RJ VARONA

Excited to announce that I’m participating in the Blackathon Hackathon building solutions where innovation meets real-world impact. This year, I’m presenting Luladash, a platform helping small businesses, especially underserved and women-led SMEs, gain digital visibility, reach nearby customers, and build financial credibility through commerce data. Across Africa, millions of entrepreneurs have great products but limited access to markets, funding, and growth opportunities. I believe technology can change that. Luladash is designed to turn everyday business activity into access, opportunity, and economic empowerment. Hackathons are more than competitions, they are spaces where bold ideas become real solutions. Grateful to be building alongside talented innovators who are shaping the future. Thank you to the partners creating this platform for builders and dreamers: NSBE SF Bay Area Professionals Algorythm BlackWPT - Web Developers, Programmers/Engineers & Techs Black Women in Technology /dev/color Looking forward to sharing the journey, the build process, and what comes next. #Blackathon #Hackathon #Startup #Innovation #SMEs #Fintech #Ecommerce #AfricaTech #Builders #Entrepreneurship

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We soft-launched JoliHunt a few days ago. No hype — just a simple start. Shared it with a few friends, got some honest feedback, and yes… it helped. But that’s not enough. We built this because job hunting today is messy — tracking applications, follow-ups, interviews, everything scattered. So we started with a basic job application tracker and are slowly building it out, feature by feature. Here’s the reality check: Building the product wasn’t the hardest part. Getting it in front of the right people is. That’s the real grind. We’re trying different approaches, testing ideas, pushing it out — but the traction isn’t where we want it yet. Still, we’re not stopping. If you’re actively job hunting or have been through that chaos, try JoliHunt and tell us what’s broken, what’s missing, and what actually matters. We don’t need validation. We need real feedback. Let’s build something that actually helps. #JoliHunt #BuildInPublic #JobHunt #StartupJourney

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A business idea sparked by being a CRED user... Ever used CRED, opened a reward excitedly, only to win ₹4 or worse—a completely useless coupon—after seeing a "Win up to ₹250"? Feels like a bait, right? The frequency of these disappointing moments seems to be rising for many CRED users. And here's the thing—trust erodes when reality consistently underdelivers on promises. Personally, I’d prefer an app that simply says: "You’ll win ₹50"—and actually gives me ₹50. No drama, no ‘up to’, no guessing game. Consumers are smart. They don’t like being tricked by such ‘up to’ gimmicks. Moreover, there are also many reports of prizes being cancelled or never honored! In one of the case, CRED canceled MacBook and iPad jackpots won by 200 users, citing a technical bug—and offered just ₹1,000 instead. Many users call the games and jackpots marketing gimmicks, designed to spike engagement rather than genuinely reward offers. CRED has also significantly scaled back its cash rewards on card payments lately. That signals a perfect opportunity for someone out there to build a CRED alternative. Ashneer Grover once said something similar as below (paraphrasing): "Paytm, Google Pay, and PhonePe trained people to scan QR codes. I just replaced their QR with mine (BharatPe)." CRED has invested years in habit-forming behavior—rewarding users for paying their credit card bills. If a new app with great UX came along and offered minimal but assured cashbacks, users would gladly switch. The friction is already low. I still remember when Google Pay started handing out "Better luck next time" on every scratch card. Around the same time, PhonePe quietly began offering small but consistent cashback of ₹1–₹5 on every transaction back then. Guess what? I—and millions of others—shifted to PhonePe. This is evident from their market shares. Now imagine a new app that offers: Guaranteed cashback (no ‘up to’ nonsense) Transparent reward systems Respect for user intelligence Such an app would immediately resonate with today’s digital consumers. A small but assured win is more satisfying than an exaggerated promise that rarely delivers. Indian users appreciate clarity and honesty, even if the reward is small. Loyalty follows trust. And once you build a loyal user base, you don’t have to charge brands the kind of premiums CRED does. You can build a better & leaner revenue model. I’ve thought through several additional strategies that could help take off this idea—and would love to collaborate with someone working on the next big fintech breakthrough.

