This page lists planned and past SPA SG meetings in London. See also the presentations and notes published under past evening meetings.
2025
Meetings are normally held in hybrid form - at BCS London and online simultaneously. Doors open at 18:00 with refreshments, programme begins at 18:30 and continues to about 20:00 (give or take 15 minutes including Q&A), networking continues over freshly delivered pizza & drinks and we aim to clear the building by 20:45. Those who have the urge to debate further are warmly invited to adjourn to The Old Doctor Butler's Head about 5 minutes' walk away.
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 8(!) January | SPA-397 | |
| 5 February | SPA-398 | |
| 5 March | SPA-399 | |
| 2 April | SPA-400 | |
| 7 May | SPA-401 | |
| 11(!) June | SPA-402 | |
| 2 July | SPA-403 | |
| 6 August | SPA-404 | |
| 3 September | SPA-405 | |
| 1 October | SPA-406 | |
| 5 November | SPA-407 | |
| 3 December | SPA-408 |
2024
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 3 January | no meeting | |
| 7 February | SPA-386 | Andrey Breslav: Kotlin - bits of history, by the original language designer |
| 7 (!) March | SPA-387 | Derek M Jones: Software Estimation - evidence for and against common practices |
| 3 April | SPA-388 | Immo Hüneke: Speed up your CI/CD: getting started with Bazel |
| 7 (!) May | SPA-389 | Quintin Balsdon: Design for Accessibility |
| 5 June | SPA-390 | Giovanni Asproni: Design for Testability |
| 22 June | SPA-377 | Derek M Jones: Data analysis for software engineers (all day tutorial) |
| 3 July | SPA-391 | Tom Gilb: Is your AI quality good enough to save humanity? |
| 7 August | SPA-392 | |
| 4 September | SPA-393 | Allan Kelly: Learn how to win the Value Poker game |
| 9 (!) October | SPA-394 | Chris Jones, CryptoQuantique: Using cloud-based dev tools to simplify Post-Quantum security for the IoT from chip to cloud |
| 6 November | SPA-395 | AGM + Charles Weir, Lancaster University: Looking to the Future - How Can I Prepare? |
| 4 December | SPA-396 | Dildeep Gabrhi: Adventures in AI-generated video |
2023
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 11 January | SPA-374 | Anupama Pathirage, WSO2's Director of Engineering leading Ballerina Language development: The role of modern programming languages in cloud-native application development |
| 1 February | SPA-375 | Isaac Putt, AppCheck: Bridge the gap between automated and manual penetration testing |
| 8(!) March | SPA-376 | Amit Bhagwat:Â Empathy & Inclusion in Professional Life |
| 5 April | SPA-377 | no meeting |
| 3 May | SPA-378 | no meeting |
| 7 June | SPA-379 | Tom Gilb:Â Quantifying Software Security - Engineering Cyber Security |
| ? June | SPA2023 | No full-scale conference this year |
| 5 July | SPA-380 | Sean Rafter, Firebrand Training:Â Scale the BCS Business Analysis Certification Ladder (joint event with Business Change and West London) |
| 2 August | SPA-381 | Akmal B. Chaudhri, SingleStore: AI - Using Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPT) Without Hallucinations |
| 6 September | SPA-382 | no meeting |
| 4 October | SPA-383 | Tomasz "TK" Kropiewnicki: The First Rule of Scaling Agile |
| 1 November | SPA-384 | AGM followed by Gojko Adzic: "Hey ChatGPT, do we still need developers?" |
| 6 December | SPA-385 | Rafe Tariq, SingularityNet: 3 Ways to build your own Financial Assistant with Generative A.I. |
2022
Meetings are normally held in hybrid form - at BCS London and online simultaneously.
