Yearly archives: 2013

Making use of OpenStreetMap Data – Southampton 18/3/2013 1

 in OSSG Events by (updated 4040 days ago)

Monday 18th March 2013

Speaker: Nick Whitelegg

Time: 6.00pm for 6.30pm

Venue: Southampton Solent University, Reginald Mitchell Building, third floor, room RM326, SO14 0RD
Maps: Directions and maps at www.solent.ac.uk

Joint with the BCS Hampshire Branch, and Southampton Solent University

OpenStreetMap

This event is free, open to all, but please if possible book through the BCS website https://events.bcs.org/book/584/ , when available, both for BCS members and non-members for arranging refreshments, and particularly as the numbers are limited.

This technically-focused talk will introduce what the OpenStreetMap project is all about, but focus on how to use the data in your own projects.
The OpenStreetMap API will be introduced along with a number of tools for making use of the data, such as Osmosis, osm2pgsql, Mapnik and kothic-js.

The Freemap site and Android apps will be introduced as examples of third-party software making use of OSM data.

Nick Whitelegg is a senior lecturer in Computing (Web Development) at Southampton Solent University and teaches on a range of undergraduate software development courses including Java and web development. He has contributed software and data to the OpenStreetMap mapping project and has developed an open source mapping site and associated tools for walkers.

Hadoop Session – London 01/05/2013 1

 in OSSG Events by (updated 3997 days ago)

The Open Source Specialist Group (OSSG) will be holding an event on Apache Hadoop from 1800 hours at the BCS Central London Offices, First Floor, The Davidson Building, 5 Southampton Street, London WC2E 7HA ( http://www.bcs.org/upload/pdf/london-office-guide.pdf).

Software Practice Advancement Specialist Group

This event is a joint meeting with the BCS SPA SG (Software Practice Advancement Specialist Group, http://bcs-spa.org).

This bookable event is free and open to all with buffet and refreshments.

Students are particularly welcome to attend.

Closing date for booking is 1st May at 09:00 am.

Apache Hadoop

Speakers

Shashin Shah (LinkedIn profile) and Christy Kulasingam (LinkedIn profile) of Onepoint IQ

Timings

18:00 – Registration & buffet
18:30 – Presentation
20:00 – Networking Session

Synopsis

Discover and appreciate the rising importance and prominence of the Open Source Apache Hadoop ecosystem in the Big Data space. Come and learn about the history of Hadoop, what business challenges it solves, why it has such widespread adoption not seen before in the Open Source world, and how innovative solutions from leading vendors such as MapR are built on top of Apache Hadoop. Session will comprise of presentations and demonstrations of the Hadoop ecosystem.

About the Speakers

Shashin and Christy have over 50 years combined experience helping major clients with their Business & IT Strategy, Enterprise Architecture and Open Source covering multiple industry verticals on major business and technology transformation projects.

Shashin and Christy are co-founders off Onepoint IQ, a niche consulting company focused on helping clients realize the value from data (big and small).

Update (06 May)

Shashin and Christy have kindly shared the slides from their presentation:

maddog at Birmingham City University

 in Education / Knowledge / OSSG Events  tagged Linux / LPI / open source / OSS by (updated 4074 days ago)

Hear maddog talk at Birmingham City University about “Making and Saving Money with Free Software and Open Hardware” – There is much confusion about how people can make or save money with Free Software. As it turns out, there are more ways that people can make money with Free Software than there are with closed source, proprietary software.  This talk illustrates some of those ways, how to formulate a business plan around Free Software and how to avoid traps that make unprofitable companies.

Register for your tickets at: http://lpi-uk.eventbrite.co.uk/

Jon “maddog” Hall is the Executive Director of Linux International (www.li.org), an association of computer users who wish to support and promote the Linux Operating System. During his career in commercial computing which started in 1969, Mr. Hall has been a programmer, systems designer, systems administrator, product manager, technical marketing manager, author and educator.

He has worked for such companies as Western Electric Corporation, Aetna Life and Casualty, Bell Laboratories, Digital Equipment Corporation, VA Linux Systems, and SGI. He currently works as an independent consultant, and is currently involved with bringing environmentally friendly computing to emerging marketplaces through Project Cauã (www.projectcaua.org), as well as consulting for Futura Networks, the parent company of Campus-Party.org

Mr Hall has worked on many systems, both proprietary and open, having concentrated on Unix systems since 1980 and Linux systems since 1994, when he first met Linus Torvalds and correctly recognized the commercial importance of Linux and Free and Open Source Software.

He has taught at Hartford State Technical College (HSTC), Merrimack College and Daniel Webster College. While at HSTC his students gave him the nickname of “maddog”.

Mr. Hall is the author of numerous magazine and newspaper articles, many presentations and one book, “Linux for Dummies”.

Mr. Hall has consulted with the governments of China, Malaysia and Brasil as well as the United Nations and many local and state governments on the use of Free and Open Source Software.

Mr. Hall serves on the boards of several companies, and several non-profit organizations.

Mr. Hall has traveled the world speaking on the benefits of Open Source Software having received his BS in Commerce and Engineering from Drexel University, and his MSCS from RPI in Troy, New York.

Open Educational Resources – London 20/02/2013 1

 in Education / Legal / OSSG Events by (updated 4095 days ago)

The Open Source Specialist Group (OSSG) will be holding an event on Open Educational Resources from 1800 hours at the BCS Central London Offices, First Floor, The Davidson Building, 5 Southampton Street, London WC2E 7HA ( http://www.bcs.org/upload/pdf/london-office-guide.pdf).

This bookable event is free and open to all with buffet and refreshments. To book a place to attend, please follow this link: https://events.bcs.org/book/539/ (Closing date is 19th February at 11:59pm).

Open Educational Resource

Abstract

Open Educational Resources (OERs) range from learning/teaching tools to complete courses freely available online. OERs are growing in popularity and have featured highly in JISC priorities in the UK. There is a global drive for open resources through organisations such as UNESCO, which hosted the World Open Educational Resources Congress, in June 2012. Some high profile institutions have also shown their support for OERs namely: Oxford University, Open University, The University of Nottingham in the UK and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in America.

The aim of this presentation is to clarify the main characteristics of OERs and provide the tools to find and evaluate OERs.  Key themes and issues within the area of Open Educational Resources will be discussed. Current research in the area will also be explored.

Speaker

Ella Mitchell is currently Subject Librarian for the School of Architecture, Computing and Engineering at the University of East London. Ella has been working in academic libraries for 6 years and is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (HEA). In March 2012 was awarded a short-term fellowship at the SCORE (Support Centre for Open Resources Education- http://www.open.ac.uk/score/) based at the Open University. Prior to this she was involved in a project team that developed an innovative online Information Literacy tool, Info skills, at the University of East London.  Presently Ella is working on a project with colleagues from across the academic library sector to investigate ways of collating and disseminating Information Literacy Open Educational Resources.

Volunteers needed for the Open Source SG

 in OSSG / OSSG Article / OSSG News  tagged article by (updated 1729 days ago)

Help wanted

Would you consider helping your Specialist Group to provide a full and varied programme for BCS members and the public?

The Open Source SG of BCS is also looking for volunteers to assist with the running of the SG, which includes its events programme. There are a variety of duties available for everyone no matter how much time you are able to give.

Becoming a volunteer for BCS is a great way to expand on your CV, as well as providing a service for local members.

If you have an interest in helping the BCS Open Source Specialist Group by volunteering your services, then please contact the Member Groups Team on groups@hq.bcs.org.uk for more information on the roles available.