Knowle West Media Centre (KWMC) is launching a new programme of digital skills workshops to coincide with the national Get Online week (30th October – 6th November 2011). The varied programme includes a Work Club, which will support those looking for employment, weekly classes and a drop-in club for people interested in learning more about […]
Our friends at Bristol’s Pervasive Media Studio are holding a free lunchtime talk on Friday 11th November 2011 from 1.00 pm to 2.00 pm on the ‘Latest in Smart Clothes and Wearable Technology’ Electronic textiles (e-textiles) and wearable computers offer a unique platform for pervasive media. Attributes of future ‘smart’ clothing will enhance communication, wellness, […]
A couple of days ago, Bristol24/7 reported that Bristol is entering the race to be Europe’s top green city in 2014, so it’s perhaps appropriate to have a look at what Bristol Wireless can do as regards green IT (although, of course, we’re not the only people doing stuff like this in Bristol. Ed.). The […]
Following on from recent news about the revival of Bristol City Council’s open source project (news passim), the council has now issued the following statement. Bristol City Council Leader Barbara Janke said: “Bristol is leading the way on promoting open source solutions and supporting our strong creative media and digital sector. We held a very […]
It’s easy to be critical of Bristol City Council; any long-term resident will vouch for that. However, amongst British local authorities it has been a pioneer for its willingness to dip its toes into the waters of open source, although even here it has not had an easy time (news passim). News emerges today on […]
Yesterday Bristol Wireless volunteers Jim and your correspondent attended the afternoon session of the two Wiki Wildlife Edit-a-thons (news passim) that were jointly organised by Wikimedia UK and Wildscreen’s ARKive project, the Bristol-based digital archive of the world’s endangered species, which has kindly donated 200 items from its text archive on endangered species to help […]
Earlier this year we reported on Bristol’s successful bid to host the next FIRA RoboWorld Cup (news passim). Further details have now been published by Bristol24-7, which states that this will be the first time the event has ever been held in this country and that it will further boost Bristol’s position as a leader […]
Along with our friends over the road at Bristol Hackspace, Bristol Wireless gets an honourable mention in the latest Tuxradar podcast, brought to the world by Linux Format magazine. The podcast is available as both a high quality ogg or a low quality mp3. The total length of the podcast is 53:18. What’s more, we’re […]
Earlier today, our friends at Knowle West Media Centre announced the forthcoming Knowle West T Party on 26th September at the Media Centre itself on Leinster Avenue (map). The event starts at 1.00 p.m. and ends at 3.00 p.m and attendance is free. The strapline for the T Party is ‘Keeping in Touch with Technology’ […]
Bristol is well known for its links with natural history and wildlife. The city is the home to the BBC’s Natural History Unit and Bristol Zoo is celebrating its 175th anniversary this year. To build further on this base, there’s a Wikipedia sprint coming up soon in Bristol in aid of ARKive, the organisation dedicated […]
The chief scribe had just been examining our website statistics, as provided by the excellent open source AWstats package (a contraction of Advanced Web statistics. Ed.), and thought readers may be interested in their revelations. For the first time since switching to a new host and a new platform (running the whole site on WordPress, […]
I’m writing this at the instigation of fellow UK Wikimedia member Matt Jukes following on from last week’s successful Bristol Girl Geeks vs Wikimeet event (news passim) with a few thoughts on a couple of the barriers to contributing to Wikipedia and its sister projects and raising the project’s woeful gender imbalance (87% male in […]
Last night saw another first in collaborative events in Bristol when Bristol Girl Geeks got together with a bunch of local Wikipedians plus trailblazing female Wikipedian Fiona Apps, who helps Wikimedia UK with outreach work (news passim). After we’d all got a glass of wine and some nibbles, Fiona was introduced and gave a brief […]
After the recent spate of revelations about Bristol City Council’s IT problems (news passim), it’s good to be able report some positive IT news from the Counts Louse. The Council’s new website, built upon the open source Drupal content management system (CMS), went live today and first impressions are very favourable: the new site looks […]
Yesterday, 12th August, marked the 30th anniversary of the birth of the personal computer (PC). On 12th August 1981, IBM announced the launch of its 5150, subsequently called the IBM PC. The 5150 was originally released with a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 CPU, 16 KB of RAM, 2 x 5¼ floppy drives and a 80 […]
Yesterday we reported on the troubled history of Bristol City Council’s troubled efforts to implement its open source strategy with the ‘assistance’ of Computacenter, one of the country’s largest suppliers of proprietary Microsoft products (news passim). Today Mark Ballard of Computer Weekly has published a new post on the affair, which highlights, inter alia, the […]
Some weeks ago we gave advance notice of the forthcoming Bristol Girl Geek Dinners and Wikipedia event on Thursday 18th August (news passim). Further details have now emerged. It’s being held at the Merchant Venturers Building, University of Bristol, Woodland Road, Bristol, BS8 1UB (map) and starts at 7.00 pm. The main aim of the […]
In recent weeks we’ve reported several times on developments at Bristol City Council (news passim), but it seems the software wars between open source and proprietary are still going on down the Counts Louse. Computer Weekly now reports that systems integrator Computacenter has prevented Bristol City Council from publishing details of a consulting project that […]
Yes, you did read that correctly; today, Friday 29th July is System Administrator Appreciation Day, the 12th since its inception. For 364 days of the year sysadmins toil away unappreciated, their arcane skills only really being noticed when a problem needs sorting out (and nobody can do any work at all until the sysadmin’s done […]
Our friends at Bristol Hackspace are organising a beginners’ Arduino programming workshop on Saturday and Sunday 30th/31st July 2011 at the Bristol’s Pervasive Media Studio (map). By the end of the weekend participants should be able to: Make LEDs light up in different colours and patterns; Detect switches, light/dark, touch; Make sounds drive motors and […]