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 5 January | SPA-362 | Jagandeep Singh:Â Example mapping - A collaborative approach to exploring user stories |
| 2Â February | SPA-363 | Vassilis Rizopoulos:Â Gaudi - an architecture for project automation |
| 2 March | SPA-364 | Galatia Evangelidou:Â An introduction to Network Subnetting |
| 6 April | SPA-365 | (no meeting) |
| 4 May | SPA-366 | Tom Gilb:Â Clarity - the essentials of getting 2 people to agree on anything |
| 1 June | SPA-367 | Raul Rodriguez:Â Web Development Patterns - ReactJS Apps vs WebFlow |
| 22 June | SPA2022 | One-day annual conference -Â Software in Practice (a.k.a. MiniSPA) - Leeds |
| 6 July | SPA-368 | Chintana Wilamuna:Â Getting started with Choreo - a modern platform for delivering digital experiences fast |
| 3 August | SPA-369 | No meeting |
| 7 September | SPA-370 | No meeting |
| 5 October | SPA-371 | No meeting - launch of BCSÂ Annual Diversity and Inclusion Report by Coding Black Females. Please contact Member Groups if you wish to attend. |
| 2 November | SPA-372 | Dr Charles Weir: Threat Assessment by the Numbers – How to Avoid Doing Security and Privacy |
| 7 December | SPA-373 | AGM + Jonathan Tate: How to Reduce Your Cloud Footprint |
2021
PLEASE NOTE: until further notice, all BCS SPA specialist group meetings will be held as virtual meetings, via GoTo Webinar, in order to comply with official advice to limit the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus.
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 6 January | SPA-350 | Peter Leeson: A Manifesto for Vitruvian Quality - why process doesn't necessarily equate to progress |
| 3 February | SPA-351 | Fazal Ahmad, General Manager at EN-Projects: The Role of Technology in Humanitarian Programmes |
| 3 March | SPA-352 | Gen Ashley: Diversity, Equity & Inclusion - The Practical Bits |
| 24-25 March | MiniSPA 2021 Conference | |
| 7 April | SPA-353 | Akmal Chaudhri: Data Analysis with Pandas (interactive workshop) |
| 5 May | SPA-354 | Nader Talai, ValueGlide: The need for business agility - how to meet the challenges with SAFe |
| 2 June | SPA-355 | Daniel Aherne, Adjust Services - Neurodiversity Understood |
| 7 July | SPA-356 | Kevlin Henney - Six Impossible Things |
| 4 August | SPA-357 | Peter Leeson - Design a Culture for Innovation (with Software Quality and Business Change SGs) |
| 1 September | SPA-358 | Gian-Luca Frei, Patrick Steger - the new OWASP Application Gateway |
| 13-17 September | SPA2021 | Annual Conference: Software in Practice |
| 6 October | SPA-359 | Dr Stephen Castell - software defects and the Law: dealing with the despair, distrust and disputes of a DISPRO, the DISaster PROject |
| 3 November | SPA-360 | AGM and Jack Shirazi - A Guide to Reliability Engineering |
| 1 December | SPA-361 | Sherilyn Aitken, BCS:Â Managing Your Own IT Career - time to take (back) control? |
2020
PLEASE NOTE: until further notice, all BCS SPA specialist group meetings will be held as virtual meetings, via GoTo Webinar, in order to comply with official advice to limit the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus.
