Flynny's Blog

UK UPA Careers Event - Thursday June 25th 2009

2009-06-24T08:25:00Z

Tomorrow night EMC Conchango will be exhibiting at the UK User Professionals' Association careers event.

Date: Thursday 25th June 2009
Time: 6.30 for 7pm.
Location: LBi, Truman Brewery, 146 Brick Lane, London, E1 6RU
The LBi Office is just north of the Truman Brewery overhead bridge - on the right just before the Vibe Bar (which is on your left)
Nearest tubes: Aldgate East, Liverpool Street, or Old Street

The event is for all those working in or otherwise interested in User Experience. It is an informal and relaxed event, offering the opportunity for you to network, seek talented practitioners, meet those soon to graduate or find a new role...there will be many opportunities to hear from different perspectives and get to know your peers.

The evening will feature several sponsors including EMC Conchango, LBi, Fortune Cookie, Flow, Bunnyfoot and Aquent – companies and agencies who will be displaying some of their work and will be there to tell you all about their approach and experiences and to answer any questions you have.

Introducing the Reverse Job Board

There will be a job board advertising people looking for a job. Simply take an A5 piece of card, state what skills and experience you can offer and what kind of job/ company you’re looking for. You don’t have to put your real name or contact details on there, just make sure to let us know your alias either before the event or after by emailing careers@ukupa.org.uk and let us know if you’re interested in being contacted by companies and/or recruitment consultants and we shall do the rest.

Remember to make it readable, memorable and that you tell us your alias so we can put you in touch with the right people afterwards. If you don’t have time to prepare a card before-hand, we’ll have some spare cards available to use on the day.

There will be a short introduction and discussion panel at 7pm. Drinks and snacks will be provided to keep you going so you can focus on socialising!

Hope to see you there.

Silverlight User Group #8

2009-06-16T09:12:00Z

We now have all the details confirmed for the next SLUG.

Date: Wednesday 22nd July 2009

Time: 6:30pm onwards

Venue: Microsoft's Cardinal Place

The agenda is:

Speaker: Ian Ellison-Taylor the General Manager of Client Platforms and Tools at Microsoft.

Ian will be covering the new features and insights into Silverlight and Expression v3 as well as providing you with the opportunity to ask questions.

There will be beer provided by EMC Consulting and pizza by Microsoft J

Please email EMCCUKSilverlight.UserGroup@emc.com if you would like to attend.

Also we are continuing to grow our community so please forward this onto anyone else who may be interested.

If you would like to see videos of the last SLUG with TrickyBusiness and Paolo Barone you can go to my blog.

Video from the Silverlight User Group - Tricky / Ben / Phil

2009-06-15T09:13:00Z

Big thanks to Ian Smith for recording the Silverlight User Group, here is the recording of the 1st session which was given by Tricky, Ben and Phil from TrickyBusiness. You can also see the 2nd session by Paolo Barone on a previous blog.

Silverlight UK User Group Meeting#7 Talk#1: Building a 'Top Trumps' Twitter Application for FOWA (Tr By Ian Smith
View in HD Download Version Visit Ian Smith's ExposureRoom Videos Page

Are you looking for a new permanent job?

2009-06-08T09:49:00Z

EMC Consulting and EMC Conchango are currently recruiting into Application Consulting, Business Consulting, Infrastructure Consulting and Interactive Media.

The roles in each team are:

EMC Conchango (Interactive Media)

Senior User Experience Architect
User Experience Architect
Information Architect
Senior Web Designer
Head of Search Engine Optimisation

Application Consulting

ATG Architect
ATG Developer
Microsoft BI Architect

Business Consulting

Oil & Gas Senior Business Consultant
Utilities Senior Business Consultant
Telco Senior Business Consultant
Telco Business Consultant
Investment Banking Business Analyst

Infrastructure Consulting

Practice Team Lead
Senior Practice Consultant
Practice Consultant
Technical Design Authority
Migration Expert

If you would like to see full job specs go to http://www.conchango.com/join-us/. For more information on the team or the career you could have with us please email me EMCCUKRecruitment@emc.com

You can also follow my twitter for more regular updates on vacancies we have to fill.

Maven 3 Talk at Java Web User Group

2009-06-08T09:07:00Z

EMC Consulting are hosting the next Java Web User Group on Tuesday 17th June in their London offices.

