The fight to warn areas of the UK about flooding has stepped up a gear by the introduction of a new Facebook application from the Environment Agency.

Powered by the Bing Maps platform and developed by Microsoft partner Shoothill, FloodAlerts is built on official flood warning data. This allows the Bing map to show areas where flooding threatens to leave homes and businesses underwater.

Shoothill’s Managing Director, Rod Plummer, explained: “FloodAlerts is the world’s first graphical representation of flood warning data on Facebook which provides localised updates every 15 minutes, keeping users informed about the potential flood risks in their area on a Microsoft Bing Map.

A good example is this Bing Map showing the impact of April’s wet weather sweeping across England.

Because the wettest April on record has left the ground saturated, any further rainfall flowing straight into rivers in the near future could prove a potential risk.

David Rooke, Director of Flood and Coastal Risk Management at the Environment Agency said: “Being prepared is vital to help reduce the risk of flooding. With over five million people living or working in areas at risk from flooding across England and Wales, we are urging communities to use the new application, alongside the Environment Agency's existing Floodline telephone service and website updates, to keep one step ahead of future floods.”

Innovation awards

As a mark of how useful the new FloodAlerts application is, developers Shoothill have been shortlisted for a high profile national innovation award. High praise indeed, whether they win or not.

The Guardian and Virgin Media Business’s Innovation Nation awards reward the most innovative use of technology in the UK private and public sectors.

Rod Plummer, said: “We have already had a fantastic response from everyone who has seen FloodAlerts and being shortlisted for a high profile award such as this is something we’re very proud of. It’s recognition for all of the hard work our very talented team has put into what is a unique product.

“We hope to see it blaze a trail for the possibilities of taking large public data sets and putting them to practical uses that have the ability to improve everyone’s lives. Facebook is an excellent medium to put this technology in front of people in a way they already understand and has the power to reach half of the UK population who we know have accounts on the social network.”

To vote and to see the list of finalists, see the Innovation Nation web page. The winner will be announced at the end of May.

The future of flood warnings and alerts for UK citizens certainly looks bright. With ever more innovative ways of communicating this kind of important information, social media seems an excellent and exciting path on which further milestones will surely be passed.

Windows Azure, Windows 8, Devices and Open Source - The Microsoft Cloud Day on June 22^nd at the Vue Cinema in Fulham, London is a free conference for public sector developers where you can find out more about the latest innovations in Microsoft technology for the cloud and open source.

If you are building or considering building applications for the cloud, our one-day conference will provide invaluable insights and information on our latest innovations.

There are four tracks in the Microsoft Cloud Day agenda:

• Track 1:  Core platform services such as infrastructure, data, High Performance Computing and big data.
• Track 2:  Sessions on PHP, node.js, Java and Office 365 and SharePoint.
• Track 3:  Sessions on developing for Android, iOS, Windows Phone and Windows 8 backed by Windows Azure.
• Track 4: Sessions on Team Foundation Build, Agile, CI, MongoDB and Windows Azure.

Registration for the Microsoft Cloud Day on June 22nd, 11:30-18:30 is free for developers and IT professionals from the Public Sector.

You can find out more and register to attend the Microsoft Cloud Day here:

http://azureconference2012.eventbrite.com/

Registration code for Public Sector developers and IT professionals: CG150SAMSMQ

If you work in one of the many marvellous charities spread throughout the UK, you might be looking into ways of communicating effectively.

Great communication to the public is something so essential for charities but how is your communication within your organisation? Is there room for improvement?

It's surprising how many people would probably say 'yes' in answer to that question. Sometimes it's a case of the bigger the organisation, the bigger the internal communication problem.

Without trying to sound too much like a door-to-door salesman, Office 365 could be that essential (and inexpensive) ingredient that you might be looking for!

Microsoft and CTT are joining forces to host a helpful online 'live meeting' and demo to help inform charitable organisations about Office 365's benefits.

Best of all, you don't have to wait weeks for this to come around - it's this Thursday, 3rd May, at 2pm.

To register and to find out more, see here: http://office365livemeeting.eventbrite.co.uk/

Thanks!

posted by Howard

Day two of the Worldwide Government Solutions Forum got off to a fantastic start, despite attendees battling the horrific weather to arrive at the venue. The morning consensus was very excitable with a full day ahead of us and a fabulous gala dinner to look forward to in the evening.