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| Thu! 9 January | SPA-338 | No meeting |
| Thu! 30 January | Joint meeting with Business Change SG | Build your winning business model: Value proposition canvas and business model canvas |
| Tue! 4 February | SPA-339 | From source to finish: fast, cloud-native development workflows with Garden |
| Thu! 5 March | SPA-340 | Martyn Puddephatt - Why Agile is Nothing New |
| 1 April | SPA-341 | Tom Gilb - Technoscopes: Meet the Challenge of Engineering Complexity (slides here) |
| 22 April onwards | Tom Gilb Workshop Series (rescheduled): Agile Tools for Value Delivery (now 100% online) | |
| 6 May | SPA-342 | Nick Tune - The Sociotechnical Architecture Toolkit: Designing Loosely-coupled Systems and Teams |
| 3 June | SPA-343 | Pradeep Bhadani - Introduction to Terraform and Google Cloud Platform |
| Tue! 23 June | Joint with Business Change SG | Tom Gilb - Proper Public Planning Principles: Engineering Society Responsibly |
| 1 July | SPA-344 | Dr Kuan Hon - GDP-Huuuuh? Myths, Misconceptions - and Reality [resources mentioned in the presentation] |
| 21-22 July | SPA2020 | Annual conference: SPA Software in Practice 2020 (postponed to Spring 2021) |
| 5 August | SPA-345 | Joint meeting between Quality and SPA SGs with Hampshire and Sussex branches - Passing the ISO 9001 Audit in the 2020s |
| 2 September | SPA-346 | Bernie Fishpool, Mark Fishpool - Software Development in Practice (joint meeting with BCS Software Quality SG) |
| 7 October | SPA-347 | Charles Weir and Lucy Hunt - the Agile App Security game (hands-on) |
| 4 November | SPA-348 | AGM followed by Kevlin Henney on Unreasonable Architecture |
| 2 December | SPA-349 | Giuliano Casale - Rational decomposition and orchestration for serverless computing with RADON |
2019
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 9 January | SPA-327 | No meeting |
| 6 February | SPA-328 | Yan Cui, DAZN: Starting AWS Lambda Serverless Development (workshop) |
| 6 March | SPA-329 | Martin Brenig-Jones and James Dawn: Accelerating Change and how to become a Maestro of Transformation |
| 3 April | SPA-330 | Kostas Bonikos, RapidMiner:Â AI and Machine Learning in the real world |
| 1 May | SPA-331 | No meeting |
| 5 June | SPA-332 | Steven Duckaert, Platform9: Develop Fast Serverless Functions for Kubernetes with Open-Source Fission |
| 3 July | SPA-333 | Alok Dwivedi, instaclustr: An Architect's Guide to Scalable Technologies - Cassandra, Kafka, and ElasticSearch |
| 4 September | SPA-334 | Akmal Chaudhri, OmniSci & City University (London): Speed meets Scale |
| 2 October | SPA-335 | |
| 6 November | SPA-336 | AGM + Kacper Gunia: Bridging the gap between IT and business using Event Storming |
| 4 December | SPA-337 | Andy Parker: Effective Incident Analysis - Leaving Blame Behind |
2018
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 7 February | SPA-317 | Glenn Wilson: Putting the "Sec" into "DevOps" |
| 7 March | SPA-318 | Ivan Sanchez and David Denton: Server as a Function. In Kotlin. Without the Server. |
| 4 April | SPA-319 | no meeting |
| 2 May | SPA-320 | no meeting |
| 6 June | SPA-321 | Rob Brown: What's possibly possible in large organisations adopting agile? |
| 1 August | SPA-322 | Stefania Chaplin:Â We are all Equifax - The Data behind DevSecOps |
| 5 September | SPA-323 | Chris Sluman:Â A discussion on Identity, Persona, Authority, Authorisation |
| 3 October | SPA-324 | no meeting |
| 7 November | SPA-325 | AGM (see minutes) + Immo Huneke: Consumer Driven Contract Testing - Integration without tears |
| 5 December | SPA-326 | Natalia Oskina and Giovanni Asproni, Zühlke Engineering: Be Your Own Threatbuster! |
2017
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 4 January | SPA-306 | Tony Das: Container 2.0 - moving beyond Docker itself |
| 1 February | SPA-307 | Alison Lowndes, NVIDIA: Machines that Think - how Deep Learning fuels the AI boom |
