Tag: ontario

Open Data and Municipal Election Results

As local readers will know, I created an election results dashboard for the municipal election that took place in Edmonton on October 18, made possible thanks to the City of Edmonton’s open data. I’d say it was very well-received! There was lots of positive feedback, and it resulted in the highest-trafficked day ever for ShareEdmonton. There were also hundreds of tweets about the dashboard, including some from people in other cities.

I was able to update the dashboard on-the-fly that night, fixing the graph colors and other issues as they were identified. Overall I was pretty happy with how it turned out, though I wish I had been able to add a few more features in time for the big event. Over the last couple days, I decided to extract the dashboard from ShareEdmonton and I have now added that new functionality. Specifically, the page updates automatically (no more refreshing) and there’s a mobile view as well, so it looks decent on your mobile device.

New Dashboards

Today is election day in Ontario, and thanks to open data from Toronto, Ottawa, and London, I was able to launch three new election results dashboards, all featuring the latest improvements:

Some new issues have appeared that I didn’t have to worry about in the Edmonton election (for example, there are 40 candidates for mayor in Toronto, so having them all appear on the graph is difficult at best) but the sites all seem to be running smoothly. I guess we’ll find out at 8 PM EST tonight when the results start to come in!

Open Data

All of these dashboards were made possible because the cities made election results data available, so kudos to each of them for doing so. The tricky thing for a developer like me is that all four cities (Edmonton, Toronto, Ottawa, and London) made the results available in a different format!

  • Edmonton – XML/JSON using OGDI
  • Toronto – plaintext, pipe-separated
  • Ottawa – plaintext, HTML scrape, kind of a pseudo-CSV
  • London – XML

Fortunately, when I had created the dashboard for Edmonton, I had built in a translation-layer. So instead of loading directly from the City’s catalogue into ShareEdmonton, I loaded it first into an internal format. So to get the dashboard working with the other cities, all I had to do was write that translation piece, from their catalogue to my internal format. As you can see, that strategy has worked fairly well (Ottawa was by far the most difficult, and did not provide me with enough information to calculate voter turnout, so that was removed from the ShareOttawa dashboard).

I’m not complaining about the need for this translation layer. I would much rather have a city make its data available than delay just to try to find a common format. But I do hope to see convergence over time. It would be great if these cities (and others that offer this data, like Vancouver) could agree on a common format. That would remove the extra work required to make an application reusable, and would hopefully result in even more applications that make use of the data.

And Beyond!

I’m pretty excited about the possibilities of open data, especially as it relates to politics and democracy. There are some really great apps being built, such as Vote.ca, and we’re really just scratching the surface. If we keep at it, I’m confident that open data will have a positive impact on the way we engage with politics.

Why the Facebook ban will be lifted within two years

Post ImageAccording to the Globe and Mail, government employees in Ontario have been banned from accessing Facebook. Kristen at Mashable points out that YouTube, online poker, and various other sites are also banned. And Mark Evans points to this story about TD Bank banning Facebook during business hours. There are undoubtedly many other major organizations that have banned access to Facebook and other social networking sites.

I think these bans are ridiculous. And Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty makes it easy to understand why:

“I think Facebook is predominantly a social network. It has its value, but we just don’t really see how it adds value to work that you do in the workplace.”

You sir, Mr. McGuinty, are an idiot.

When you don’t understand something, the correct course of action is to learn about it. Admit you don’t know something, and then find out what it is that you don’t know!

The idea that work exists only between the hours of 9 to 5, and only in your place of business, is dead. Welcome to the 21st century. Human behaviour has changed, and it’s time that the workplace caught up.

I am reminded of something Leonard Brody said yesterday (I am paraphrasing here):

People often say “oh email, instant messaging, there’s too much information, I can’t take it!” Well, you’re all liars. You thrive on more.

It’s true. Employees today can be incredibly productive, so long as their employers make it possible. Banning them from something like Facebook isn’t going to help. There are no doubt many people working for the Ontario government who are part of an older generation, one that isn’t trained to be connected all the time. Perhaps banning Facebook won’t affect them much.

The ban sets a dangerous precedent, however. The next generation of workers the government hires simply won’t stand for it. They are fundamentally different, wired to be connected 24/7. To them, Facebook is both entertainment and work. It’s a tool, not a time-waster. They’ll use it to connect with friends, and they’ll use it to connect with colleagues. Banning Facebook for these workers will definitely hinder their productivity.

Don’t be surprised to read about the Ontario government reversing this decision sometime in the next two years. I don’t think they’ll have any other choice.

Read: Mashable

Podcasters Across Borders

Post ImageThere are so many podcasting events taking place now, which is a good sign of the buzz level surrounding the technology. The latest one I have run across is called Podcasters Across Borders, taking place on June 23rd and 24th in Kingston, Ontario. There isn’t too much information on the event yet, so stay tuned to their blog if you’re interested in going. They also have a details page with a little more information.

I think we’ll start to see more and more targeted podcasting events appear. I have a feeling that there can only be so many “general purpose” podcasting events, and with the Portable Media Expo, Podcastercon, and other conferences like Gnomedex or Northern Voice, I’m willing to bet that we’re getting close to reaching the limit. So if you’re a conference organizer looking for a great topic related to podcasting, let me suggest one! I’d love to go to a conference about business podcasting. How are businesses using podcasting? How could they use it? That sort of thing.

In Toronto

We drove down to Toronto today after leaving Ottawa around 10 AM. We didn’t realize there was an extra drop charge on the car rental, but it still worked out to about the same or slightly cheaper than a flight. It didn’t take too long to get to the city, and the drive was actually pretty nice, but it took longer to find the place we were going! Thank goodness for MapPoint. We had a meeting with a colocation facility (Frontline) which went very well (they were nice enough to meet with us on Saturday). After the meeting, we called our good friend Ashish Patel!

Ashish was nice enough to take us on a tour of the IBM Toronto Software Lab where he works. I took a few pictures, but told him I wouldn’t post them (no need to find out if they have a blogging policy the hard way!). The place is pretty neat and is a world class IBM facility where WebSphere, Rational, Tivoli, Lotus and other software products are created (including the compiler for the upcoming PS3). It was very cool to see where Ashish works, and he has our Podbot picture proudly displayed at his desk!

After the tour we took Ashish for dinner (he chose Boston Pizza which was fine by me) and then we just hung out at his place for a while. Was kind of nice to relax for a couple of days here. We drove to the airport tonight and got a room at the Sheraton so that we don’t have to get up so early to leave tomorrow.

We considered extending our trip and going to New York, but decided maybe next time! We’ll be back in Edmonton tomorrow at 2:30 PM.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention, it rained almost all day, both in Ottawa when we left and in Toronto! Sure beats the snow though 😉