Headstarter

sometimes it doesn’t matter how many: - leetcodes - resume edits - networking events You do Because there is a lack of substance. Here are 3 ways to build “substance.” 1 / build relationships with people better than you, older than you and smarter than you. This is not networking. Networking can often be transactional. Aka “hi i hope you are having a good day… Can i get referral pls” Instead be curious and a data machine. These people better than you, older than you and smarter than you… how did they get there What were the projects, mentality and people they met that moved the needle. 2 / Solve hard technical feats and talk about it. Maybe in your internship you were the first to figure out something that no one else on team found out. Maybe in your side-quest you tried to ship it but found a dependency injection issue on lanngchain repo and you made a PR. (This is literally why I hired an intern last year out of 9,000 applicants on Handshake/li) Demonstrate technical prowess within the limited knowledge and capacity you have. Then talk about it on LinkedIn. Write blogs about your thinking. It validates it. 3 / Have a deep desire to achieve. Bold words and a bold voice will echo. Famous proverb by Napoleon “What man shall concieve, man shall achieve.” You need want to come out guns blazing, wanting to become different, standout. And that sharp voice will resonate. Vica versa. A dull attitude, a dull github and dull resume will be against you. So just as a friendly reminder: sometimes it doesn’t matter how many: - leetcodes - resume edits - networking events you do when you don’t have substance. Thoughts? ♻️ repost if you agree

sometimes it doesn’t matter how many: - leetcodes - resume edits - networking events You do Because there is a lack of substance. Here are 3 ways to build “substance.” 1 / build relationships with people better than you, older than you and smarter than you. This is not networking. Networking can often be transactional. Aka “hi i hope you are having a good day… Can i get referral pls” Instead be curious and a data machine. These people better than you, older than you and smarter than you… how did they get there What were the projects, mentality and people they met that moved the needle. 2 / Solve hard technical feats and talk about it. Maybe in your internship you were the first to figure out something that no one else on team found out. Maybe in your side-quest you tried to ship it but found a dependency injection issue on lanngchain repo and you made a PR. (This is literally why I hired an intern last year out of 9,000 applicants on Handshake/li) Demonstrate technical prowess within the limited knowledge and capacity you have. Then talk about it on LinkedIn. Write blogs about your thinking. It validates it. 3 / Have a deep desire to achieve. Bold words and a bold voice will echo. Famous proverb by Napoleon “What man shall concieve, man shall achieve.” You need want to come out guns blazing, wanting to become different, standout. And that sharp voice will resonate. Vica versa. A dull attitude, a dull github and dull resume will be against you. So just as a friendly reminder: sometimes it doesn’t matter how many: - leetcodes - resume edits - networking events you do when you don’t have substance. Thoughts? ♻️ repost if you agree

🚀 AI-Powered Code Editing – Seamless, Fast, and Integrated Another exciting week of development Headstarter and I’m thrilled to share my latest project: an AI-powered Code Editor built on Judge0 IDE - DevMind, integrating real-time AI assistance directly into the developer workflow. Instead of treating AI as a separate tool, this implementation embeds AI into the coding process, enabling developers to get instant explanations, debug errors, and make inline edits without switching contexts. Key Features: ✅ AI-Powered Code Assistance – Get real-time insights, explanations, and debugging help directly in the IDE. ✅ Inline Chat & Edits – Select a segment of code, ask AI for modifications, and apply changes seamlessly. ✅ Smart Code Mode – AI modifies code intelligently, preserving structure and context instead of rewriting entire blocks. ✅ One-Click Fixes – AI detects precise errors and suggests targeted fixes that can be applied instantly. ✅ Blazing Fast AI Responses – Leveraging Groq API's ultra-fast inference speed, AI interactions feel instantaneous. ✅ Seamless API Key Management – Users can integrate their own Groq API Key for a customizable experience. Technical Highlights: Integrated Groq Llama-3.3-70B, optimizing response parsing for structured, accurate AI-driven code suggestions. Implemented diff-aware editing, ensuring only necessary lines are modified rather than full replacements. Built with Monaco Editor & Golden Layout to maintain a fluid, developer-friendly interface. Enhanced AI formatting for structured responses, syntax highlighting, and improved readability. Why This Matters? Traditional AI assistants function more as external advisors, requiring developers to copy and paste suggestions manually. This project bridges the gap between AI and the IDE, making AI a seamless part of the development process rather than an external tool. A special thanks to Faizan Ahmed & Yasin Ehsan 🚀 for their continuous support and feedback throughout this project. Also, a huge shoutout to Ryan Chwiecko, Duncan Finlayson, and Khushal Mehta for their encouragement during the development process! For a detailed walkthrough, check out the demo here: https://lnkd.in/ecF7qQmg Looking forward to hearing your thoughts—what AI-powered coding features would you like to see next? 👇 #AI #SoftwareEngineering #MachineLearning #DevTools #Coding #Headstarter #Judge0 #LLMs #AIIDE #Programming #GroqAPI #BuiltWithAI