| 1 March | SPA-308 | Jonathan Rothwell: Accessibility - the developer's overlooked responsibility |
| 5 April | SPA-309 | Jo Kent, BBC Radio: Automated Data Architecture - creating user journeys through content using Linked Data |
| 3 May | SPA-310 | Robert Chatley: Lean Learning -Â Applying Lean Techniques to Improve Software Engineering Education |
| 7 June | SPA-311 | Tom Johnson: Failure Patterns in Java |
| 5 July | NO MEETING | |
| 2 August | SPA-312 | Quentyn Taylor, Canon Europe:Â IoT Printing - The Unloved Elephant in the Room (with DevSecOps SG) |
| 6 September | SPA-313 | cancelled |
| 4 October | SPA-314 | NO MEETING - BCS London closed from 2-16 Oct for AV systems upgrade |
| 1 November | SPA-315 | Phil Nash (JetBrains): Swift Driven Development |
| 6 December | SPA-316 | Paul Stringer: Subcutaneous Mobile Application Testing |
2016
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 6 January | SPA-295 | No Meeting |
| 3 February | SPA-296 | Yan Cui, JUST EAT:Â 7 ineffective coding habits many F# programmers don't have |
| 2 March | SPA-297 | Giovanni Asproni, Asprotunity:Â Design for Testability |
| 6 April | SPA-298 | Daniel Bryant, OpenCredo: The Seven Deadly Sins of Microservices |
| 4 May | SPA-299 | Emily Webber, Tacit: Building Successful Communities of Practice |
| 1 June | SPA-300 | Duncan McGregor and Nat Pryce: Hands-On Introduction to the Kotlin Language |
| 6 July | SPA-301 | Immo Hüneke, Zühlke Engineering: The blockchain e-commerce/e-government revolution |
| 7 September | SPA-302 | Liz Keogh: Handling Uncertainty with BDD and Cynefin |
| 6 October (Thu!) | SPA-303 | Daniel Gartmann:Â Harness the power of HTTP headers to secure your web apps |
| 2 November | SPA-304 | AGM followed by Jason Gorman: Are you a TDD maker, or a TDD faker? |
| 6 December (Tue!) | SPA-305 | Giovanni Asproni: Creating an Incremental Architecture for your system |
2015
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 7 January | SPA-285 | Pathfinding Peril - Chris Parsons. Escape the Minotaur! |
| 4 February | SPA-286 | Decision Modelling by example - Paul Vincent |
| 3 March (Tue!) | SPA-287 | How to build streaming data applications - Akmal Chaudhri |
| 1 April | SPA-289 | Make a Shrimp for Easter - a practical embedded computing workshop for kids and their parents |
| 6 May | SPA-288 | Retrospective Antipatterns: what can go wrong and how to fix it - Aino Corry |
| 3 June | SPA-290 | Getting to Grips with Data: can Clojure breach the abstraction barrier? - Roland Sadowski |
| 2 September | SPA-291 | Cancelled |
| 7 October | SPA-292 | AGM followed by A Practical Introduction to DevOps |
| 4 November | SPA-293 | Planning for Value - Allan Kelly |
| 2 December | SPA-294 | Defend your Web apps: what every developer needs to know - Daniel Gartmann |
2014
| Date | No. | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 5 February | SPA-277 | The Development Testing Process - where next? |
| 5 March | SPA-278 | Resource-Oriented Computing - what happens when Web concepts are applied to solution economics |
| 2 April | SPA-279 | Pushing CSP to Prod - Case Study of a Real-World Implementation of Content-Security Policy |
| 11 April | with Agile SG | Introduction to Holacracy |
| 7 May | SPA-280 | ARM yourself - an Architectural Reference Model for Enterprise Application Development |
| 3 September | SPA-281 | How to build front-end web apps that scale - Phil Leggetter |
| 1 October | SPA-282 | How to name things: the solution to the hardest problem in programming - Peter Hilton |
| 5 November | SPA-283 | AGM followed by a workshop on Visual Thinking and effective note-taking |
| 3 December | SPA-284 | My adventure with source code management: How I learned to stop worrying and love the merge - Graeme Macfarlane |
2013 and earlier
The preceding meetings are listed here.