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We had two local and two international speakers this month&hellip; Andrew Grieve from Google talks about converting your Chrome web apps into mobile apps with Apache Cordova<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/MFu8-NlQ1tk" width="560"></iframe> Next Stefan Stölzle from Sencha discussed using <a href="https://www.sencha.com/blog/building-a-tizen-app-with-sencha-touch/" target="_blank">Sencha with Tizen</a> Richard Collins from Canonical talks abo...

The old paradigms in software design have been on life support for a long time. Who under 30 can relate to the metaphors many interfaces are based upon: desktops, folders, files, disk icons and cutting and pasting with scissors and glue brushes? Who in their life has ever kept a file inside a folder, inside a folder, inside another folder? I can't even imagine what that would look like.

I&rsquo;ve been attending the <a href="https://www.meetup.com/Melbourne-KMLF/events/142133462/" target="_blank">Knowledge Management Melbourne</a> sessions without still being entirely clear what a Knowledge manager actually is, but I find the topics they present interesting and relevant, so&hellip; Tonight&rsquo;s topic was a paratactical session on facilitation techniques, which is something I undertake occasionally so was interested in hearing some ideas and suggestions. These were both te...

This was a great <a href="https://productanonymous.com/" target="_blank">Product Anonymous</a> session with <a href="https://au.linkedin.com/pub/jason-cormier/15/131/744" target="_blank">Jason Corimor</a> of <a href="https://www.mashery.com/" target="_blank">Mashery</a> that covered the business and commercialisation of using APIs, I intend to expand on a few of these topics in the future, so will touch upon them here. Jason likens discussing APIs with businesses to discussing websites a decades...

I have the fantastic opportunity to represent two of my favourite non-tech talks from last year, I&#39;m back at Laneway Learning to present my &quot;<a href="/cosmic-horror-hp-lovecraft">Cosmic Horror &amp; HP Lovecraft talk</a>&quot; on March 5th, you can <a href="https://melbourne.lanewaylearning.com/classes/cosmic-horror-and-hp-lovecraft/?utm_content=buffer21da4&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=twitter.com&amp;utm_campaign=buffer" target="_blank">book in at the Laneway Learning website</a>. I_...

<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">A strange session tonight as we had a last minute cancellation, this coupled with the typical business session audience, i.e. High RSVP, high no-show, meant it was a quiet and quick evening.<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">Andrew Skinner confessed to not being a confident public speaker, however this didn&#39;t detract from his high quality, high content presentation. The presentation covered getting client / internal team buy in...

This was a strange event for a couple of reasons, firstly it didn't run very smoothly with lots of minor technical issues and delays that made the event run very long and late, with the main event not really starting until 8pm after a 6:30 start. Secondly the pitches (I saw, see later) were generally a little unsure and not in the traditional pitch style, I spent a lot of time thinking 'and...?', it was never very clear why the pitchers were pitching, what did they want to win for, what did they...

This was a great session with a myriad of conflicting opinions and points of few, that always sparks a good debate :)</div>&nbsp;</div>First up a great set of introductory resources for startup founders from Scott Handsaker, with a lot of new initiatives arriving in Melbourne. His slides will be available on the <a href="https://www.meetup.com/Lean-Startup-Melbourne/events/160212272/" target="_blank">event&#39;s meetup page</a>.</div>&nbsp;</div>Secondly was a very constructive talk on outsourci...

When did you last use the references feature in Microsoft Word? Or truly needed any more than about a quarter of the filters in Photoshop? When talking about feature bloat in applications, our minds often slip to thinking about Microsoft or Adobe software and the statistic that most users only utilise about 20% of their feature sets.

<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">Over the weekend I saw <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1798709/" target="_blank">Her</a>&nbsp;and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2007360/" target="_blank">Computer chess</a>, very different films about technology that were delivered in very different ways, but there were several similar threads running in them that got me thinking, these similarities were&hellip;<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">They ended up not being...

<span style="line-height: 1.538em;">For many, 2013 has been an intense and not always good year, but personally it&#39;s been pretty good and I&#39;m looking forward to building upon the foundations from this year into 2014. Here&#39;s some reflections and highlights for you all to enjoy/endure. <strong>Travels</strong><br />I spent a lot of time travelling this year, to conferences and Holidays, this included three DrupalCons in Sydney, <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/chrischinchilla/se...

I've been learning to drive (again) recently, with an aim to finally actually take my driving test, I'm also a keen (legal) cyclist… None of this has any real bearing on me deciding to attend tonight's event, that was more to do with my fascination in knowing about and understanding the various data sets that are available from our government agencies.  There was a slightly strange feeling in the air that is always present when those from ‘old school’ government agencies or business present in...