Jason van Zyl of Maven fame will be presenting on Maven 3.

If you would like to attend please register at Eventbrite and to subscribe to the User Group go to JAVAWUG.

You can also follow my twitter for up to date tweets on events we are hosting.

Open Space Coding Day #3 - follow up

2009-06-01T09:40:00Z

A big thanks to everyone who attended the Open Space Coding Day on Saturday and a special thanks to Alan Dean who organised the event, EMC Consulting who hosted it and Liam Westley who provided the breakfast.

The event was attended by 28 developers who are dedicated enough to self learning to come together on a beautiful sunny day to code in a collaborative environment - they were rewarded for their dedication with lunch in the sun by The Thames and a nice cold pint afterwards.

Some of the topics that they decided to cover on the day included: Boo, Git and Mass Transit.

If you would like to find out more about the event check out #openspacecode as there was plenty of tweeting going on during the event, and it seems in the pub after.

The next Open Space Coding Day is part of the Alt.Net UK Conference on 1st August 2009.

Silverlight User Group #7 - Paolo Barone Video

2009-06-01T08:53:00Z

Thanks to everyone who attended the Silverlight User Group last week. We had over 50 attendees, which was an impressive number since it clashed with the Champions League Final, and a number of new faces which is always great to see.

We were very lucky to have Ian Smith at the event who kindly recorded it all for us.

Here is the 2nd session from Microsoft's Paolo Barone on Silverlight 3 and Blend 3. The recording of Tricky, Ben & Phil's session will follow shortly, although you can see Phil's slides by clicking here.

If you would like to join the mailing list please email EMCCUKSilverlight.UserGroup@emc.com

Silverlight User Group Meeting#7 Talk#2: Silverlight 3 and Blend 3 (Paulo Barone) By Ian Smith
View in HD Download Version Visit Ian Smith's ExposureRoom Videos Page

AltNetConf UK London 2009

2009-05-26T12:45:00Z

EMC Consulting / EMC Conchango are pleased to be co-hosting the AltNetConf UK the 1st weekend of August 2009.

The event will be run over the entire weekend as follows:

Altnet Beers - Fri 31st July @ Tequila

Open Space Coding Day - Sat 1st August @ EMC Conchango

Alt.Net UK Conference - Sun 2nd August @ EMC Conchango

Due to demand the conference is now full but you can follow the tweets over the course of the weekend by following the attendees as listed on the sites above.

Java Web User Group (JAVAWUG) celebrates it's 5 year anniversary with EMC Conchango

2009-04-30T12:28:00Z

May 2009 sees the 5 year anniversary of the Java Web User Group and it's 48th meet up!! EMC Conchango have been given the honour of hosting the celebrations which will be an Open Mike Night.

Date: Weds 20th May

Time: 6:30pm - 8:15pm

Venue: EMC Conchango, SE1 9EU

Places: Limited to 40 so register quickly, click here

Details: The event is free! There will have a whip around of £10 so that pizza can be ordered and delivered. (Students pay only £5.) Please send your diet request (meat / no-meat, ham/no-ham, veggie) to the mailing list (javawug at Google Groups). The remainder of the money will go on beer at the pub for the after party.

What are the talks about?

Once again, as did in BOF 43 Open Mike, they are turning the event over to an "Open Mike" session. You can volunteer to talk about any related Java Virtual Machine technology for up to 15 mins, or general softare architecture and practice.

Slot 1

Time: 18:40-19:00
Author: Peter Pilgrim
Subject: JavaFX BBC Sound Emulator
URL: http://jroller.com/peter_pilgrim

Slot 2 - 5 To be confirmed

After Party

We will be definitely heading to the pub afterwards and we will find somewhere to eat as well, if required. Plenty of good eats are within walking distance!

London to Paris 2009 - 3rd time lucky

2009-04-21T09:12:00Z

Yes we are mad enough to do it again!!!

September the 4th will see us starting our third annual London to Paris bike ride to support Palestinian children. This year's event will be bigger than the last two years, as we are aiming for 50 riders (and there is talk of a tandem....). It should be a tremendous weekend, and we are praying for the same weather we've had the last two years (see photos from last year).

