Comments (0)

By Melanie, 9, April, 2013 8:00 am

We’ve just published a GeoVation booklet which includes information on GeoVation Challenges and case studies on winning ideas. For those of our blog followers who aren’t aware, Ordnance Survey’s GeoVation runs innovation challenges, which aim to address problems, which may be satisfied in part through the use of geography.

GeoVation Challenges are open to entrepreneurs, developers, community groups, government and individuals.  They are focussed on finding innovative and useful ways of using geographical information, including open data and tools, to build new ventures that will generate social, economic and/ or environmental value.

The booklet has some interesting facts about GeoVation which has been running since October 2009.  In that time:

• 1448 participants have registered
• 509 ideas have been submitted
• 57 teams have participated in GeoVation Camps and
• 20 winners have been awarded a share of over £435, 000 in innovation funding to develop their ventures.

We’ve made the booklet available online, so you can find out more about how you can innovate with GeoVation, the GeoVation journey, the ideas we have funded so far and the people who make GeoVation happen.  We’ve also made the case studies available individually– see our case study map.

Download your copy of the GeoVation booklet and find out more!

Continue reading 'A GeoVation update!'»

Comments (1)

By Gemma, 8, March, 2012 8:00 am

We’re fast approaching the two-year anniversary of the release of OS OpenData, which gave more access to free, unrestricted Ordnance Survey mapping than ever before.

We’re giving you the opportunity to gain a greater understanding of open data, and the tools and techniques to use open datasets, through a series of free masterclasses. They’re following on from the success of the two previous open data masterclass series, run by our GeoVation initiative and supported by Horizon Digital Economy Research.

The masterclasses will combine theory and practical sessions and give you the chance to try free-to-use open datasets on data.gov.uk, including OS OpenData. You’ll learn a range of techniques, from data collection and processing, to data analysis and map visualisation. As well as OS OpenData, you’ll have time to use open datasets from government departments and public-sector organisations including higher education, healthcare, transport and environment.

We’re offering up to 30 places at each masterclass, running from 9.30 am until 5.00 pm each day. Just click on the session link you’re interested in to reserve a spot.

Continue reading 'Learn how to make the most of open data at our free masterclasses'»

Comments (3)

By Paul, 31, August, 2011 7:17 am

Earlier in the year, with the anniversary of data.gov.uk, I read quite a few articles or blog posts similar to this by Paul Clarke, lamenting the fact that the simple release of open data hadn’t automatically resulted in an explosion of useful applications and commercial value.

Publication didn’t necessarily mean communication or application, seemed to be the running theme.

To that end, we’ve seen an increasing number of organisations take open data and try to help people make sense of it – you might remember this post we published earlier in the year looking at DataTap, which uses OS OpenSpace to visualise a range of open data released by Windsor and Maidenhead Council.

DataTap subsequently won the MediaGuardian award for the ‘Best Use of Data’ but they’re just one example. I hope you’ll agree that Ordnance Survey is doing its bit through the GeoVation programme and our support of the Open Data Masterclasses (and a few more things in the pipeline I can’t talk about yet…) but there are other organisations out there trying to help people make sense of, and more importantly, use of open data.

Continue reading 'Making sense, and use, of open data'»

Comments (9)

By Paul, 30, August, 2011 7:42 am

We think this is pretty cool, and it’s an example of a company creating commercial value from open data.

Lovell Johns, a company that has been providing traditional mapping products for the private and public sectors for 45 years, has created a range of Street Map Guides for Amazon’s Kindle.

Mapping on Kindle isn’t actually unique, but this is the best interface I’ve seen that manages to overcome the Kindle’s basic navigation functionality.

Downloadable within seconds, the guides contain OS Street View mapping covering the central area of each city – with London, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Bristol, Oxford, Cambridge, Portsmouth, Cardiff and Edinburgh available so far.

Users then navigate about the map using the traditional page turning buttons, plus on page click-to-navigate tools. Personally I think this is one of the more innovative commercial uses of OS OpenData I’ve seen.

Kindle Map Guides can be found on the Amazon website.

Comments (1)

By Paul, 30, June, 2011 9:07 am

Is this the start of a new Cambridge Conference tradition?

The Ordnance Survey vs. The Rest of the World cricket match, in a beautiful green setting with glorious evening sun, and cool jazz in the background. It was a fabulous evening in which everyone had the chance to have a go – great fun. Huge thanks to all the delegates for their enthusiasm in making it such a success.

Anyone for cricket?