November has been a great month for meet-ups, perhaps everyone wrapping up for the year is making organisers up the ante. **Google glass / Wearables** This is the first time i've really seen a Google Glass in the flesh and they do look a bit odd and distracting. The developer world is now growing and open. It provides a chronological view and you have to talk or touch to do things, so not as intrusive? It still looks a little unresponsive and i'd love to know what it doesn't look like projected o...

With&hellip;&nbsp;Cory Doctorow, Melbourne Writers Festival Director Lisa Dempster and Peter Williams of the Deloitte Centre for the Edge. A main presentation, followed by a panel discussion, which I haven&#39;t really covered here and got interesting just as it was ending. <strong>Cory Doctorow&#39;s three laws</strong><ul><li>If there&#39;s a law that takes away your right to do things with something you&#39;ve bought it&#39;s not in your interests. But generally not in the interests of publi...

It seems as the year draws to an end, we&#39;re having some of the best talks! Damn Christmas&hellip; <strong>Web for TV, Sam Buckley</strong><br />Smart TV&#39;s don&#39;t do anything well. 33% of Australians have one only 5% browse the web on them, but a high amount for app type functionality.<br />Distance between viewer and device is an issue? Also interfaces are unattractive, lack of know how, not enough content, slow speed.<br />There&#39;s a lack of UX on TV(!) and the Internet is still...

First up, I find it strange how different sectors describe the same things with different names and have the same problems. It&#39;s simultaneously refreshing and depressing that small and large organisations have exactly the same problems with their projects. <strong>Small or large, what is the fundamental problem?</strong><br />&nbsp; <em>Here&#39;s my bullet point thoughts on the breakfast</em><ul><li>Vendor management = project management etc</li><li>Deliver more that you promise, not the...

<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">A few weeks ago I quit my job, I&rsquo;d been there for two years but it was no longer right for me anymore.<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">I&rsquo;m not one to rest on my laurels, so what&rsquo;s next? After a process of figuring out who I am and what I want to do, quite a lot is on the horizon, allow me to introduce you to some of the potentials&hellip;<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;"><strong>Wrapping up my in...

Jonathan Teo (originally from Sydney) from General Catalyst Partners, a leading VC firm in Silicon Valley. Jonathan has personally led early-stage investments in 3 of the hottest companies of recent years including Twitter, Instagram and SnapChat, so a body of great knowledge. <span style="line-height: 1.538em;">He went from tech work to growth strategy for tech companies, he commented that venture capital success is often just from good connections, which is interesting and does it say that lo...

<p class="p1">I feel slightly cheeky writing much about the event as I didn&rsquo;t really end up doing very much and felt somewhat humbled and embarrassed by the other attendees.<p class="p1">Anyway, to start at the beginning.<p class="p1">HealthHack 2013 was a weekend hackfest solving problems that medical researchers face. HealthHack brought together medical researchers, bioinformaticians, software developers, data analysts, data visualisers and designers. Together, they created new software...

<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">As part of RMIT&rsquo;s sessions in Open Access week I toddled down to &ldquo;Publishing the Open Access Way: The Change in Business Thinking Towards Open Access&rdquo; and a slightly small crowd&hellip; I&rsquo;m a little behind with blog posts, so this will again, be a little bit of a collection of items with some opinions and thoughts.<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">The speakers and talks were<p class="p1"><b style="line-heig...

I am excited to be the track chair for site building at DrupalSouth in Wellington next year and it&#39;s time to get your session proposals in! Site building is the glue that pieces together a Drupal site and everyone has their favourite tools, tips and techniques for achieving requirements. I am also considering sessions around tools and techniques for content editors in this track and am up for hearing some wild ideas from new voices, so don&#39;t be afraid to submit a session idea no matter...

An ever growing miscellaneous list of travel tips and thoughts that occur to me. These are about travel itself, not my actual travels.<ul><li>After flying international, getting low cost flights for remainder of the journey isn&#39;t worth it.</li><li><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">Don&#39;t always go for the cheapest option for transfers etc, often not worth it the long run.</li><li><span style="line-height: 1.538em;">British airports suck and so do most of the associated services, they ha...

<p class="p1">I am travelling on a three stage international flight today, it has a few hours stopover in each transit location, but that&#39;s little enough time that on upset can throw the whole flight out of whack.<p class="p1">I woke up this morning to see Google Now telling me that my first flight from Melbourne to Sydney had been delayed (I love big data and personally don&#39;t rely mind what services now about me, as long as I am aware) by two hours, which would mean I would miss my seco...