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I’m starting to realize that AI doesn’t actually 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞 code. It just 𝐬𝐮𝐠𝐠𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐬 it. And lately, those suggestions are costing me more time than they’re saving. Working at RBC, I’m constantly dealing with systems where context is everything. But when I drop a prompt into Co-pilot, it’s like talking to a genius who has five seconds of short-term memory. Here is what my 𝐀𝐈 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐟𝐥𝐨𝐰 actually looks like right now: I ask for a logic fix. It gives me a clean solution that works in a vacuum. I spend 20 minutes realizing it completely ignored our specific error-handling patterns and security constraints. I spend another 10 minutes refactoring its efficient code back into something that actually fits our architecture. 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲 : Logic out of context is just technical debt in a fancy package. It’s great at the micro like writing a regex or a simple utility function. But it’s struggling with the macro that makes an enterprise system actually stay upright under load. I’ve found myself spending less time typing and way more time vetting. I’m not just a developer anymore; I’m a high-stakes editor. If I’m not careful, 10x productivity quickly turns into 10x more bugs to fix in production. To my fellow engineers: How are you handling the 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐆𝐚𝐩? Are you feeding it entire files, or have you just accepted that you’ll always have to rewrite 30% of what it gives you? #SoftwareEngineering #AIHallucinations #RBC #SystemDesign #CodeQuality #TruthInTech

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One post about a hackathon win. Three startups in my DMs. Recruiters aren't scrolling through your repos at 11pm. But they ARE scrolling LinkedIn. Back when I competed in hackathons, I posted about winning BlockHack Toronto. Built a De-Fi charity app in 36 hours with my team. Shared the wins, the tech stack, the lessons. That one post led to DMs from blockchain startups I'd never even heard of. Your projects deserve an audience. Here's why building in public actually works: 1. It's your hidden resume Your GitHub might have 3 stars from your mom and two bots. But a LinkedIn post about that same project? Hundreds of eyeballs. Recruiters. Founders. People who actually hire. 2. It forces you to finish The moment you announce "I'm building X," you've created accountability. Now you actually have to ship it. No more half-finished repos collecting dust. 3. Strangers become collaborators I've gotten DMs with feature ideas, bug reports, and "hey let's work together" from people who saw my posts. Free feedback from people who care. Stop building in silence. Your next opportunity might come from a post, not a job board. I've been using Stanley to help me actually post consistently. It's an AI tool that learns your writing style and helps you create content that sounds like you, not like a robot. Makes it way easier to ship posts the same way I ship code. What's a project you've been building that deserves more attention? 👇

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We got cooked at the Shopify Hackathon. I was invited to compete in the Shop Mini Shopify hackathon last weekend, and got absolutely cooked. The theme was about recreating the shopping mall experience through Shop Minis. Along with Akhil Devarasetty Grace Lal Nitya Narasimhan Himavanth Karpurapu we made Fitcheck, simulating a personal stylist / changing room. Idea was simple: upload a full body pic, describe your vibes, receive recommendation straight from the Shop app, try it on using AI (s/o fal ai for sponsoring credits), and save your outfits. We aimed to solve the problem of not knowing what to wear and the challenge of visualizing how online clothes fit on you. While AI can generate realistic outfit images, one limitation we faced was accurately representing sizing, the model assumes a perfect fit, which isn’t always the case in reality. It was an absolute blast. A huge thank you to David Hoffman, Sanjay Shah, and the rest of the Shopify team for mentoring and organizing the event. Everyone made such amazing products, there were so much talent in one room to learn from. Congrats to the winning teams :-) #Hackathon #Shopify #AI

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Next tech talk I do in #Ottawa is going to be on web #cryptography I'll show folks how to do client side encryption and verification using the built in SubtleCrypto APIs and vanilla JS.