We always get asked how Harvey Hu and I met, and our answer is always the same: a random networking event. Harvey was considering a career change to quant finance, and I was there to mainly socialize. We set up some time the following week to chat more about the industry, as I had experience with side projects in the field. In that meeting, I pulled an uno reverse and convinced Harvey to work with me on this new idea I had been cooking. In just two weeks, we built a web browsing agent that set a new state-of-the-art. Shortly thereafter, we got into Y Combinator. Now, I’m always suspicious when I hear the word serendipity–I once got baited into flying cross country for “serendipity facilitation” (read: a colossal waste of time). But this random networking event was serendipity in the truest sense. We were both about to skip the event, but now we make a kick-ass team, and we’re going to build a kick-ass product. That is a promise 🫡

Check out our Headstarter NYC office. GTFOL comes irl in the city that never sleeps. Ever since I moved to SF, me and Faizan have been thinking what to do with our space. We decided it be best for the cs community. Last Saturday we had 7 hackers. This week run it back? Saturday / sunday. Come hack with us. GTFOL!!!! If you want to come this weekend and put up some solid hours coding a side quest DM me for RSVP link!

Omw to create a Cursor-type IDE with built-in AI assistance ~ This last week for Headstarter I forked Judge0's open source IDE and added some features: - 🤖 AI Assistance: tired of context switching? Ask questions about the code directly without any copy/paste - ❓ Inline Assistance: tired of using your mouse? Ctrl-K to ask questions directly in the editor! ▶️ Check out the demo video below! 🧱 Challenges: - working with an existing codebase - coding in vanilla JS haha! I've gotten so used to Next.js that it was hard to switch back ⏳ If I had more time: - cleaning up the inline editor (looks pretty janky right now) - calculating diffs and adding code completions Thanks to Faizan Ahmed for the coding assistance, Yasin Ehsan (hiring) 🚀, and Vrandan Sharma for his inspiring and helpful demo. It's motivating to see how far I have to go! #headstarter #softwareengineering #softwaredevelopment #artificialintelligence

⭐ Excited to announce a project I worked on last week! ⭐ Inspired by Cursor, my project consisted of building out AI features on top of the open-source Judge0 IDE to enhance the user experience. I decided to use the Qwen: Qwen-Turbo model for AI coding assistance as recommended by Faizan Ahmed! It was very good! My favorite challenge I took on was having the AI assistant implement the changes to the IDE automatically, helping users reduce the time needed to complete their coding tasks. This project quickly became one of my favorites! Future iterations include highlighting bugs on the actual IDE, and more. Shoutout to Headstarter, Yasin Ehsan (hiring) 🚀, and Faizan Ahmed for the support building using the latest tools. #aicodeeditor

Cursor is something I can't live without, and I wanted to see if Headstarter Software Engineering Residents can replicate its core AI features I gave them the task of working with the existing Judge0 IDE repo and add the features that Cursor has on top of it (AI chat, Composer, & Bug Fixer) and they were able to deliver Im proud to share some of the top demos that our SWE Residents submitted: - Vrandan Sharma https://lnkd.in/ebEf4kwy - Brian Leach - https://lnkd.in/ecEzC7TH - Salif Tankoano - https://lnkd.in/eNNVkHht - Joudi Saeidan - https://lnkd.in/euiyf3MC - Arhaan Keshwani - https://lnkd.in/dxrMf8nK I had to set up a meeting with the Founder of Judge0 - Herman Zvonimir Došilović to show him the incredible work that our folks have submitted Im happy to share that Herman has now joined the Headstarter Slack community and is meeting with those who had the best projects!

Last week, Headstarter Software Engineering Residents replicated the core AI features of Cursor 🚀 Working with the Judge0 IDE, they were able to add the chat panel to let users ask questions about their code using different LLMs, the Agent feature where code suggestions are inserted in the user's editor automatically as diffs, and a bug finder feature to detect and highlight errors Here are some of the top demos: - Vrandan Sharma: https://lnkd.in/ebEf4kwy - Brian Leach - https://lnkd.in/ecEzC7TH - Salif Tankoano - https://lnkd.in/eNNVkHht - Joudi Saeidan - https://lnkd.in/euiyf3MC

I flew to NYC this weekend to play chess with a dude I'd never met... 🤔 Ok that's a bit of a lie, I accomplished way more than just that. This weekend I attended HackNYU & built at Headstarter's inaugural #GTFOL event in NYC; and I actually did spend hours playing chess with Seva Baev! 🌎 Despite nearly being locked in due to the snow, I was part of the first people introduced to Headstarter's new "Buildhaus" program, a community focused on building new MVP's & scaling ideas to products every weekend.👷 Big shoutout to Shadman Sakib for organizing this, & it was amazing to meet other passionate students & entrepreneurs from across NYC!🌠 I had amazing experience at HackNYU too, with it being my first solo-hackathon, I had a blast building from scratch completely on my own for a change!⚙️ And of course, there's nothing better than some over-the-board chess. Thanks for the games Seva Baev, & man the Greenwich Chess Forum is such a vibe!♟️ This is your reminder to keep on exploring! ps: What city do you want to explore? #NYC #Headstarter #HackNYU #Chess #Networking #Exploring #Hackathons #Tech #Entrepreneurship #Startups #GTFOL #Building