But before that, though, we had a full day of conference.

Continue reading 'Cambridge Conference: Day 3 Report'»

Comments (0)

By Paul, 28, June, 2011 10:56 am

Yesterday we had around 120 delegates from all over the world here in Southampton for opening day of the Cambridge Conference. Here are some highlights from Day 1:

Our opening keynote was delivered by Professor Nigel Shadbolt, UK Government’s Open Data Advisor, who spoke enthusiastically about the power of crowd sourcing. To demonstrate this, Nigel showed a powerful illustration of how OpenStreetMap helped map Port au Prince in just days in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake.

He expanded on the drivers behind open data and said that his over-arching principle is that data should be published unless there is a very good reason not to.

Professor Nigel Shadbolt addresses the delegates

Continue reading 'Cambridge Conference underway: Day 1 report'»

Comments (0)

By Paul, 24, June, 2011 11:26 am

Senior representatives and leaders from mapping organisations from across the world are about to descend on Southampton next week.

They’re here for the The Cambridge Conference – so named because of its historic ties to the city – which this year is taking place at our new head office in Southampton. It is a unique occasion, giving top international experts the chance to discuss developments in mapping, changes in technology and issues of global importance.

Professor Nigel Shadbolt will be chairing a session on open data

Continue reading 'Mapping experts set to arrive in Southampton'»

Comments (7)

By Paul, 17, March, 2011 12:23 pm

It won’t have escaped the notice of some of you that we’re rapidly approaching the first birthday of OS OpenData (has it really been a whole year?!) So with that in mind, we’re very pleased to be able to announce that OS VectorMap District has graduated from an alpha to a beta release and is now available to download and order.

Consider it an early birthday gift from us, to you.

OS VectorMap District made its debut as part of OS OpenData last year, designed specifically for displaying third part information on the web (like our Blitz map last year), and when in its vector format, as a customisable backdrop map. It was an alpha release and by no means the finished article, so based on your feedback the new beta version boasts new content and a range of improvements.

What’s new? Continue reading 'OS VectorMap District graduates to beta release'»

Comments (1)

By Lars Malmqvist, 23, February, 2011 9:37 am

Transparency is high on the political agenda these days.

As you’ll be aware, the coalition government has made serious commitments to change the culture in the public sector from one where data are hoarded in-house to one where they are open by default.

Public sector organisations of all stripes from the biggest government departments to the smallest local authorities are starting to publish datasets on a wide range of topics such as the salaries of senior officers, the details of local schools, or even the service requests received by the customer services department.

The data isn’t always well-formatted or easy to process, nor is it always given out with a happy heart, but it’ there.

However, while great strides have been made in making data available, less progress has been made in making it meaningful to a wider public. Let’s face it, while there’s a lot of a talk about “armchair auditors” downloading reams of data and spending endless nights combing through them in Excel, most people aren’t going to know what to do with a raw CSV file or even care enough to try.

In Arcus, we have been working with the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead to address this. Jointly, we have created a solution called DataTAP, which makes it easy for the authority to publish open data from internal systems and make it useful to the average resident.

The site allows users to visualise a range of local government data.

In a nutshell, the solution has an agent sitting inside the Council’s IT infrastructure that extracts and transforms the data into a publishable format. The data is then transferred to our infrastructure on the Cloud and made available to the public in a variety of formats.

This includes the usual downloadable CSVs and XML, but more importantly we add the ability to instantly visualise the data in a variety of formats including tables, charts, KPIs, and notably in this contexts heat maps based on the OS OpenSpace API.

Continue reading 'Bringing the power of Open Data to the citizen'»

Comments (0)

By Paul, 22, February, 2011 8:42 am

On 11 February, the GeoVation Challenge, ‘How Can We Improve Transport In Britain’ closed to new entries, with the deadline undoubtedly seeing many an entrant scurrying to finalise their submission. And with a share of £150,000 on offer (thanks largely to Ideas in Transit and Technology Strategy Board), there was every reason to take it seriously.

A total of 155 ideas have been submitted including ones from CycleStreets, MySociety and Mapumental. The ideas themselves range from the proposal to build powerful web mapping tools to empower cycling campaigners; to the notion of building a sat nav for train drivers.

Check out the full range of ideas for yourselves on the GeoVation site.

The Geovation transport challenge is now closed

Once again we’ve been delighted at the quality and scope of the ideas submitted and the level of passion in evidence from the entrants.

Continue reading 'Right, that’s it your time is up'»