Opening the talks, Beatrix De Munck Loyola, Deputy Mayor, Council Organisation, Quality and Society Information for Tres Cantos, Spain. Beatrix explained how the city of Tres Cantos created The Citizens Advice Service Online which ensures that the council attends to every citizen; they listen, answer and share and as result the council has generated a new loyalty with their citizens.

The morning included the theme of health innovation, with Svein Holen, Manager of the Department of Health and Social Welfare in Vaga Municipality speaking about how the department will be supporting the increasing number of elderly people with growing life expectancy by helping the elderly stay in their homes for longer.

Peter Hindmarsh, Professor of Paedritic Endocrinology, UCL and Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, later led an interesting talk on data driven health telling us how the NHS have developed a portal to support patients and families of diabetes. The portal has dropped Diabetes administration time by 25% and there is better management and access of information for diabetes.

Daniel Batts from Microsoft, hosting the cloud debate at the end of day two.


Matthew Briggs, Programme Director for Tell Us Once at the UK Department of Work and Pensions explained in his talk how they created the Tell us Once programme. The cross-government programme lets people tell central government and local authorities of births and deaths just once, rather than having to inform each public body that needs to know separately. It also helped cut processing time and costs for government.

The morning highlights included Stephen Hart, Head of IT services at States of Jersey who focused his talk on the partnership with c5alliance to develop a number of websites into one single web platform for Jersey citizens. Talieh Ashjari and Kirsten Brogaard from the County Administration Board of Vastra Gotaland Sweden Introduced us to ‘One Way’ a web portal that co-ordinates and simplifies the process for new arrivals in Sweden.

Other speakers included; Gordon McKenzie, Public Sector Director from Be Informed, Roy Fielding, CEO of Coactiva, Arnaud Atoch, Head of Economics Department IT, Organisation for Economic CO-operation and Development, Ester Camara, the CIO of the Municipality of Terrassa and Louise Tustian from Cherwell District Council.

After lunch, Kirsti Kierulf, Global Product Manager of Accenture Connected Government Platform passionately presented some interesting views to us. She spoke of how citizens do not understand nor accept the complexities of governments. She told us to use the cloud and a connected government platform, and how it is a cheap, readily-available and a shared intelligence platform which we should all start using now.

Following Kirsti’s invigorating talk Cigdem Aygun, Government Industry Solution Manager at Microsoft introduced us to the Government modernisation and transformation topic. Geoff Connell, Divisional Director ICT for the London Borough of Newham began the session speaking about reducing costs through digitalising the Borough and how they are currently on track to saving 25% in costs.

Nigel Ward of Newport City Homes and Darren Lloyd of Modality Systems then told us how their organisations live up to the initiative: ‘work is what you do, not where you should be’. They told how using Lync has created a new flexibility within their workplaces and they have noticed a massive difference to the employee’s work-life balance. The contact centre is more efficient, productive and effective, tapping into different expertise within the company to meet the customer’s needs more professionally and efficiently. 

The mid-afternoon session was rounded up by Makar German, Head of Perm Region Government Office and Denis Mironov, Head of Perm Krai Information and Development Agency, at the Government of Perm region, Russia. An interesting example of the decision making process when making the move to cloud was demonstrated.

The afternoon had an air of excitement with a cloud Q&A panel discussion moderated by Daniel Batts from Microsoft and with panellists Jon Creese - CIO at Hampshire County Council, Nigel Tyrell - Head of Environment at London Borough of Lewisham, Nigel Spencer - Head of Information Services at The Crown Estates and Adrian Scaife from the UK Ministry of Justice.

Jos Creese began the Q&A by suggesting that cloud is not a new technology and not really a new business model but what has changed is how we can interact with the public sector. A model that is particularly useful for small public services that would usually join larger organisations or outsource. Nigel Tyrell moved on to discuss how the Borough of Lewisham has developed the app ‘Love Lewisham’ in 2004 and now moved the app into the cloud so that it can be shared more easily. This shared data has contributed to a sense of identity for the Borough, especially with the Olympics. "We needed a platform to draw in public engagement and to make people part of something," Tyrell concluded.

