Bristol Wireless was donated* some redundant laptops yesterday that were surplus to requirements. Their arrival has encouraged volunteer Acesabe to try experimenting, as about an hour ago he tweeted: Think I’ll have a pop at installing ChromeOS on one of those old laptops we got donated @BristolWireless yesterday http://chromeos.hexxeh.net Please let us know how it […]
Yesterday Jono Bacon published a blog post inviting people around the world to organise events for this year’s Ubuntu Global Jam, which is being held from 2nd – 4th March. The Ubuntu Global Jam is a worldwide fun event that’s a great way to meet other Ubuntu and free software enthusiasts. Event organisers will need […]
2012 is fast approaching and there are two reasons for celebration in the New Year. Firstly, the United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives as an acknowledgement of the fundamental role of cooperatives in promoting the socio-economic development of hundreds of millions of people and have released a little […]
Regular users of Wikipedia will be aware that the main page showcases a different article every day; this is known as the featured article. Yesterday’s featured article was the one on Bristol’s Knowle West area. Those familiar with the Wikipedia article grading process will know just how much effort has gone into getting an article […]
It’s been an interesting day in the lab. Your correspondent arrived early in the lab and found Rich and Acesabe getting ready to out on a cabling job, running Cat6 round a new office for a client. After a while Jim turned up, followed shortly after by Chris, our newest volunteer. It’s interesting working with […]
One of the barriers frequently mentioned to getting involved in editing Wikipedia is the clunky editing interface; indeed it has come up at sessions attended by Bristol Wireless volunteers cunningly disguised as Wikipedians (news passim). Your scribe has some vague memory of the topic of the clunky editor even coming up in the course of […]
From the Bristol Girl Geeks Dinner website: Following on from the success of our Girl Geeks vs Wikimeet event back in August, we are teaming up with Wikipedia again, this time to bring you a hands-on editing event, at the University of Bristol. This event will run from 1pm until 5pm on Sunday 15th January […]
We’ve been contacted on Twitter by Easton Arts Trail of Bristol with the following request: @BristolWireless We’re looking for a web designer to relaunch our website. Do you know anyone who might take it on as a project for free? The Easton Arts Trail was founded in 2006 by a group of local artists and […]
Connecting Bristol reports that a new three-year initiative has been launched in Bristol to help local people, particularly the elderly and disabled, access the internet, learn new skills and find out more about computers and technology. The project’s called Get IT Together and will feature sessions tailored towards the learners’ own personal interests and delivered […]
Yesterday the Charity Commission approved Wikimedia UK, the UK membership organisation supporting Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia projects, as a registered charity. The news comes shortly before the launch of this year’s global Wikimedia fundraiser. Starting on 14th November, Wikimedia UK aims to raise £1 million to support Wikipedia and its sister projects. The Charity […]
Your correspondent arrived at the lab last Friday to find there was – initially at least – nowhere to sit down. We had a full complement of volunteers present – both old and new – and a couple of customers too. Looking at our volunteers, I’d like to draw your attention to 2 of them. […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
As previously announced, the second run of the Bristol Wiki Academy took place on Monday this week up at the BBC’s Broadcasting House in Bristol (news passim). We got off to an early(ish) start at 10.30 am with a round of introductions, followed by a brief presentation on Wikipedia’s mission of free knowledge for everyone […]
Are you enthusiastic about Debian and thinking about contributing? If yes, then the Debian Women project and the OpenHatch project want to teach you the basics. They’ll be will be holding an IRC event on Saturday 7th May to help people that want to compile their first Debian package from source, and apply their first […]
Last week BW volunteers Rich and Acesabe paid a visit to the Rosevear sheltered housing scheme in Newtown to see if their link to our network could be restored. One of the last things they expected to find there was wildlife interfering with our infrastructure… Rich takes up the tale below. “As I was unscrewing […]
Our friend Emma Harvey (a fine exponent of singing the ‘Free Software Song‘. Ed.) at Trinity Community Arts has sent out an email today to let people know Trinity is looking for volunteers to assist in developing its work. Amongst the types of volunteers wanted, we noticed the following: IT Assistant to help us build […]