CoCreCo

WhiteHouse.gov Releases More Drupal Code

cmcmahon — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 17:16:36 +0000

Grist to the mill for the Drupal brand:

WhiteHouse.gov Releases Second Set of Open Source Code

Friday morning at the Tech@State event at the State Department, the White House’s New Media Director Macon Phillips announced the White House’s second code release to the open source community that powers the Drupal content management system.

Last April, we released f our modules for the Drupal community, which focused on the scalability, communication, and accessibility of our site.

Today’s code release constitutes a few modules we developed for ourselves, as well as a recognition of our sponsoring the development of modules widely used in the Drupal community, which improve the administration of our site in a variety of ways: file management, content presentation, and URL shortening are just a few examples.

For the code originating from within the White House, we wanted to improve the functionality offered by a popular file manager, IMCE, so we developed a module called IMCE tools, which has three major functions:

First, IMCE Directory Manager provides an interface for specifying which directories a user can access via the IMCE module. It is useful when you have users which have the same user roles but need to be confined to directories which cannot be derived from user data.

Second, IMCE Search allows for searching for files in the IMCE interface which helps identify the location of uploaded files.

Third, IMCE File Path easily presents the url of a file, facilitating sharing it as a link.

We also recognize that there are really good projects already embedded in the Drupal community and reached out to help support their development. Several of these are used in the collaboration software suite, Open Atrium: Features, Spaces, Boxes, Context, StrongArm, and Admin. We also supported the development of an auto-tagging module, Calais, a bulk file uploading utility, IMCE SWFupload, as well as the module that powers our shortened wh.gov domain, shortURL.

Keynotopia – app development protoyping

cmcmahon — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 11:04:39 +0000

This is a very cool and helpful tool if you want to develop apps: http://keynotopia.com.

It allows you “design user interfaces and create interactive prototypes” in Keynote (Apple), PowerPoint (Windows) and Impress (OpenOffice). It is a very low-tech way of producing a high-value prototying design. It will save you hours in costly design time by being able to lay out your idea before approaching a development company.

The creator, Amir, is a cool guy to work with. I can tell you from my own experience, if you’ve any problems (I ordered the Keynote bundle instead of the Powerpoint bundle) he will take care of you right away.



KM Events & Conferences
cmcmahon — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 14:23:44 +0000
A sample of KM events & conferences around the globe:

Annual KMWorld Conference (http://www.kmworld.com/)
KM Middle East Conference (http://kmmiddleeast.com/)
KMIS Conference (www.kmis.ic3k.org)
European Conference on Knowledge Management – ECKM (http://www.academic-conferences.org/)
Knowledge Management Conference & Exhibtion (http://events.1105govinfo.com/)
International Conference on KM (ICKM) (http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/ickm)
APQC’s Annual KM Conference (http://www.apqc.org/)
i-KNOW International Conference on KM and Knowledge Technologies (http://i-know.tugraz.at/)
US Dept of Defence (http://www.digitalgovernment.com/Downloads/DoD-Knowledge-Management-Conference.shtml)
Army Operational Knowledge Management (AOKM) Conference (http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/BCKS/aokm2010/index.asp)


         


Teaching KM
cmcmahon — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 13:32:49 +0000
I’m starting my second semester teaching “Foundations of KM” in DIT School of Computing as part of the MSc in Computing (Knowledge Management). I took this class as part of my masters course three years ago.
The first semester was DT209, a full-time class. It went ok (I was given good notes), but was a bit rough around the edges.
This semester is DT217, a part-time, evening class. Lectures run from 18:30-21:30. This semester I will be focusing much more on putting KM into action. There will be added emphasis on case studies and gaming-out hypothetical KM strategies. Furthermore, there will be considerable focus put on the benefits of KM (“Show me the money!”). Less talk, more walk.
In an effort to share resources, links, and KM-related information I will posting more regularly to this blog again.

         


OSS Barcamp Dublin
cmcmahon — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 09:53:43 +0000
There’s an OSS Barcamp in DIT Kevin Street tomorrow focusing on the latest developments in the open source software world. Some very interesting topics being discussed.
Check it out:


         


Semantic Web: From Web 2.0 to Web 3.0
cmcmahon — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 01:16:18 +0000
FYI…

Semantic Web: From Web 2.0 to Web 3.0
7 Apr 2009
The Institute of International European Affairs present
Round table with Liam Ó Móráin, Digital Enterprise Research Institute.
Liam Ó Móráin, representing the Digital Enterprise Research Institute, will discuss the work of DERI on the semantic web and the transition from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0. Liam Ó Móráin develops DERI’s industry links and is working on semantic web startups.

The Semantic Web is the future generation of WWW technology that envisages information from diverse sources being easily combined and used in profoundly different and more powerful ways. This “Web 3.0″ will use additional information about concepts, terms and relationships, rendering what appears in websites easily understood – rather than simply displayed – by a new generation of Web applications. This capability will mark a major change in the Web environment for users, developers, and service providers. This round table meeting is an essential meeting for those interested in any aspect of the Web.
http://www.iiea.com/eventsxtest.php?event_id=431

         


Wiki Patterns
cmcmahon — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 22:25:39 +0000
I finally purchased Wiki Patterns by Stewart Mader.
It was recommended to me by Colin Mooney months ago but I never got around to picking it up. I’m looking forward to reading it. I’m hoping I’ll get even more out of now that I’m 6 months into a major client wiki development (plus several personal experiments).

I’ll update more as I get into the book. Meanwhile, here’s a video of Stewart in an action.


         


UNESCO language map
cmcmahon — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 01:36:33 +0000
This study and resulting map certainly increases the knowledge of the earth’s languages:
Safeguarding endangered languages

Interactive Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger ©UNESCO




         


Intervention logic
cmcmahon — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 11:56:25 +0000
I heard about “intervention logic the other day at a KM networking event.
The gist of it, as it was explained to me, was that by breaking things down to their constituent elements, you can then see why you are doing things and make clear choices on where you will intervene.
There’s very little info on it from what I can see. It seems particularly big in New Zealand. I’ll be on the look out for more info on this topic.

         


KM conveyor belt
cmcmahon — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 11:57:20 +0000
An organization’s knowledge and information is constantly changing, in a constant state of flow. The closest approximation to what I’m selling is a conveyor belt for knowledge. Once the conveyor belt is set up, I then train people how to get stuff on and off. It is assumed that people already have knowledge to put on the system. They need help organizing it and moving it around.



The conveyor belt system is varied, made up of rollers, magnets, rubber, etc. Each bit of the system does something different. They have different attributes, offer different benefits and designed for different things. They’re all intended to move things around – different things, in different ways.
To my mind, KM is the practice of moving knowledge and information around an organization. The aim is to make sure that it is available to people whenever then need it. The challenge is to anticipate what people will need and when (which is pretty much impossible). The solution is to have constantly updated/revised information and the appropriate  mechanisms to deliver it . Most commonly the mechanisms are computer based, but not always, e.g. debriefings, CoPs, sharing sessions, etc. The most important element are people. IT systems are nothing without the right inputs and usage.
It’s not about the conveyor belt. It’s not even about the packets that are moving around the belt. It’s about the people putting on and taking off the packets. Eveything else is just a mechanical process.