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🚀 Excited to share what I built at the Build with MeDo Hackathon — InterviewAce AI! The problem hit close to home: talented people fail interviews not because they lack skills, but because they never practice out loud. Professional coaches cost $100–$300/hr. Friends get tired. YouTube videos give zero personalized feedback. So I built a solution — entirely through conversation, zero code written manually. 🎯 What InterviewAce AI does: → Simulates real job interviews (Technical, Behavioral, HR & Mixed) → Scores every answer 0–10 using Gemini 2.5 Flash AI → Breaks down Relevance, Clarity & Depth for each response → Reveals a model answer after every question → Tracks your improvement with a radar chart over time → Works in the browser — no login, no install 🤖 How I built it with MeDo: I described the entire app architecture in a single detailed prompt. MeDo generated every screen, every React component, the Gemini API integration, localStorage persistence, voice input, and deployed it to a live URL — all through multi-turn conversation. The most impressive part MeDo built? The AI feedback engine. You submit an answer, and within seconds you get structured JSON feedback with scores, dimension-level coaching, and a model answer — powered by Gemini 2.5 Flash. 📊 Already live with real users on Day 1. This project changed how I think about building software. The bottleneck is no longer writing code — it's thinking clearly about what you want to build. 🔗 Try it here: https://lnkd.in/did3K-aT #BuiltWithMeDo #AI #Hackathon #InterviewPrep #NoCode #GeminiAI #ProductDevelopment

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"Finding a job in Canada as a newcomer is harder than I imagined." Back in India, I worked as a Software Engineer for 3 years, building, debugging, learning, and growing every day. For me, success isn’t about competition—it’s about building a strong team through learning, collaboration, and sharing knowledge. That’s where true team success lies. After moving to Canada, I decided to broaden my skill set and completed Post-Graduate programs in Project Management and HR Management — hoping to bring both technical and people skills into my next role. But entering the job market here has been challenging. Rejections, silence, and the feeling of being unseen — it’s something many of us newcomers face. One of the hardest parts? The ATS (Applicant Tracking System). Many resumes are filtered out before a human even reads them. People are now tailoring resumes just to “beat the system,” sometimes even changing their real duties to match the “right” keywords. Finding a job here isn't just about what you know—it's about how well your resume speaks to ATS scanners. But is that really what hiring should be about? Here’s what I believe: Every experienced professional was once a fresher. Throughout my 3 years, I was a learner every day—growing, sharing, and eventually mentoring others.  Learning never stops, no matter the years behind you. Skills can be taught. But curiosity, honesty, mindset, and the will to grow—those can’t be scanned by a machine. We don’t stop learning just because we’ve got experience — in fact, that’s what experience is: learning, adapting, and growing over time. To all recruiters and hiring managers: Yes, skills matter — but so does mindset. So does honesty. Not everyone will ace a technical question, but many will bring dedication, curiosity, and the drive to learn things quickly and do them right. Please don’t overlook someone just because they didn’t check every box. Give people a chance — one real opportunity is all it takes. I’m here, ready to contribute as a Software Engineer, with added strengths in project coordination and people management. Like many others, I’m just looking for someone to believe in potential over perfection. #JobSearch #OpenToWork #CanadaJobs #NewcomerInCanada #SoftwareEngineer #ATS #MindsetMatters #ProjectManagement #HRManagement #Recruitment #CareerGrowth #LetPeopleGrow

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💡 Spring Bean Scopes When I first started working with Spring, I didn’t pay much attention to bean scopes. But later, I realized they quietly shape how clean, scalable, and memory-efficient our applications become. Let’s break them down 👇 🧩 1️⃣ Singleton (Default) - One instance per Spring container ✅ Perfect for stateless services and shared configurations 💡 Most common and memory-efficient 🔁 2️⃣ Prototype - A new instance every time it’s requested ✅ Great for short-lived or stateful beans ⚠️ Be cautious about memory usage! 🌐 3️⃣ Request (Web only) - One instance per HTTP request ✅ Isolates data per web request 🌍 Ideal for REST controllers in web apps 💬 4️⃣ Session (Web only) - One instance per HTTP session ✅ Perfect for user-specific session data 👤 Keeps user info separate and safe 📦 5️⃣ Application - One instance per Servlet-Context ✅ Shared across the entire application ⚙️ Useful for global configuration or caching ⚡ Why it matters: ✔ Avoid concurrency issues ✔ Manage memory efficiently ✔ Keep your code clean and scalable 👨‍💻 Takeaway: Understanding bean scopes is more than knowing annotations — it’s about designing with lifecycle awareness. That’s what separates a working app from a well-engineered one. 💬 What’s your go-to scope in Spring projects — Singleton or Prototype? Share your experience below 👇 #SpringBoot #Java #SpringFramework #BackendDevelopment #CleanCode #SoftwareEngineering #Programming #CareerGrowth

