Date: Wednesday 2nd December 2009, 10.15 am
Speakers: Nikki Rogers and Mike Jones, Institute of Learning and Research Technology (ILRT).
http://mobilecampus.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/
This year the ILRT won a six-month project funded by the JISC to prototype a smart-phone-accessible, online datasource offering students just-in-time, location-sensitive information as they move around the University campus. Nikki Rogers (project manager) and Mike Jones (lead developer) will present the live demo created by the project and explain how an iPhone user can, for example, quickly find out answers to questions such as “Where’s my nearest wireless hotspot?”, “How many PC’s are currently free in the Computer Centre?” and “How long is it until the next bus from my nearest bus-stop?”
Only a few UK universities have started initiatives like this already and this presentation will present the work on Mobile Campus Assistant in context, noting that the project's funding ends this month and there are no funds as yet to continue it as a service. We will discuss problems encountered in integrating some University data so far and suggest an approach taken by Oxford in creating a geo-location database for their University.
We warmly invite attendees to discuss key questions with us such as,
Speaker: Nick Skelton, Information Systems and Computing.
Mobile IT is in its infancy. Smartphone have reached the level of 1980s micros - exciting new models every month but few common standards or obvious market leaders. How can we effectively support mobile IT users? Can we provide people with what they want, without descending into a chaos of incompatible systems and competing demands?
Nick will talk about the Gartner managed diversity support model, or alternatively restaurants. Pick-and-mix dim sum is fun but unhealthy. We can't afford a la carte silver service. Can we agree on a set menu?
See the Futures Café blog.