So you seem to want to:<p>- socialize with other engineers,<p>- work (= program, I suppose) on interesting projects together.<p>My opinion is that programming is actually a very lonely activity to the point where I think it is actually harmful if you are not concentrated during programming. It may be more fun to get out of someone&#x27;s own &quot;bubble&quot; for a couple of minutes and have a talk with some fellow programmer, but that fellow might be very comfortable in his&#x2F;her bubble at that time, so you are actually distracting him&#x2F;her.<p>So maybe you should try to find interesting software projects one way and try to socialize another.