Hey everyone! My name is Varun Gullapalli, and I am a rising sophomore studying computer science at Stanford University. I spent my past nine weeks working with Glific’s software development team, and I have quite a few things I want to share with you about my experience. And to do this, I want to start at the very beginning: my interview. 

When Radhika interviewed me, I did not know how to pronounce Glific. I asked her for the correct pronunciation, but not before I called it Gil-Fac(where in the world did I get the a from). But what was originally an embarrassing moment now acts as a reminder of the position in which I started, a point in time that I can look back upon to accurately grasp the extent of my growth throughout my time at Glific. 

When I open my terminal, I know now that I do not have to retype every command, a simple keystroke of the up-arrow will suffice. When I test my API calls, I know now I do not mindlessly have to keep adjusting and readjusting my code until it works, I can now type “IO.inspect” to more discern the problem and solve it quickly. I highly recommend learning these first few lessons from a company like Tech4Dev, a company that is non-profit, open source, and dedicated to creating code that helps others. My fundamentals in software development being embedded in service is priceless. 

Throughout my internship, I did not enjoy everything I had worked on. But to assume that every project will inspire your undivided attention shows a naive perspective on hard work. I argue that though my initial projects did not fascinate me, they taught me resilience, and throughout it all I learned. And when you do find something that fascinates you, everything you learn up until that point emboldens you to do that passion justice, enabling you to produce your best possible work. 

What particularly fascinated me throughout my internship was my final project, integrating file search API into Glific. File Search enables our NGOs to upload a file and be able to retrieve specific information from the file seamlessly through the API. This may not seem particularly groundbreaking for one page summary sheets, but for some NGOs where the amount of information extends past two hundred pages, being able to use AI to retrieve the information one specifically needs is groundbreaking. 

To enable file search, one must create a vector store, then upload the file(s) to the vector store, then create an assistant, and finally link the assistant to the vector store. All of this must be done in the OpenAI UI. My work was creating functions that make API calls so that we can do these steps without interacting with the OpenAI UI, making the process more efficient and accessible to our NGOs. I created functions that enable us to create and delete both vector stores and assistants, as well as storing the created objects’ information into a database to reduce the amount of support needed for each use of Filesearch. In the future, the goal is to be able to upload files directly through Glific as well, so that little to no interaction with OpenAI UI is necessary, making our usage of the API as efficient as possible.

I worked tirelessly, not just to write the code, but to understand the process and the importance of the work I was doing. One of my last days of work, I gave a demo to the entire Glific team, explaining the importance and the applications of my work and how we can use the code I made to help our beneficiaries. It is one thing to create code that is eventually deployed. It’s something else to know that the code you write will help hundreds if not thousands of people one day. That feeling is euphoric. And I am incredibly grateful that working with Glific gave me the opportunity to feel that once in a lifetime feeling.

As I leave Glific, I first have many people to thank. I would like to thank Radhika, for giving me the opportunity to interview and for being my advocate throughout the process. I want you to know that when I did see I earned the internship, I jumped out of bed in joy, desperately calling everyone I knew because each and everyone of them understood how much I wanted this. I would like to thank Akhilesh and Anandu for supporting me throughout the internship and inconveniencing themselves for the sake of my learning and my growth. It means more than you could know. I would like to thank my co-intern Harshal for being a friend and supporting me in times of doubt. And lastly, I would like to thank the entire team, for being so welcoming and uplifting. To have Glific to be my first experience working in a real company has set the bar far too high. 

As I move on from this internship, its lessons still stick with me as I continue to grow and develop in the future. I do not know where my path leads, but I am incredibly glad that Glific was a part of it. Varun signing out!