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By chris, 14 June, 2013 8:00 am

With the GeoVation Environment Challenge camp starting one week today, we are delighted to announce that Jason Davies, winner of last year’s Transforming Neighbourhood Challenge, has agreed to join the judging panel for GeoVation Camp which runs from 21 – 23 June.

Jason and colleagues won £41 000 (including the GeoVation Community prize) for their innovation venture Community Payback Visibility. This looks to use Ordnance Survey map data in a mobile phone app for the public to use, to nominate projects for Community Payback.

Jason graduated in modern languages (French and Russian) following which he spent several years travelling and teaching English as a foreign language. On returning to London, he worked as a BBC subtitler at TV Centre, before moving back to his home town of Birmingham to set up the live subtitling unit at Pebble Mill.

Jason had an opportunity to use his love of statistics as a data and GIS analyst with the Probation Service and National Offender Management Service, a role which has expanded to include leading commercial and digital projects in the world of criminal justice.

Since Jason has agreed to join us for the whole of the camp, from the Friday evening kick-off through to judging on Sunday, participants will have an opportunity to quiz him on what it is like to go through the whole of the GeoVation camp experience and what to focus on.

Jason joins the rest of our judging panel of Alison Prendiville (London College of Communication), Ant Parsons (Environment Agency), John Carpenter (Ordnance Survey), Quentin Johns (Hub Westminster) and our panel chair Roland Harwood (100%Open).

Добро пожаловать в жюри Джейсон! (Welcome to the judging panel, Jason!)

We can hardly wait until next Friday’s kick-off!

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By viv, 3 June, 2013 8:00 am

With less than 3 weeks to go until GeoVation Camp, we can now announce the finalists who have confirmed their attendance.

The ideas were submitted to our GeoVation Challenge to look for ways that British business could improve their environmental performance using Ordnance Survey products or services in the solution.

Unfortunately some teams we invited were unable to make the weekend of 21 -23 June,  so we’ve been able to invite some teams from our reserve list.  Places at camp have been limited to 10 teams this year,  so that there will be more time to help develop ideas to into prototyped ventures and to work on pitches for funding.

The confirmed finalists are listed below – or you can find out more about the ideas by clicking on the links in our OS OpenSpace map.

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Continue reading '10 finalists confirmed for GeoVation Camp'»

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By Luke, 23 May, 2013 8:00 am

This week from Monday through to Sunday you’ll find us at the Digital Shoreditch festival, an event that attracts hundreds of speakers from the most innovative and successful companies and organisations across creative, technical, start-up tech and digital spaces and beyond. During the week, we’ll be exhibiting, speaking and promoting our digital products and services amongst some of Tech City’s most talented digital and technical creative individuals.

The festival has a different theme each day, comprising of panel sessions, key note speeches and discussions – kicking off with Monday’s “What Tech City” theme. During the day, festival goers collectively explored the many companies and organisations that make Tech City what it is, focusing on developing new ways to exploit the potential for growing global engagement and improving our digital economy and society.

Continue reading 'Digital Shoreditch festival 2013 – hear how we’re involved!'»

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By viv, 7 May, 2013 8:00 am

Our latest GeoVation Challenge has just closed and soon we’ll be announcing who the finalists that will be invited to GeoVation Camp on 21 – 23 June.

We’ll be selecting the best ideas that address the problems identified and use Ordnance Survey data, including OS OpenData and OS OpenSpace, together with other open data in the solution.

Some of the ideas could make use of Linked Data.  The term Linked Data is used to describe a method of exposing, sharing, and connecting data and information using uniform resource identifiers (URIs) on the Web.  Across government over the last ten years there has been a growing realisation to the power of linked data for exposing, sharing, and connecting pieces of data).

Ordnance Survey will soon be launching the next iteration of the Linked Data Service. In preparation a new beta version (http://beta.data.ordnancesurvey.co.uk) of the service has been designed for you to have a play around, test and review against your current applications.

Ordnance Survey launched Linked Data in April 2010 and has seen a continued growth of the use in government and research. This understanding of the use of Linked Data has been used to develop an improved service which is easy to use and access adhering to new standards making the data more open.

Continue reading 'A new Linked Data Service from Ordnance Survey'»

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By chris, 3 May, 2013 10:55 am

So, with judging now underway in our current challenge, Chris describes yesterday’s All Wales Coast Path first anniversary event in West Wales and progress of our previous challenge winner.

GeoVation challenge partner, Ramblers Cymru hosted a fantastic event in Kidwelly, yesterday to celebrate the first anniversary of the opening of the Wales Coast Path and to launch the Big Welsh Walk, which takes place around the path this bank holiday weekend. The Wales Coast Path was, of course, the subject of our previous GeoVation challenge: “How can we connect communities and visitors along the Wales Coast Path?” which was timed to coincide with the official opening of the path on 5 May 2012.

