Local News
May 01, 2005
Iain Galloway is pleased to attend and present at CEOS .
His talk is titled "Product development using uClinux"
CEOS - Atlantic Canada's Open Source Software Conference
May 12-13, 2005. Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia
January 25, 2005
December 09, 2004
For future reference:
Prince Edward Island: Progressive Tax Rebate Program
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November 24, 2004
minister said the government's not going to tell them how to get there, just that they need to put a plan in place.
Read the ministers press release here
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November 15, 2004
Today at the tech centere Rogers and the Province announced the folllowing investment.
- Rogers Wireless to enhance wireless coverage in PEI
- Company to invest in research and development fund to spur technology
developments on the Island. $500K + $500K matching from the Province. (* over a four year period)
It appears the fund is directed at such things as wireless gaming, and other services that can be provided via GSM cell phones.
Details from newswire follow....
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Rogers Wireless Announces Significant Investment in Prince Edward Island
- Rogers Wireless to enhance wireless coverage in PEI -
- Company to invest in research and development fund to spur technology
developments on the Island -
CHARLOTTETOWN, PEI, Nov. 15 /CNW/ - Rogers Wireless and the Province of
Prince Edward Island today announced that Rogers Wireless will enhance
wireless service on the Island, making it easier for residents, tourists and
business travelers to stay in touch with the people and information that
matter most to them wherever they travel. In addition, Rogers Wireless and
Ericsson Canada announced that the two companies would make a $500,000
contribution to the Province's Technology Development Fund, earmarked for
wireless research and development in PEI. This contribution was matched by the
Province of PEI.
"By enhancing our wireless coverage on Prince Edward Island, Rogers
Wireless will provide residents, as well as the more than one million business
travelers and tourists who visit the Island each year, with access to superior
wireless service and seamless access to the people and information that
matters most to them," said Jean Laporte, President, Eastern Region, Rogers
Wireless Inc. "As the number one wireless provider in Canada, Rogers Wireless
is committed to providing our more than 5.5 Million customers with choice,
value and convenient access to communications services, and we are delighted
to work with the Government of Prince Edward Island to meet that commitment
here."
The enhanced network coverage will be deployed by Ericsson Canada, Rogers
Wireless' primary network infrastructure supplier.
Rogers Wireless and Ericsson also announced that the two companies will
contribute $500,000 over the next four years to the Technology Centre
Development Fund for wireless research and development in PEI. This donation
will be matched by the Province of PEI.
"We welcome Rogers Wireless' investment in PEI and believe that our
agreement with Rogers Wireless will benefit both residents of PEI as well as
those who travel to our province," said the Honourable Pat Binns, Premier of
Prince Edward Island. "The expansion of Rogers Wireless' service across our
province will ensure greater availability of wireless service to the more than
138,000 Island residents, including the Police, Fire, Ambulance and other
Emergency Service Providers and the more than 1.2 million visitors to our
province each year.
"Further, we welcome Rogers Wireless' and Ericsson's commitment to this
investment fund designed to assist mobile game and SMS development companies
operating in Prince Edward Island. This fund would be used to support the
creation of innovative new mobile games and messaging systems delivered
through a mix of development grants, production loans and equity placements.
This fund will make Prince Edward Island highly competitive and would assist
our efforts to increase expansion and relocation of developers."
In addition to the expanded wireless service, Rogers Wireless will open
two stores: Rogers Plus and Rogers Video, by April 2005. Rogers Wireless
products and services are currently available on-line at www.rogers.com, 24
hours a day, 7 days a week.
For more details about the Atlantic Technology Centre, please visit:
http://www.atlantictechnologycentre.ca/main.html
About Rogers Wireless:
Rogers Wireless Communications Inc. (TSX: RCM; NYSE: RCN) operates
Canada's largest integrated wireless voice and data network, providing
advanced voice and wireless data solutions to customers from coast to coast on
its GSM/GPRS/EDGE network, the world standard for wireless communications
technology. The combination of Rogers Wireless and Microcell will have 5.5
million wireless customers and offices in Canadian cities across the country.
Rogers Wireless is approximately 89% owned by Rogers Communications Inc.
About Technology PEI:
Technology PEI is the Government of Prince Edward Island's lead agency in
the development, adoption and use of information technologies in business and
community in the province.
For further information: Sheri Landry, Rogers Wireless Inc., PH:
(902) 493-7111, sheri.landry@rci.rogers.com; Ann Thurlow, Department of
Development and Technology, PEI, PH: (902) 569-0571, aethurlow@gov.pe.ca;
Archived images on this organization are available through CNW E-Pix at
http://www.newswire.ca. Images are free to members of The Canadian Press.
