MiramarMike: Blog

Hack Miramar continues to disrupt and is out on the skiny branches as it endeavours to improve the lot of people in teams of the Accelerator programme run by MBIE/R9. To that end we are running a 'hackathon' aimed at giving people a "try before you buy' opportunity on Jan 29th/30th/31st. Our goal is for teams to get to know each other before deciding on going forward to the full Accelerator - it's a small but important part that we can play. http://www.hackmiramar.org/revup-for-accelerator-20/ I ask that people register and/or pass on the link to 5 others they believe should know about the event/programme. As many of you know I went through the initial accelerator and, after coming out bruised and battered, this is my small attempt to take that experience and make it 'better' for future participants.

It's easy and tbh Google have a tonne of very simple to follow steps, helpful videos and answers to common questions. But it's not about how easy it is, it's the perception that it's to do with "computers" and that a migration sounds like the black magic stuff from the 1990s ... well, it's not. If you want to migrate all, some or just one of the following into a Google Apps account, or even a regular Google Account most commonly referred to many as a 'Gmail account', then follow the help: Contacts Calendar Gmail Drive Remember, this following is useful for 1, 2 or a handful of users BUT if you're gonna migrate a whole organisation you'll want to start with Google's setup.googleapps.com and even engage the services of a local Google partner . Contacts Any user can do this at any time: Export Contacts from OLD Import Contacts into NEW Check your mobile devices are syncing with the new account: Apple , Android

What I found searching "bigness NZ" I have a theory ( another one ) - and this one I call Bigness , or on Twitter #bigness. Here in New Zealand, a country with a population of 4.471 million, living on land bigger than the UK (pop: 64.1m) we have many cultural attributes that are uniquely Kiwi, just look at the reaction to the flag debate and how people are expressing their, "This isn't us!" to see it in action. Many of these Kiwi attributes are awesome but one, that I have labeled #bigness, is a problem. It is an attribute that slows us down, holds us back and ties us to a thinking we don't need to. New Zealand is, to all intents & purposes, a Western-ised, predominantly white (male) country. When it looks to role models it immediately gravitates to those like it, Australia, UK, USA and Canada (the Five Eyes ). When we look for help, guidance, "lessons to be learnt", processes to copy, institutions to emulate it is to these that we a

I'm doing some work for an IT association and my roles is to approach a segment of the tech 'community'* that views this association, and any association that has an office, with scepticism and a great deal of, "What's in it for me?" I have used a broad brush label to name this section of the tech 'community'* - "hoodies". Another purely Wellington focused label could be, "that end of town" (think Manners St, Courtney Place, Cuba Street end of town) as opposed to "the other end of town" (Lampton Quay and north). My hypothesis: The underlying drivers of all ICT workers are the same, but the manner of engagement is very different 'community'* - why use the asterisk? OK, let's get this out of the way first. Many MANY use the word 'community' when referring to those that work within the ICT / tech / computer industry. This is not something peculiar to Wellington or New Zealand as you'll see

(this is a cross-post from Hack Miramar ) Apart from our own Meetup.com entry there are over 30+ technology / ICT meetups listed for Wellington - here they are: Please let us know if you know of more ... or even best, just open the Sheet and edit it yourself .

"Team PUP", what the hell are you talking about Mike? Team PUP is the name we have for the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) "Procurement project" being run through a CreativeHQ "accelerator programme" that in itself is named after the Government's Result 9 focus , hence  R9 Accelerator . Wow, that's a mouthful eh ... and we're all sitting pretty at BizDojo ( 115 Tory St ), come visit. There are 5 other 'projects' trying to deliver an MVP in 12 weeks that will then go forward for "investment" (whatever that turns out to be) but this is not about them, what is "Team PUP" and here is our official line: Better procurement   Problem: B​usinesses report that current government procurement processes are overly prescriptive, are not outcomes based, do not support innovation and favour larger suppliers. Opportunities exist to source innovative solutions to enable meeting of outcome requ

On April 16th & 17th here in Wellington the fine folks from Github, Enspiral, Loomio and Chackle have brought together a worldclass set of international, New Zealand and local speakers on the subject of Open Source Open Society . I will be facilitating a taster workshop for the July GovHackNZ event - think of it has "hackathon 101" with an actual hackathon run in 45 minutes - you'll have to see it to believe it. With so many brains discussing, challenging and teasing out what it means to be an open society there is likely to be a plethora of practicable ideas emerge. These ideas and, hopefully the people behind them, can focus their energies into becomming a team at the GovHackNZ event (either here in Wellington or at any of the NZ-wide location s closer to their home). We look at the GovHackNZ event as the "do-y" to the OS/OS "hui". So, get your tickets to the OS/OS conference ... When: Thursday 18th & Friday 17th April, 2015 Wh

An editable list - please add to and/or correct

Back in 2010 I did a post,  In Depth And Highly Scientific Comparison Between Microsoft Windows And Ubuntu , which was a comparision of the boot-up times of Ubuntu 10.04 and Windows Vista: I have had a number of regular (free) upgrades to the Ubuntu system and it now running 14.10 and booting up about the same time ... well, maybe a little lag in step 2 (see below). I've not had a Microsoft Windows machine since Vista but we do have a WIndows 7 laptop in the so I might also compare it ... one day. On to my HP Chromebook (v40.0) - here's the deal: From boot to login: 8.5 seconds From entering my password and loading my Gmail: 10 seconds Logging out: 5 seconds Re-enter password and back to Gmail again: 7 seconds Restart (all the way back to the dual boot): n/a How different 5 years can make; the biggest difference is in step 2, this from 5 years ago: Ubuntu 10.04: 2mins 30secs Windows Vista: 1min 5secs Note that "loading my Gmail" on my Ch

Working with the Flatpak team over the past six weeks has, I'm sure +Victoria Maclennan  will agree, been an honour and a privilege. And now it's your turn to help this amazingly focussed team bring their product to market (a market they have validated with the likes of FMG as well as many individual farmers).

I'll be honest, this is a post to bring forward my cheat sheet called, " How To Facilitate A Barcamp/Unconference " :) Right, the 5 things are: A venue A date A logo People A need Once you have those everything else is logistics ... read more on my original post ...

Like most of my presentations the pictures are something to hang the words off but the speaker notes are pretty good (even if i say so myself), to open: Click the cog at the bottom of the slides: Choose Open speaker notes to see notes in a pop up window