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Random evening. Got a call from Walmart for a role I had applied to. The conversation was going great. Good discussion, strong alignment, felt like one of those calls where things just click. And then came the question “Do you need visa sponsorship?” I said yes. And just like that, the energy shifted. Here’s the part that stays on my mind Hiring an international student on OPT isn’t complicated. In many cases, it’s a ~$215 filing fee and a bit of paperwork. That’s it. Not a massive legal battle. Not months of uncertainty. Just a small step that could open the door for someone ready to contribute from day one. I get that companies have constraints. Policies, timelines, internal approvals. It’s not always in the recruiter’s control. But it does make you think about how many capable candidates never get the chance to even finish the process. Still showing up. Still taking the calls. Still building. Because it only takes one “yes” that doesn’t stop at that question.

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LinkedIn comment sections are slowly becoming an AI battleground 😭 “Interested! I’m currently pursuing…” “Would love to connect and learn more!” “50/50 split is exactly what I’m looking for!” At this point I’m not even sure if I’m networking with people or prompts. Lowkey impressive though — everyone optimized for the same recruiter keyword filter 💀 ⸻ If you want a slightly sharper / more sarcastic version: ⸻ This comment section feels like one shared ChatGPT prompt. Same structure. Same tone. Same “would love to connect.” We’ve officially reached LLM–LLM networking. Not even mad… just observing the meta evolve in real time 👀

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🤩 Excited to share a wrap-up of several projects from my Web Design course at Concordia University!! 👏 Project Highlights: 1. Wix Portfolio Website + Corgi API Integration Designed a clean and simple personal portfolio in Wix while experimenting with API embedding to create a fun, interactive Corgi image experience. Portfolio: https://lnkd.in/gDxfgfmR  API Test Page: https://lnkd.in/gYn67vNT 2. Wix To-Do List with Private API Built a functional to-do list application connected to a private API, focusing on dynamic data handling and improving user productivity through simple task management. Link: https://lnkd.in/gCvThrtJ 3. WordPress Website Redesign Recreated an older landscaping business website using WordPress to modernize the layout, improve navigation, and create a more polished online presence. Link: https://lnkd.in/gUWx4vvE 💪 Through these projects, I gained hands-on experience with: - Wix development - WordPress customization - API integration - UI/UX thinking - Responsive web design 🫶 Big Thanks to Prof. Pete Dulany. This class gave me a great opportunity to move beyond static pages and start building websites that are both functional and interactive. Always learning, always building. 🚀 #WebDesign #WixWebsite #WordPressDesign #APIIntegration #UIDesign #WebDevelopment #StudentProjects #PortfolioDevelopment

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Proud day at Evervault - we’ve just raised $25M in Series B, led by Ribbit Capital, with continued support from Sequoia Capital, Index Ventures, and Kleiner Perkins to build the internet’s clearing house for sensitive data! 🚀 What makes this milestone meaningful isn't just the number - it's what's behind it: 4× YoY revenue growth, companies like Ramp, Rippling, Overwolf and CarTrawler processing $5B+ in transaction volume through our platform, cutting PCI compliance costs by ~$100K, and shipping payment infrastructure in days instead of weeks or months. Sensitive data shouldn't exist in plaintext. We're building the infrastructure to make that a reality. We started with card payments, one of the most regulated and complex domains in software, and proved the model. Now we're taking the same approach to identity, digital wallets, and healthcare. None of this would be possible without the incredibly talented and passionate team I get to work with every day. As we take the next step, we're growing across product and engineering. Come join us → https://bit.ly/4s7gS8n

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I recently built www.hanzi.ca in just half a day, driven by the need for a better tool to practice writing Chinese characters on the iPad with Apple Pencil. Unable to find an app that met my needs, I decided to create my own using Cursor. The result is a lightweight, collaborative handwriting tool with the following features: - Natural stroke recording using Apple Pencil, including basic pressure sensitivity. - Character guidance, displaying both pinyin and stroke order for each character. - Real-time collaboration, allowing multiple users to join the same board — ideal for tutoring platforms like Preply. - Progress sharing, enabling users to record images or videos and share their learning journey on social media. It's a fast, minimal solution designed for language learners, teachers, and content creators alike. Cursor ran into a bug where some strokes is missing so I thought it was a performance issue. Cursor was pretending he knew how to fix it but I ended up jumping in and add 3 lines of code to fix it. So I only wrote 3 lines of code for this project. Please take a look. 你觉得我的字怎么样？