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November 03, 2004
Attached a notice for the upcoming Dalhousie-IRAP embedded and real-time system technology seminar. It's on Nov. 18th from 9 - 3 and you must register in advance.
Seminar notice .pdf
Hello all, please find attached a notice for the upcoming Dalhousie-IRAP embedded and real-time system technology seminar. It's on Nov. 18th from 9 - 3 and you must register in advance.
'This workshop is a technical seminar designed for engineers and managers developing computer systems for military and aerospace, industrial control, telephony and data communication, embedded appliances, data converters, process control or image processing. Presentations will be in the morning followed by a luncheon, with networking and corporate exhibits in the afternoon.'
For more information please e-mail Jeanne Mutch at jemutch@dal.ca
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Cybersocial.ca
The Rising Star - MOST Workshop - Maritimes Open Source Technologies.
Hear NRC and our Friend Peter Burtt talk about Open Source Nov 10th in Moncton.
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November 01, 2004
Nov 10, 2004 - Nov 10, 2004
Join ITAP, special guests, the 2004 Award Nominees, and Host Chuck Arsenault for a glamorous evening of entertainment & networking at The Delta Prince Edward on November 10th for our 6th Annual Industry Gala Awards Dinner & Reception.
Read more on ITAP website
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October 09, 2004
Wednesday, October 13th, 2004 at 5:30 p.m
Greater Moncton CyberSocial
Wednesday, October 13th, 2004 at 5:30 p.m.
NOTE Location change:
Manhattan Bar & Grill, Westmorland St (across from the Moncton Market)
Join us before the CyberSocial for a technical seminar
Business uses of social software
TIME: 5:00 pm to 5:30 pm
We have the pleasure of welcoming Sébastien Paquet from the NRC IIT who will speak to us about the use of the social networking systems and weblogs.
Social networking systems and weblogs (also known as blogs) have recently emerged as innovative and very low-cost ways to communicate and connect that take full advantage of the capabilities of the Web. This short talk will explain what these tools are and why they are interesting, with a particular eye to how they can be useful for businesses, e.g. in new product development, client interaction, marketing, or advancing your business profile in the industry.
Sebastien Paquet has been doing research at the intersection of social software, knowledge sharing, and eLearning for the past several years. He has contributed several articles and talks on topics in these areas. His personal weblog, as well as the Many-to-Many group weblog on social software to which he contributes, are influential sources on innovation in web-based communication.
Sebastien received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Universite de Montreal and is a Research Officer for the National Research Council's Institute for Information Technology in Moncton.
************************************************************************************
CyberSocial Grand Moncton
Le mercredi 13 octobre 2004 à 17h30
Prière de noter le changement de l'emplacement du CyberSocial:
Manhattan Bar & Grill, rue Westmorland (en face du Marché)
*** Une session technique précédera le CyberSocial ***
L'utilisation de logiciels sociaux dans les entreprises
Heure: 17:00 à 17:30
Nous avons le plaisir d'accueillir Sébastien Paquet du CNRC qui fera une présentation sur l'utilisation des logiciels sociaux et weblogs.
Les systèmes d'échange social et les weblogs (aussi connus sous le nom de blogs) gagnent de la popularité de nos jours. Innovateurs et très peu couteux, ces systèmes de communications nous permettent de se connecter et de prendre avantage des capacités du Web. Cette courte session informative décrira ces outils et pourquoi ils sont si populaires; particulièrement comment ils peuvent bénéficier les entreprises. Par exemple, dans le développement de nouveaux produits, de l'interaction avec les clients, le marketing, ou encore pour avancer le profil de votre entreprise dans l'industrie.
Sébastien Paquet a fait de la recherche dans les domaines de logiciel social, partage de connaissances et e-learning pendant dernières années. Il a contribué a plusieurs articles et parle souvent sur le soujet. Son weblob personel, ainsi que les autres weblogs auxquels il contribue, sont des sources d'Innovation dans la communication sur le web.
Sébastien a reçu son Doctorat en sciences de l'informatique de l'Université de Montréal et il est un agent de recherche pour le Conseil National de Recherche à Moncton.
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October 08, 2004
Big thanks to everyone that attended the inaugural meeting of PLUG/OSS!
There were 21 people in attendance, in advance of the meeting I heard from an additional 7 people that would have like to have been there but couldn't make it.
This group represented a diverse range of individuals consisting of Developers, Network administrators, Programmers, Webdesigners, Engineers, Users, and Enthusiasts Representing Private industry, Holland college, UPEI, CBC, and Federal and Provincial Government.
One issue that wasn't resolved was a good name for the group that indicates it's inclusiveness, as Mac OS X, FreeBSD, Gentoo, Debian, Suse, Redahat, Fedora, and uClinux are all represented.
