JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Welcome to "Assistant On Air,"
where we have conversations with people
who build for Google Assistant.
I'm Jessica, and I'll be your host today.
I'm a developer advocate for Google Assistant.
Today, we'll be chatting with Denis, who's a Google Developer
Expert for Google Assistant.
And we'll be chatting about community.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Hey, Denis.
DENIS VALASEK: Hi, Jessica.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Thank you so much for coming.
DENIS VALASEK: Thank you so much for having me.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So Denis,
tells us a little about you.
DENIS VALASEK: OK, so my name is Denis Valasek.
I'm from Czech Republic.
I'm Google Developer Expert for Google Assistant.
I'm a software developer, and I'm also a GDG Ostrava
organizer.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Can you tell the audience a little bit
about what is a GDG?
DENIS VALASEK: OK, so "GDG" stands
for Google Developer Group.
It's like a community all over the world
that's organizes Google-related events, mainly for developers.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So why do you do all of this work
as a GDE and a GDG?
What what's your motivation?
DENIS VALASEK: I really like the people,
and connecting with them, and learning new things.
And this is a great way how to do it.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Nice.
Did you learn about Google Assistant through GDG?
Or did you do Google Assistant, and that led you to GDG?
What was first?
DENIS VALASEK: Oh, first was the GDG.
But I didn't want the Google Assistant [INAUDIBLE]..
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So what got you into being a GDG lead?
DENIS VALASEK: OK, so when I am in high school,
one of our teachers started creating Google Education
Group events, [INAUDIBLE].
And that was letting me to discover the world of Google
communities.
And after a few years-- because I was 12 at the time--
I joined at the DevFest the GDG Ostrava community.
And that's how I got to the GDG.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So not everyone knows what DevFest is.
I know I do because I used to run them, too.
But what is DevFest?
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah, DevFest is one of the biggest developer
festivals around the world that connects all the developers
with all the Google-iness, I would say--
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: [LAUGHS]
DENIS VALASEK: --that they can develop.
And they learn new things, new software features,
what's new in Google.
And they learn all the stuff that they need.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: That's amazing.
So you got your kind of foot in the door
through these type of events.
DENIS VALASEK: Exactly.
Yeah, so--
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: That's fantastic.
And it sounds like nothing-- not that nothing stops you,
but that you just try things out.
And little by little, you've been doing a little more
and a little more.
So did you ever think you'd be here and being a GDE expert?
DENIS VALASEK: No.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: [LAUGHS]
DENIS VALASEK: This is so great.
But yeah, I'm grateful for it.
I think one of the reasons I could be here
is because of the community.
And that's great.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Oh, definitely.
I second that.
DENIS VALASEK: I'm so thankful for that.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Right?
It's amazing how when you find a group of people
who are supportive, and kind, and want to share information.
Your learning just goes so much faster and easier.
And the fact that you've turned around
and now you're teaching others about Actions on Google
is amazing.
What type of things do you do to teach others
about Google Assistant?
DENIS VALASEK: Mostly, we do talks, and workshops,
and lately, more hackathons and--
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Ooh, hackathons.
What type of hackathons are you doing?
Are they one-day ones?
Because conversation actions are very different than GUI
or anything Android, or mobile, or web.
So how do you do this?
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah, it takes a lot of time,
but mostly, we do 24-hours hackathons-- so all day.
But we did once a three-day one, and that was fun.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Oh, wow.
I'm assuming that the quality of the action
might be different from a 24-hour to a three-day.
DENIS VALASEK: Yes.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: How do you support folks?
Is it their first time going to the hackathon?
Are they familiar with Actions on Google first?
Or do you have to teach them there?
DENIS VALASEK: No, none of them is most of the time.
So we just do the introduction and the workshops
before the hackathon.
And after that, they at least know what to do,
and they are free to ask whenever they need to help.
But yeah, that's mostly the part that they
leave the project after [INAUDIBLE] And that's that.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Well, and I know--
I would attend a lot of hackathons back in the day.
And I would start something, and I'm like, that's cool.
And then I was done.
But for those folks that continue,
do you help mentor them?
Are they still reaching out to you?
Because are you their go-to person?
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah.
They are-- feel free to ask me anytime when they want.
But yeah, that's, of course, a possibility for them.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: You're still in high school, right?
DENIS VALASEK: Yes.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: [LAUGHS] That's amazing.
So after that, after building that action,
I know you've built a different action that's
a little bit bigger and a little bit more complex.
So can you tell me about that?
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah, I developed an action
called Community Guide.
And it connects all the GDGs across the globe.
So you can ask it about whatever group
you want, and it will give you the answer about their events,
what are they, where are they, and what's
happening in the group.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: That is amazing.
Because when we've talked before, I made one, an action,
for a particular GDG.
And that's assuming that people know that there's
a GDG within their community.
And I remember I was chatting, and you're like,
well, I'm doing all the GDGs.
And I was like, oh, my gosh, that's so cool.
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So I'm assuming,
because you've built this meatier action,
you've seen it could be-- there's a lot of work to it.
And so have you been working on tooling to make it easier?
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah, so I have developed extensions
for Visual Studio code, which enables you to speed up
your development.
So it create snippets for you so you can just
type a few characters, and it will auto-complete for you
the task that you need to do for Actions on Google.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: That's great.
Can you give me an example of [INAUDIBLE]??
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah, so when you are starting a new project
and you need to [INAUDIBLE] the developer for it,
you just type "AOG," and it will autocomplete developer for you.
So that's one of my favorites.
When I do workshops or something like that,
I don't need to copy and paste everything.
I just typed "AOG," and it's finished.
And when you are creating new indents,
indent, enter, finished.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: Perfect.
Because I know sometimes when I'm making [INAUDIBLE]
I'll copy from the one--
And it's like, oh, I have to delete.
So once you released that tool, I was like,
oh, this is so cool.
Even when I'm starting with a boilerplate,
I would still go GitHub, [INAUDIBLE],, copy, paste.
Yeah.
DENIS VALASEK: Exactly.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So I remember
when you did that, that was definitely
useful and so helpful.
[LAUGHS]
DENIS VALASEK: Thank you.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: And when you built that,
did you have plans on having this be for everyone?
Or was this tool just for you?
What was your motivation for that?
DENIS VALASEK: Yeah, I wanted to make it easier.
So I just looked what the solutions are to enable it.
And I found out I could do it.
And it was quite easy to learn how to do it
for everyone, not just for me.
So I decided to open source it.
That would be cool project.
So--
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: That's fantastic.
So let's say there's somebody out there right now.
They're listening to what you're saying.
They're like, you know what?
Denis is awesome.
I want to do things like that.
So what would be some suggestions
that people could do or some resources that you have
that maybe they could use?
DENIS VALASEK: OK, so there is lots of resources.
We have Actions in Google GitHub.
We have many projects that you can work on in code labs
if you want to join Action in Google Developers.
And, of course, community is the main point here.
So join the community GDG probably
near you, that would be great.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: And if there isn't one,
they could always start one like you.
[LAUGHS]
DENIS VALASEK: Yes.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: And be a leader like you.
Oh, my gosh.
Well, thank you so much, Denis, for joining us.
Really appreciate it.
DENIS VALASEK: Thank you so much for having me.
JESSICA DENE EARLEY-CHA: So we hope that you
enjoyed today's episode.
If you want to hear the full interview,
check out "Assistant On Air" podcast
on your favorite podcast platform.
I've been Jessica.
Chat with you next time.
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