GDG Adelaide - Build with AI - August 2026

📅 Date: 19th August 2026 🕔 Time: 5:10 PM – 7:30 PM 📍 Location: CORE Innovation Hub Adelaide, SpaceLab Building Lot Fourteen, Frome Rd, Adelaide SA 5005 🚀 Join GDG Adelaide for another exciting Build with AI evening filled with practical learning, hands-on development, and opportunities to connect with Adelaide’s local technology community. This event explores two important areas shaping modern software development: designing systems that remain fast and reliable as they grow, and enabling Android applications to interact intelligently with Gemini. The first session will explore the essential building blocks behind large-scale systems, including load balancing, caching, horizontal scaling, database sharding, and AI-powered meaning-based search. The second session will be a hands-on Android workshop demonstrating how App Functions can expose an app’s capabilities to Gemini, allowing users to trigger actions using natural-language instructions. Whether you are an Android developer, software engineer, student, or simply interested in AI-powered applications and modern system architecture, this event will provide practical concepts and tools you can apply to your own projects. What to Expect Two Engaging Sessions A practical introduction to designing scalable and reliable systems, followed by a hands-on workshop integrating Android applications with Gemini through App Functions. Hands-on Learning During the workshop, attendees will work with a pre-built Android board game application and implement App Functions that allow Gemini to understand user requests and recommend suitable games. Networking Connect with speakers, developers, students, and members of the GDG Adelaide community while sharing ideas and learning about current projects. Practical Insights Learn how modern infrastructure and AI-powered features can work together within a thoughtfully designed software system. Event Agenda 5:10 PM – 5:30 PM | 🤝 Event Kick-off and Networking 5:30 PM – 5:40 PM | 👋 Welcome and Introduction 5:40 PM – 6:10 PM | 💡 Talk 1: High-Level System Design with Logical Search - Bibek Shrestha 6:10 PM – 6:20 PM | ☕ Networking Break 6:20 PM – 7:20 PM | 🤖 Talk 2: AI, Meet App - Teaching Android Apps to “Talk” to Gemini via App Functions - Katie Barnett [Workshop] 7:20 PM – 7:30 PM | 🎉 Wrap-up and Closing 💡 Talk 1: High-Level System Design with Logical Search Speaker: Bibek Shrestha How are large-scale systems designed to handle heavy traffic while remaining fast, reliable, and available? In this session, Bibek will walk through the core building blocks of high-level system design, including load balancing, caching, horizontal scaling, database sharding, and maintaining reliability and performance at scale. He will explain the specific challenge each component addresses and how these building blocks work together to create scalable and resilient software systems. Bibek will then share his experience with text-embedding models and meaning-based search. Attendees will learn how semantic search goes beyond traditional keyword matching and how an AI-powered search capability can be integrated into a well-designed system. This session is suitable for developers, students, and technology professionals who want to strengthen their understanding of system architecture while exploring how modern AI features can be incorporated into scalable applications. 🤖 Talk 2: AI, Meet App: Teaching Android Apps to "Talk" to Gemini via App Functions Speaker: Katie Barnett Ever wished your Android app could just understand what your users actually want? Enter App Functions. In this session, we’ll explore how to bridge the gap between Android apps and Gemini. You’ll learn the core concepts of App Functions, see how they expose app capabilities to Google's GenAI ecosystem, and discover how to get Gemini to trigger specific actions within your app seamlessly. Level up your development skills! In this hands-on workshop, we’ll take a pre-built board game app and supercharge it using Gemini. You’ll write the specific App Functions that allow Gemini to scan a user’s natural language prompt (e.g., "I have 4 friends, 2 hours, and I love strategy") and instantly surface the perfect game from the app's database. No loaded dice here—just pure, fast-paced AI integration. 💻 Please bring your laptop for the workshop. Attendees should have the following installed before the event: Android Studio An Android Emulator or a physical Android device 👨‍💻 About the Speakers Bibek Shrestha Bibek Shrestha is a software engineer specialising in .NET development, system design, scalable RESTful APIs, and cloud-based solutions. At docuworx, he works on secure backend services, third-party integrations, and event-driven systems using Microsoft Azure. He has also implemented AI-powered search features using text embeddings and semantic matching to improve search accuracy and data retrieval. Bibek holds a Master's degree in information technology from Flinders University and is passionate about building scalable, reliable, and practical software solutions. Katie Barnett Katie Barnett is an Engineering Manager at Bilue with more than 10 years of experience in Android development, mobile applications, and technical leadership. She has led engineering teams, delivered applications across events and media, and supported developers at different stages of their careers. Katie is also a Google Developer Expert for Android, Co-Organiser of GDG Melbourne, and a Women Techmakers Melbourne Ambassador. She is passionate about exploring emerging technologies, improving user experiences, sharing technical knowledge, and supporting the wider developer community. 📩 RSVP Now 🎟️ Reserve your spot today! 👉 Click here to RSVP for GDG Adelaide — Build with AI August 2026 https://gdg.community.dev/events/details/google-gdg-adelaide-presents-gdg-adelaide-build-with-ai-august-2026/ Spaces are limited — secure your spot early to be part of this exciting evening of AI, learning, and community!