. And things are moving fast. Safwat believes that soon the interfaces we use to access and manipulate these AIs will improve, in the process making prompt engineers redundant. Likening it to the evolution of the computer operating system from a text-driven command line to windows and touchscreens, he says: “I don’t think this stage will last for long.”

Perhaps what prompt engineers really represent is a whole new class of employment disruption: jobs both created and then destroyed by AI.

 

[SoulSpokesman]

@RiazHaq

Brofessor sb,

Great to hear. Hopefully you will open some bootcamps in the land of your forebears too to help out disadvantaged Muslim youngsters there.

Regards

 

[nahtanbob]

Silicon Valley NEDians Sponsoring Free Software Bootcamp in Pakistan

Pakistan has seen several boot camps started in recent years to respond to growing demand for practical tech training in the country. Two of...

www.southasiainvestor.com

Pakistan has seen several boot camps started in recent years to respond to growing demand for practical tech training in the country. Two of my fellow NED University alumni in Silicon Valley - Saeed Kazmi and Idris Kothari - are "helping an initiative in Pakistan with a company xLoop Digital (www.xloopdigital.com), to provide advanced software Bootcamp training to fresh grads in computer science and engineering". Idris and Saeed are senior NEDians who graduated from our alma mater in early 1970s. I have personally known them since the early1980s when I first arrived in the San Francisco Bay Area. Both have solid track records as successful tech entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley. Here are excerpts of their email sent to me on the subject:

"The training center is located in Karachi . The first batch started in November 22. Currently, we have about 50 developers under training in two tracks -1. Cloud Native Software Development, 2. Data Sciences/Engineering. The Bootcamp training is provided by www.emeritus.org , a U.S. based company. This is a 16-week program that includes 12 weeks of technical training provided by live on-line, U.S. based instructors, and 4 weeks of soft-skills training. ..... Most of these bootcamps are free of cost however few charge a nominal fee of PKR 10,000 + for every month. In U.S. such Bootcamp costs around $15,000, however we are offering it for free. The only requirement is passing our entry test. We also provide pickup – drop transportation to students...... .The first batch graduated recently, and we are looking to outsource the talent in the U.S. These developers are ready to be interviewed by interested clients".

​

Skills Taught at Typical Coding Bootcamp. Source: DICE

What is coding boot camp? It is a technical training program designed to teach the programming skills that employers are currently looking for. Technology is constantly changing. It is important for those looking for work in the tech industry to continue to learn and update their skills. Coding boot camps offer short, intensive training courses to help employees and job candidates to meet the needs of employers. They fill the gaps in skillsets of new college graduates to enhance their employability.

Not all boot camps are alike. It is important to do due diligence before signing up for a boot camp. Some of the questions that come to mind when choosing a boot camp are: 1. How long is the program and how much does it cost? 2. What is its job placement record? 3. Is there a verifiable estimate of the average earnings of its graduates? 4. What is unique about the boot camp you are considering signing up for? How does it compare with other tech bootcamps?

Let me conclude by quoting Nate Swanner's sound advice on selecting bootcamps: "Remember, there’s no timeline for starting your journey, and nothing saying you must attend a bootcamp to learn tech. What matters is your drive and enthusiasm: two things you just can’t learn in a bootcamp".

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

Unprecedented Tech Boom in Pakistan

NED Alum Raises $190 Million to Challenge ARM's Dominance

Pakistan Broadband Subscriptions Pass 100 Million

NED University Ranked Among World's Top 200 For Impact

Pakistan's Computer Services Exports Jump 26% Amid Coronavirus Lockdown

Pakistan Gig Economy Among World's Fastest Growing

NED Alum Sells Silicon Valley Company For $7.5 Billion

Pakistan's Demographic Dividend

Over a Million Pakistani University Students Enrolled in STEM Education

State Bank Targets Fully Digital Economy in Pakistan

NED University Alum Raises $100 Million For His Silicon Valley Fintech Startup

Digital Pakistan: Broadband Penetration Reaches 90% of 15+ Population

E-Commerce in Pakistan

2021: A Banner Year For Pakistani Tech Startups

NED Alum's AI Startup Startup Named Most Innovative at RSA Conference

Karachi-Born NED Alum Leads Mercedes' Entry into Electric Vehicle Market

AI Research Funded by NED Alum at His Alma Mater

Riaz Haq's Youtube Channel

PakAlumni: Pakistani Social Network

Silicon Valley NEDians Sponsoring Free Software Bootcamp in Pakistan

Pakistan has seen several boot camps started in recent years to respond to growing demand for practical tech training in the country. Two of...

www.southasiainvestor.com

I do not want to discourage anyone. If your universities and higher institutions of learning are any good why go the bootcamp route ?

 

[RiazHaq]

I do not want to discourage anyone. If your universities and higher institutions of learning are any good why go the bootcamp route ?

Coding bootcamps usually offer more specialized training in certain areas in high demand that are not covered by college courses.

 

[nahtanbob]

Coding bootcamps usually offer more specialized training in certain areas in high demand that are not covered by college courses.

In this case what do you plan to teach ?