Who are we doing it for? The children of Gaza. The Israeli attacks on Gaza at the start of this year have left many of Gaza's children injured, maimed and traumatised. This followed on from nearly two years of blockade where very few essential supplies were allowed to reach them, which in turn has followed many decades of occupation and dispossession into a life in refugee camps. Their need for support and hope has been growing year on year, and the start of this year, which left more than 400 dead and thousands orphaned, homeless, maimed or traumatised has made this all the more urgent.

We will be raising money for a variety of play and educational projects in Gaza this year. Which ones we support will vary as time goes on depending on what the Israeli Defence Force allows through into the territory. We will post details of these as we get them approved.

If you'd like to participate, there are still a couple of places available, so please michelle.flynn@emc.com. .

If you'd like to sponsor us, then you can do it through our site on Bmycharity.

Open Space Coding Days

2009-04-09T13:01:00Z

The Open Space Coding Days organised by Alan Dean and hosted by EMC Conchango have been such a great success that the next one on May 30th 2009 already has a waiting list.

Alan is currently putting names down for the July event on 25th.

The concept of the day takes the self-organisation of Open Space Technology and applies it to hands-on learning.

The event is held at the EMC Conchango London Office and runs from 9:30am - 5pm.

If you would like to find out more check out twitter #openspacecode or some of the blogs from the people who were there: Rob, Jamie, Alan, Kareena, Alex and Emyr.

Not only is this an excellent opportunity for learning but also for meeting people within the community, and beer afterwards.....

Click here to register for July before the list is full.

Sorry about last night

2009-03-27T11:00:00Z

A big sorry to all those who were due to attend the Silverlight User Group that we had to cancel last night. You will be pleased to hear that Mark Mann is fine after falling down the stairs, but is still not able to walk properly (just in time for the weekend).

Ian Blackburn was due to present at the event so has been kind enough to post his presentation so everyone does not miss out, click here.

We are currently planning for the next SL UG to be a big one held at Microsoft Cardinal Place towards the end of May so if you are not registered on the mailing list then email silverlight.usergroup@conchango.com now.

Open Space Coding Day #2

2009-03-27T10:23:00Z

There are a few last minute places available for the Open Space Coding Day tomorrow. Click here for more info, would be great to see you there.

Asos works with EMC Consulting to create browser tool to track products

2009-03-25T12:18:00Z

The following article has been published in Retail Week:

Asos has developed an application to allow customers to track particular products on its site through their web browser, whatever website they are looking at.

The online retailer has used functionality within the latest version of Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) web browser, which Microsoft released on March 19.

Asos has worked with EMC Consulting to create the tool, which was launched to coincide with the release of the new browser.

Asos enterprise architect Simon Hamblin explained that customers who upgrade to IE8 will be able to subscribe to a "web slice" on its product pages. This function adds that product page to the customer's favourites bar in IE8 so they can keep track of it.

When new information becomes available on the page, for instance if the price of a product changes, the web slice becomes highlighted on the favourites bar. When consumers click on the web slice, it will then preview relevant information. Clicking on the preview takes the customer directly to the site.

Hamblin explained that the tool will allow customers to interact with Asos even when they are on other websites. He said that this was just one development the e-tailer is working on to allow its customers to shop in many different ways.

"The way that customers browse is not about them coming to the site and us pushing information on them," he said. "They want to know what's relevant to them without having to be on the site."

Hamblin said that Asos developed the application with EMC Consulting in about three weeks. Although IE8 has only just launched, it has been available as a beta version for around a year.

* Asos has revealed the name of its new online community, Asos Life. The interactive channel, which will be part of its main transactional site, is expected to go live in April.

The channel will allow customers to interact with members of the Asos team with blogs and give an insight into the behind the scenes running of the e-tail business.

Microsoft Surface UK Launch

2009-03-20T09:32:00Z

Wednesday 18th March 2009 saw the UK Launch of Microsoft Surface. The event was held in the Haymarket Hotel and journalists from the top publications were invited to attend.

EMC Consulting (previously Conchango) were also invited to bring their Surface device along to the event and demo some of the great work they have been doing.

Matt Bagwell, Mark Stone and myself headed to the West End to demo our Tesco Wine App, Tesco 7 and award winning Enterprise Search App.

Click here to see a video report from Reuters.

Click here to see what some of the press had to say Electric Pig, Computer Weekly, CIO, IT Pro, vnunet, MSDN, Silicon.

If you would like to find out more about how Surface can benefit your business then Matt Bagwell has written a whitepaper which is an excellent place to start. Click here.