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Today I woke up after a long, well-deserved rest following a crazy week full of studying, dedication, work, and travel, including a 2-hour trip to Ottawa to take my TEF exam. During that trip, I was using AI to help me train for the test, and somewhere along the way, I found myself reflecting on how I’ve been using technology throughout my life and career. I guess I woke up a little philosophical 😄 Throughout my career, I’ve always used new tools. Frameworks, platforms, managed services, higher and higher levels of abstraction, and I’ve been using AI since its first releases. But for me, that was never the problem. The problem starts when the tool becomes a crutch. Using technology is following the happy path. Understanding technology is knowing what to do when the happy path breaks. When the build fails without a clear error. When the pipeline suddenly stops working. When the deploy succeeds… but the system doesn’t respond. When the abstraction hides exactly the part you need to understand. At that moment, your stack won’t save you. Your reasoning will. Solid professionals aren’t the ones who know the most tools. They’re the ones who understand what happens under the hood when things go wrong. Fundamentals are not the opposite of innovation. They are what allow innovation without losing control. That’s why I never treated technology as hype. I treat it as cause and effect. Input, processing, output. Ownership of the result. If you understand the fundamentals, you don’t panic when abstractions break. If you don’t, you outsource your thinking to the tool of the moment. And no, this isn’t about a language. Or a framework. Or AI. It’s about intellectual autonomy. It’s a way to reconnect with what made us software engineers in the first place: the curiosity to understand how things work, not just ship interfaces and code without knowing what’s happening underneath. Tools change. Fundamentals stay. #Technology #SoftwareEngineering #Fundamentals #EngineeringMindset #ContinuousLearning

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Learn and share. I've been practicing this since I was a kid, and in tech since 2022. And it's worth it, even with some drawbacks. Drawbacks: 1. You might share something wrong without noticing. 2. Takes time. 3. Forces you to handle the fear of public speaking/writing, being criticized, etc. But those are the exact reasons it makes it worth: 1. Being wrong publicly is the best way to learn. People are eager to tell you are wrong. It's actually a very good thing. Call it constructive feedback. Best way to learn. 2. The time you invest in sharing adds up fast into important skills: writing and speaking. And, as we know, communication is what differentiates the good from the great. 3. Exposure takes you out of your comfort zone. It builds you for leadership, be it technical or managerial. BUT the best reason is just: > Helping other people. 😃 Here is how to do it: 1. Pick anything you worked on or learned on the side recently. 2. Check what you didn't know, and now you do. 3. Organize the main learning messages. 4. Break them down into logical groups. 5. Each logical group is a tech blog or a tech talk. We all learn new things every now and then - share them. 👍

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There comes a stage in our career when growth is no longer about just doing more. It becomes about getting clearer. Clearer on where you want to contribute and the skills that matter. Clearer on the kind of impact you want to create and the scope of influence. How to manage the growing responsibilities both professionally and personally. Mid-career is one of the defining stages of our lives. A small shift in how we think, what we prioritize, the questions we ask and where we focus can change everything. Some of the biggest shifts in my own journey did not come from having all the answers. They came from conversations with mentors, with women who had walked ahead of me, and with people who helped me ask better questions about where I could grow and build with more alignment. That is a big part of why getting perspectives from mentors and this gathering matters so much - if you are in your mid-career journey, seeking mentorship and a growth-oriented circle. This Women’s History Month, Vahati Association has designed a small, intentional space for Women in Tech in Seattle to come together and talk about growth in career, finances, and wellbeing - the pillars that shape so much of how we grow and lead. If you’re in Seattle - come join us for an afternoon of growth and reflection. If you know a friend who could benefit from this - consider sharing this event as a gift of empowerment with her :) Kudos to Rajalakshmi Ananthagopalan for organizing and driving such an amazing initiative - and providing opportunities to connect for more women in Seattle! As always - grateful for Sunita Shastri's support to the cause!! #WomenInTech #MidCareerWomen #CareerGrowth #WomenInLeadership #WomenSupportingWomen #SeattleWomenInTech #FinancialWellbeing

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