Category: hack weekend

Saturday evening updates – Codethecity Health

Pre-pizza updates from the teams:

Team Text

Since lunchtime the team have grabbed more coffee, created a big list of tasks, and been working on pulling Aliss data into their project. Work still to be done on the SMS layer.

Also discussing interesting natural language processing element to improve ease of use for the app.

Watch team Team Text on Periscope.

POMOC

The team have created a script and video prototype in English with Polish translation underway. Web based version is in progress and likely to be complete early tomorrow.

Looking at options for animation of the video tomorrow.

Watch team Pomoc on Periscope.

Delta Test

Since lunch the group have wrangled some network issues which held up progress, but have completed initial database design, and are working on the data and reporting layers in parallel.

Watch Team Delta Test on Periscope.

Friends Tree

Since lunch the team have worked on a web prototype of the front end of the service. Lowering participation through better data access, easier navigation and quality curation.

Watch team Friends Tree on Periscope.

Floating my boat

Since lunch have eaten sweets and cola. Community layer is vital to many health issues – a service discovery app.

They have created a number of user personas to enable

Four sections to the envisaged service:

  • Folk that can help
  • Your community
  • Folk that can listen
  • Events and getting about

The data underpinning this has been worked on in Open Refine and Dataseed to create visualisations of data coverage.

Watch Float My Boat on Periscope.

Codethecity Health Saturday Updates

Lunchtime updates from the teams:

Team Text

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Everyone has the right to access to information to make them well. Many people do not have regular access to the internet, best indicated by the deprivation index.

This project is looking at how to bridge this gap over SMS – allowing individuals to send a text with a location and theme such as “Aberdeen Anxiety” and receive a response either asking further questions, or suggesting a course of action. No web links, just telephone numbers and addresses.

Currently looking at quality of results, data protection issues, tech layer, how to pull information, how to store information, how to access and discover the service.

POMOC

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Pomoc is “help” in Polish. Many people are blocked from accessing appropriate services effectively due to language barriers.

This team is looking at the best ways to overcome this. They have discovered that in many cases it is cultural, rather than linguistic differences that are the biggest challenge.

Examples include cold remedies being available from doctors in Poland, but easily available in high street pharmacy in the UK. Seeing a doctor can waste GP time, lead to frustrating first appointments, and discourage further access.

They are currently working on the communication challenge around these differences, rather than on translation of medical terminology.

Delta Test

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The team are addressing demand optimisation of GP requests into labs. The core problem is that many GPs do not have access to adequate information to select which tests to request – so request a full suite of tests.

Current system is very disjointed, excel based, and difficult to use. They’re working on an on-demand alternative to deliver easier access.

Friend Tree

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A Gumtree for friends. Social isolation is a significant problem. The team wants to tackle this with a theme of ‘finding volunteers and other ways to provide social contact’.

The research phase has discovered a number of apps delivering similar ideas. The team is keen to avoid recreating something that already exists. The next phase is to test existing options.

The Team (formerly known Torry Dolphin Watchers and now known as) Float My Boat – Signposting

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The key challenge here is how to enable people to identify options for health and wellbeing services and other related activities.

Have identified the potential for an app that can be aware of individuals, carers, cared for, and even provide profile management for care professionals.

Looking at novel interfaces to encourage usage. Also looking at challenges around the sourcing and validation of data.

Codethecity Health kicks off

We have a great turn out for the first morning of Codethecity Health this morning – despite the venue change and the sub zero temperatures in Aberdeen.

Following the initial idea capture using our barrier and opportunity cards, and a few warm us exercises we formed teams around initial ideas and problem areas.

More updates about each of the teams as the day progresses, and on #codethecity.

group

Chatbots and AI – #CTC8

Code the City #8, which will take place in on Sat 25th to Sunday 26th February 2017, will be an exploration of the world of chatbots and AI (or Artificial Intelligence), identifying problems to tackle and quickly prototyping solutions.

>>> Book a ticket on our  Eventbrite page 

What are chat bots?

A chatbot is a piece of software that interacts with a customer or user to directly answer their questions. It uses existing data or information coupled with artificial intelligence to respond in a human-like way, guiding the user to a solution.

There are many examples of live chat bots in this exciting, emerging field. A chatboat could give you travel directions, tell you when its next going to rain in your area, or help you contest parking tickets. It could book you a flight and hotel, or act as a free lawyer to help the homeless get housing . The HBO series Westworld has even launched a bot to help you interact with the (fictional) holiday park!

If you are new to this field and want to get started we suggest you read the Complete Beginners Guide to Chatbots (and some of the links at the end of this article).

Example Travel Bot
Example Travel Bot
Example Waste Bot
Example Waste Bot

How will the weekend run?

We’ll apply our usual  Code The City methodology:

  • Bring together a diverse range of people from various backgrounds, to form teams.
  • Identify problems that we’d like to apply chatbots to solve.
  • Identify approaches,  information and data, to guide how we develop the bots and train them
  • Mix academic thinking, and user need, with open source technology and open data to develop new services
  • Iterate quickly through approaches, testing ideas, failing quickly and refining our approaches.
  • Prototype and demonstrate solutions to an interested audience

Who should attend?

  • Service owners – and service providers
  • Academics and students in the field of chatbots and artificial intelligence
  • Coders
  • Data specialists
  • Front-end and UX designers
  • Bloggers and social media practitioners
  • Anyone with an interest in getting involved in creating bots even for fun!

What you will do?

You will create mixed teams to workshop chatbot solutions to real world issues.  Maybe these will building on the outputs of previous work we’ve done at CodeTheCity. Through rapid prototyping you will create new applications and have some fun in the process.

We’ll show you new techniques for service design, idea generation, prototyping, and rapid iterative application development – and you will show other participants some tricks and approaches, too. We’ll share knowledge and learning.

You might even get a Tshirt, and we can guarantee the best catering of any weekend workshop in the city!

To book a free ticket visit our Eventbrite page   But be quick, tickets will go swiftly!

All attendees will get a year’s free membership of the Open Data Institute.

You can find out more about the previous events on tumblr, on the eventifier, and on flickr.

If you have any questions please get in touch.

How can I support this event?

If you are interested in sponsoring this event please, or providing other support such as access to online tools or services, please  get in touch.

Useful Articles and Resources

>>> Book a ticket on our  Eventbrite page