During the Q&A Nigel Spencer informed us of how important cloud is for the Crown Estate for collecting, sharing and exchanging data with the public. This was then followed by Adrian Scaife who described the challenges facing the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) agency who do not have their own ICT function but instead share one with the Ministry of Justice. NOMS benefits from exploiting the opportunities that cloud offers to deliver services in a more effective and cost saving way.

The day’s talks, discussions and revelations left a lot to be discussed at the evening Gala Dinner. We would like to say thank you to all the partners, speakers, customers and Microsoft employees who made this event an interesting and successful two days! We shall look forward to seeing you all again next year!

The sixth year of the Worldwide Government Solutions Forum saw the turn of London, featuring speakers from 26 different countries. After sampling a few international cuisines we sat down to gain a range of views from around the world on how the Government and Public Sector can incorporate cloud computing to build towards better and smarter cities, focusing on the need for a very real and innovative change.

The day opened with a welcome from David Burrows, Managing Director, EMEA Government, Microsoft. David introduced the morning’s speakers, who included Scott Dodds, General Manager of Marketing and Operations, Microsoft UK, Niels Soelberg, Vice President Public Sector EMEA, Microsoft, Liam Maxwell, Deputy CIO at the Cabinet Office and Andrea Di Maio, Vice President at Gartner Research.

Scott’s welcome focused on the national plan to build a better Britain – a healthier, greener, working Britain. He talked about the Anywhere Working project which aims to help 500,000 people reduce travel and save money with a focus on helping deliver flexibility and efficiency through working. Scott also talked about Microsoft initiatives around education, apprenticeships and citizenship amongst other topics.

Neils Soelberg focused on making an impact for better government. He said that there are challenges facing government and reminded the delegates that we also represent our customers - the citizens. As citizens we are demanding towards our government, we all need to ensure we stay healthy for a long life and we are taxpayers – a refreshing message in this day and age.

Liam Maxwell Deputy CIO at the Cabinet Office talked about government as an enabler that will help people get the solution that works, to get the public service that works and works for them specifically. He said that our government needs to be digital by default to communicate with the citizens, that public services for the citizens need to offer engagement with the government online. He also said that young people don’t use public services online as they are simply not available in a relevant format. We face a threat, if we can’t provide services to people in the way they want them, then we can’t provide services at all.

Andrea Di Maio of Gartner Research focused his talk on an uncertain future. He talked about the increasing amount of information out there; personal information and also on public bodies and services. All this new information comes together to create new possibilities for government as well as challenges and uncertainties. Di Maio said that we need to take lessons from the past, both good and bad, and use these to move towards a better future for open government systems.

The afternoon kicked off with an introduction from Munir Ismet of HP and Eric Basha, Government Industry Managing Director at Microsoft, who in turn introduced the afternoon’s guest presenters. They were Paul Bevan, Secretary General of EUROCITIES, Susan Attard, Deputy Town Clerk at City of London, Kevin Lasitz of Infusion, Peter Kommers of the Municipality of Utrecht and Jan Cornelis den Ouden of Logica, Manel Sanroma, CIO of the City of Barcelona and Graca Fonseca, Deputy Mayor of the City of Lisbon.

Highlights of the afternoon included Jan Cornelis den Ouden of Logica giving a video demo of his work on developing applications that can control street lighting digitally. His demo sparked some delight from the crowd as a tablet controlled a street light in real time. His life’s work spent making a big light switch, he said.

Manel Sanroma of the City of Barcelona also brought the room to life with a talk that focused as much on Barcelona FC’s Lionel Messi as it did on technology. A lively presentation, Sanroma focused on the potential and the implications of mobile devices – which he called weapons of mass construction. And the acronym MESSI stood for Mobility, E-Administration, Smart city, Systems and Innovation which he explained in full throughout his talk.

All in all it was an enjoyable event which was discussed online through the Twitter hashtag #ukgsf2012.

Rounding the day off with a few laughs, it is clear that change is on the cards and a collaborative one across all countries. The first day was a huge success; however London’s hospitality left a lot to be desired with the London tube strikes and the inhospitable weather. We are looking forward to day two.

