Welcome to Open Data Manchester

Open Data Manchester has been leading the way in open data practice in Manchester since 2010. It was set up as an advocacy group to encourage and share open data practice between public bodies, business and citizens alike. It has been instrumental in the setting up of DataGM and various other open data initiatives in Greater Manchester and beyond. It is most well known for bringing together communities of practice to help disseminate and share knowledge, participate in policy making and support organisations using data. Now, having taken up residence at Federation in the centre of Manchester we are looking at building a centre for state of the art data practice by pulling in the knowledge and skills of the data community both in Greater Manchester and further afield. Get in touch and join us on our journey.

Techniques for learning and teaching data skills #2 Storytelling with Data

Thursday 14th March, 13.00 – 17.00
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF

In partnership with 360Giving

In this increasingly complex and digital age, knowing how to turn data into information is a powerful thing. Communicating complex numbers and crafting meaningful stories from them is a desirable skill that can help to move policies, create new partnerships and lead to positive change.

During this workshop, we will build compelling stories for grantmaking from datasets. We will start by focusing on the ‘who’ we are telling the story to and how to craft a narrative that is compelling to them.

We will also review best practices for using stories crafted from data to build a better understanding of our stakeholders and their needs. We will explore data – 360Giving’s, your own, or other data sources – and think about the story it tells us, drafting stories for our audiences.

This is a train the trainer session where we will teach how to facilitate this activity, but it’s open to everyone who wants to learn how to tell stories with data.

Register here

 

Mapping Your World – a beginner’s guide to using Open Street Map

Tuesday 26th February, 18.30-20.30
Tech Incubator
Oxford Road
Manchester M1 7ED.

OpenStreetMap is a free and editable map of the world, created and maintained by a huge international community. It’s used in numerous projects by local communities, governments, software developers and more, with nearly 5 million registered users and 1 million contributors from all over the world.

It includes data about roads, buildings, addresses, shops and businesses, points of interest, railways, trails, transit, land use and natural features, and much more.

We’ll explore the fundamentals of mapping with OpenStreetMap, some tools and apps, best practice, and some re-use by 3rd part projects.

Whether you’re completely new to OpenStreetMap, or whether you’ve used it before and wish to dive a bit deeper, then this is for you.

Register here

An Introduction to Open Street Map

Saturday 2nd February, 11.00 – 17.00
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF

Join us for a day’s introduction to Open Street Map, the free and editable map of the world, created and maintained by a huge international community.

This workshop will act as a ‘beginners guide’ to OSM, but with a slant towards looking at how we might map accessibility and mobility features, as informed by our Mapping Mobility Stockport project.

Whether you’re completely new to OSM and want to know more, you’ve used it before and wish to dive a bit deeper, or you’re an OSM pro but wish to explore accessibility and mobility features in more detail, then this is for you.

We’ll be joined by OSM pro Andy Mabbett, who will take us through the fundamentals of mapping with OpenStreetMap. We’ll explore some tools and apps, best practice, and how the map has been re-used by 3rd party projects. Some of the things that we will be covering include:

  • What is Open Street Map?
  • Policies and rule
  • OSM editing tools, including ID and JOSM
  • Basic OSM mapping concepts, tagging & accessibility-related tagging
  • Hands-on editing
  • Apps
  • Where to find help
  • Data imports, explorts and 3rd party re-use.

Register here

 

Things Manchester 2019 – We Are Open

Tuesday 21st January, 18.30 – 21.00
Tech Incubator
Oxford Road
Manchester M1 7ED.

The Things Network and LoRaWAN is the breakout technology in the IoT space. Increasingly adopted by industry, civic and commercial bodies – but still supporting experimental and small-scale usage – The Things Network has seen rapid evolution over the last few years.

Join us for our first meeting of 2019. After a few months away, we’ll have a recap introduction to LoRaWAN and TheThingsNetwork, with slots for show-and-tell and open discussions. Bring your plans for devices and deployments, questions, ideas or just plain old networking hats, and join the biggest – and original – Award-Winning open IoT community in the UK!