What was decided was...
What was decided was...
- That there was keen interest in on-going meetings
- Our next meeting would be at UPEI which had projector facilities.
- We would discuss things further online. via a mailing list.
(We'll work on that ASAP anyone volunteering to set it up?
For the moment we can use our corporate blog)
What needs to be determined is:
- Date for next meeting ? How about November 4th?
- People that are interested in presenting any topic to the group?
(The format is pretty open, and so you can have from 2 minutes to 20 minutes, as long as you let someone know in advance.)
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September 28, 2004
We've been talking about doing this for some time now... How about the inaugural meeting of - for lack of a better name - PLUG/OSS (PEI Linux Users Group). This name isn't entirely representative of what I'm thinking about, but at least people have some idea what a LUG is, and we could consider following a similar format.
The idea is to be inclusive of Linux, Open Source, BSD etc... and generally get to know each other and present technical topics to each other, simiar to the way MLUG operates.
I have reserved the back room at St. James Gate for Thursday Oct 7th after work at 5:30.
Any Takers, any thoughts or suggestions?
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September 25, 2004
Spread the news....
Blogger Meet Friday Oct 1, 12:00 noon, Formosa tea house.
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July 09, 2004
Local News: Open Source to improve the delivery of health care, help control costs, create local jobs and save as many as 100 lives in the first full year of operation.
Full text copied from:
http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040707.wbeli0707/BNStory/Technology/
By GEORGE BUTTERS
From Thursday's (july 8 2004, Globe and Mail
Fredericton — A former Central American cycling champion has a new challenge off the track — training to master the Canadian-made information system that's part of a sweeping reform of health care in the country of Belize.
“It's been very, very exciting,” says Ian Smith, his lanky frame leaning over the table in the crowded boardroom at Accesstec Inc., a 12-person software development firm in Fredericton. The manager of information systems for the Belize Health Ministry describes learning alongside developers working on a code for the health information system that goes live under his direction on July 14.
He's excited for good reason. The computerized system promises to improve the delivery of health care, help control costs, create local jobs and save as many as 100 lives in the first full year of operation.
“Half of those lives will be saved by the timeliness of the data transfer,” says Dr. Michael Graven, a neonatologist and international expert in bio-informatics who Belize hired to assist with the reforms.
A team of medical personnel, process improvement specialists and software developers spent months researching, analyzing and refining the country's existing, mostly manual procedures.
“There's almost no problem that can't be solved once people understand the components,” says Accesstec founder John Rutter who has been working on community development projects in Belize since 1999.
“If you don't know how to control the costs in the system, you put a cap on them,” adds his son Tristan, vice-president of business development. (Another son, Nick, is company president.) “The truth is that 80 per cent of your health dollar, and this is almost universal, is spent on people. So the real challenge here is to make evidence-based information available so you know where to point the people.”
The key to the Accesstec system is an electronic, cradle-to-grave individual health record supported by enabling legislation. As of next week, it will be available in all but the most remote parts of Belize, a country of about 250,000.
Because of the dated information systems in Belize, there wasn't the usual encumbrance of having to deal with legacy computer systems. “We had the chance to create this process from the beginning to the end,” says Norbert Horvath, Accesstec's director of software development.
The system is based on free open-source software such as Java, Tomcat, MySQL and Apache — a feature Accesstec believes helped the tiny East Coast firm beat goliaths such as California-based Oracle Corp. for the contract. The open-source path is being followed by more and more countries wary of being tied to hefty licensing fees for proprietary computer code.
Development was done in less than 90 days, thanks to a process known as automated testing. A test is written for each program component, and then the actual code is written to pass the test. Mr. Horvath said the move paid off, because the last 10 per cent of a typical software development project eats up 50 per cent of the costs as clients get heavily involved and repeated testing of modifications is required.
“Let's say you jump in and pull out a piece of functionality. All you do [with automated testing] is push a button and re-run the test suite,” he says. “You make a change, you push a button and you watch a green bar.”
The Accesstec software is designed to manage Belize's new national public health insurance plan, track pharmaceutical prescriptions and inventory, and provide virtually instant actuarial analysis of medical trends.
“If you have a rise in malaria for example at point A, point B and point C, you can triangulate that there's a swamp in the dead centre,” Mr. Horvath says. This allows authorities to begin local education and insect control programs immediately to minimize costly outbreaks.
Unlike the usual IT consulting contract, “the overwhelming majority of the functionality that matters is going to be in the client's hands,” Mr. Horvath adds.
Mr. Smith says this was a critical selling point: “If we have to rely heavily and constantly on the developers of this application, for a small country like Belize, it's going to run the government dry.”
Furtther reading ...
Accesstec
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