Please do also go and check out this blog post from our colleagues in the Worldwide Microsoft on Government Team, which will also recap some of the discussion from the event.

You can help your team to be more productive than ever before with Office 365. While getting users up and running on Office 365 is simple and straightforward, these resources below are available to help. Sign in to Office 365 at any time and double-check your custom deployment plan to make sure you have completed all the necessary steps.

1. Introduce Office 365 to your organisation

Download the welcome kit to find email templates and other materials to help to introduce Office 365 to your organisation.

Distribute the End User Quick Start Guide to help users to learn the basics of Microsoft^® Outlook^®, Microsoft^® Lync™ and Microsoft^® SharePoint^®.

Encourage users to take the tour of Office 365.

Microsoft^® Lync™ Online interoperates with select audio conferencing providers to enable users to easily join Lync meetings from any phone. Learn more about available qualified dial-in audio conferencing services and purchase options in the Office 365 Marketplace.

2. Get users prepared for Office 365

Make sure your users know their unique URL to access Office 365 at https://portal.microsoftonline.com.

Verify that all users have set up their desktops to connect to Office 365.

Introduce users to the Outlook Web App by sharing these tips.

Help users to learn how to work collaboratively with Team Sites by distributing this article.

Share these articles on how to use Lync Online.

The next step in the Office 365 deployment is to promote usage of your Office 365 services. You’ll receive more information in the upcoming message.

3. Deploy with a partner

An Office 365 Marketplace partner can support your transition to the cloud by helping you to assess your needs and to get you up and running. Find a partner today.

This weekend in Manchester, the Blue Light Camp unconference took place and was reported to have been very a unique and refreshing day. The emergency services event was the brain child of Sasha Taylor, Paul Coxon and David White and provided a fantastic networking opportunity for those interested in the use of social media and technology in Blue Light services. Here at the blog we followed the buzz online closely and thought a wrap up of some of the highlights would be useful. 

Highlights included the following sessions; the US police 'Thank a cop' praise system brought up the idea of using social media to reward effectual police officers and help correct those who need development. ‘Reading the Riots’ explored the spread of rumours during the riots and how emergency services can better use social media during a crisis. ‘Volunteer Force’ put forward the idea of setting up a volunteer force to assist Blue Light services online during emergencies. All of these highlights can still be seen on Twitter using the #blcamp and #bluelightcamp hashtags.

Discussions also included how social media can help the Blue Light Services communicate with the public; in particular The West Midlands Police looked into how the Police can use the iPhone app Bambusa to communicate with the public. You can also find Chief Inspector of Local Policing in Coventry, Kerry Blakeman who promotes and uses the app via this link: www.bambuser.com/channel/kerryblakeman

The event was live streamed and pics were uploaded to Flickr here.

Some blog posts reviewing the event have already been posted online: 

• Shirley Ayres  

• Jon Harvey

• RoryGeo

All in all, great discussions and insights, innovation-sharing and online buzz.

Were you there? Did you find it useful? If so, please share your thoughts with us here or on our Twitter feed.

We are thrilled to extend the invitation to you to attend our series of App Compat Sessions!

Microsoft have teamed up with Camwood, Citrix Systems and Quest Software, all application compatibility experts, to help show you the range of solutions available to help you overcome App Compat road blocks.

Join us to learn how browser compatibility issues occur, how to overcome them with Group Policy, virtualisation and simple application fixes and how to develop a successful migration plan.

Not only that, we’ll also cover some of the latest App Compat tools and techniques that apply to desktop, web and server compatibility issues.

Take your pick of the dates below and use the links to find out more and Register Now with our partners.

Who, Where & When?

Thurs 19^th April

Microsoft & Quest ChangeBASE

Reading Football Club (Madejski Stadium)

09:30 – 14:00 (+ stadium tour!)

Register Here

Thurs 3^rd May

Microsoft & Camwood

Cote St Paul’s, London

09:30 – 12:45

Register Here


On behalf of all the team at Microsoft, we hope to see you there!

It's less than a month to go now until the huge Worldwide Government Solutions Forum in London (24th-25th April). We thought we'd share the latest agenda with you - it's packed full fantastic speakers and chances to do some great networking. Just see for yourself below...
More soon - don't forget, you can register here!