Started in 2015 the Things Network has become an global IoT phenomenon. Manchester was one of the first communities to develop outside Amsterdam and since September 2018 the Things Manchester network has been under the custodianship of Open Data Manchester CIC.

Open:Data:Night

Tuesday 29th January, 18.30 – 20.30
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF

Kicking off our 2019 programme of public events, Open:Data:Night is an open session for anyone with an idea, project or interest related to open data and data practice.

As in previous sessions, we’ll have a couple of speakers talking about the work they’re currently doing in open data in the Greater Manchester area, but we’ll also have a number of quick-fire slots available on the night.

If you want to present what you’re doing, find a collaborator, co-conspirator or get feedback on a project, come along.

If you’ve never been to an Open:Data:Night before, you can read a summary of the previous event here.

Find out what the Open Data Manchester community is doing, what it’s all about and the benefits!

Register here

Why we need better data on towns and rural communities

Tuesday 27th November, 18.30 – 20.30
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF

Register to attend.

“We need better data” is a constant in our work at Open Data Manchester. Nowhere is this more true than with geographical data. We have national and regional data, and relatively good data at the local authority level, but there is a gaping hole in the availability of data at the town level. We still haven’t decided what a town is! This is particularly important given that the last two decades have seen the dominance of cities and city-regions as engines of economic growth. If we are to construct better place-based policy, it makes sense to have much better place-based data.

Which is why we’re bringing together Ian Warren – Centre for Towns, Professor Cathy Parker – Institute of Place Management (MMU) and Tom Forth – Iamactivate and ODI Leeds to hear about why these issues are critically important for everyone and what we need to do about it. During this session we want to look at the state of publicly-available data on local transport, high street retail and arts & culture to understand why better data would equal better policy, and what we can do about it.

Register to attend.

So you think you know your country – revealing the hidden patterns in local democracy

For six weeks over the summer we had Pamilla Kang, a placement student the University of Manchester, work to update the data around political representation in local documentation.

She’s written a blog post about her experiences which can be found here.

The updated dataset can be found on our github here.

Linked Data in Digestible Form

Tuesday 30th October, 18.30 – 20.30
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF

Register here.

Join us at Federation as we invite Swirrl to present a whistle-stop tour of linked open data.

Open Data Manchester’s very own Jamie Whyte will be joined by Swirrl’s Julija Hansen and new Swirrler (and experienced open data enthusiast) Jen Williams.

They’ll discuss:

  • what linked data is
  • why it’s useful
  • where can you find it
  • some tools and recipes to help access it.

The evening will feature some practical sessions, so we recommend bringing along a laptop to work with.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Register here.

Image: Alex Warren bit.ly/2O6tAls

Joy Diversion 4

Saturday 20th October, 11.00 – 17.00
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF

Join us for our fourth Joy Diversion – and the final one of 2018!

As before, we’ll be starting with maps of Manchester and Salford from 150 years ago, proposing expeditions to uncharted territories or revisiting previously explored places, strange meanderings and any other diversions that people fancy.

Adventurers will be split into parties and encouraged to map, photograph, document and bring back their findings to share with everyone.

We’ve put together a summary of September’s Joy Diversion which you can view here.

Register to attend.

Things Manchester – Uploaded

Tuesday 11th September, 18.30 – 20.30
Federation House
Federation Street
Manchester M4 4BF.

Things Manchester has developed one of the largest ‘commons-based’ Internet of Things networks in the UK. It allows the connections of all sorts of digital devices and sensors.

From the beginning of August Open Data Manchester has taken on the running and maintenance of Things Manchester’s constellation of roof and tower mounted gateways covering Manchester, Salford, Trafford, Stockport and Bury.

Join us to see what people are doing with the network, how you can get involved and become part of this great public initiative.

Things Manchester is part of the global Things Network started in Amsterdam in 2015 and one of the first cities to get connected.

Register to attend.