Throughout the day, class after class of local school children (and adults) explored Wales and its coastline with Gwenda Owen, Ramblers Community Engagement Officer, on the enormous map produced by Ordnance Survey for Ramblers Cymru, and visited stands exhibiting activities on or near the path including local beekeeping, and allotment growing groups. In the afternoon MissionExplore (previous GeoVation winners) worked with several classes to produce mini mission explore booklets with children choosing their missions.

Local school children exploring Wales with Gwenda Owen, Ramblers Community Engagement Officer

Continue reading 'Real Food Wales at Wales Coast Path Anniversary'»

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By Luke, 30 April, 2013 8:00 am

In a previous blog, we shared news about how we were supporting the BlueLightCamp hackathon, which was a developer event that took place in Manchester last Sunday. Aimed at developers that work in the Fire, Police and resilience services in the public and private sector, the event provided an opportunity for participants to explore and develop prototype ideas that address just some of the criminal and justice issues we face today.

The day kicked off at 10 am, with the event organisers providing a recap of some of the key topics that had been discussed in Saturday’s unconference. One recurring theme related to the increasing role that social media is playing in the provision of such services and the potential that these channels of communication may hold for the future. Many examples were cited of how police forces are increasingly using platforms such as Twitter and Facebook to communicate with the public. It was highlighted that some forces are even adopting other platforms such as Google+, Pinterest, YouTube and Flickr to not only to broadcast information, but to engage with people directly and to open lines of communication that were previously not in place.

Continue reading 'Developers gather at BlueLight Camp 2013 hackathon'»

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By Luke, 23 April, 2013 8:00 am

You may have missed it, so we thought it was timely to remind all our GeoVator’s that Ordnance Survey recently refreshed the portfolio of products that are freely available through the OS OpenData portal.  Releasing both a new height dataset, as well as making significant updates to one of the backdrop mapping products, here are just a few key points that might whet your appetite.

The portal has been updated with a new version of OS VectorMap District and a new product – OS Terrain 50® being released, we’ll cover the height dataset first.

The image illustrates OS Terrain 50 data overlaid on backdrop mapping

OS Terrain 50®

Developers can also now access a new fully maintained analytical height product called OS Terrain 50. The new product, which has a similar resolution to Land-Form PANORAMA, will enable users to access an advanced product with consistently maintained height content for the whole of Great Britain.

Continue reading 'New products available through OS OpenData portal'»

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By Luke, 16 April, 2013 8:00 am

On the weekend of 27/28 April, we’re supporting BlueLightCamp, which is a free event being billed as both an unconference and hackathon. Attracting workers from across the blue light services i.e. Fire, Police and resilience services, the aim is to innovate through promoting good-practice sharing, exchanging knowledge, networking as well as providing an opportunity for concepts and solutions to be tested through the hackathon.

Through two mapping agreements that we have with the Public Sector, Ordnance Survey already works closely with many of the blue light services, providing: digital map products; the sharing and visualisation of data; supporting better problem solving and helping to reduce costs and drive up efficiency levels amongst other aspects. So it seemed entirely fitting to support the BlueLightCamp as we have a further opportunity to engage with and support the very individuals that work in these services.

Continue reading 'Unconference and hackathon weekend – come and innovate at BlueLightCamp'»

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By Luke, 11 April, 2013 8:00 am

Held at Imperial College, London between 8^th April and 26^th June, Urban Prototyping (UP London) is an International festival that brings more than 300 developers, technologists, academics, artists, government bodies and community groups together for a series of events that focus on the role that digital technology can play in creating sustainable society.

This year we were invited to participate and contribute to the agenda, which has a specific theme concentrating on the role that digital technology can play in harnessing the creation of resilient environments, economies and communities. We were delighted to accept the invite, as the festival presents an opportunity for us to introduce our range of products and services in such a context, whilst allowing us to engage with communities that might not have previously considered the many benefits geographic information can bring to potential innovations.

Continue reading 'Digital technology to digital economy – our involvement at Urban Prototyping Festival'»

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By viv, 19 March, 2013 8:00 am

Last weekend (16 -17 March) we were busy supporting the env[:hack] organised by Environment Agency and Geeks of London. The event, held at the University of Bristol attracted over 50 software and hardware developers to look at the problems associated with environmental responsibility and create some cool and innovative demos showcasing how technology can help us all be more green.

The weekend kicked off with presentations from Environment Agency which highlighted some of the barriers to business in improving environmental performance, and how this can be turned to opportunities – such as re-use of waste?  There were also examples of good practice.

This was followed by a presentation from GeoVation where participants learnt about the current GeoVation Challenge ‘How can we help British business improve environmental performance?’ in which successful ideas can win a slice of £100,000 to help make their idea a reality.

Continue reading 'Hacking for greener business'»