Month: July 2013

Week 112 – That’s Another Fine Soldering You’ve Got Me Into

29th July 2013
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"Week 112 – That’s Another Fine Soldering You’ve Got Me Into"

Each week we’ll endeavour to publish some details of the interesting things that members of DoES Liverpool have been up to over the past seven days. You can find out a bit more about them in our introductory post.

And remember, if you’re involved with DoES Liverpool at all, let us know what you get up to so we can include it here!

Things of Note

Coming Up in the Next Week

Tuesday 30 July, 6:30pm-9:00pm Geek Up
Wednesday 31 July, 5:00pm-8:00pm Friends of the Earth

Week 111 – Getting Out and About

22nd July 2013
"Week 111 – Getting Out and About"

Each week we’ll endeavour to publish some details of the interesting things that members of DoES Liverpool have been up to over the past seven days. You can find out a bit more about them in our introductory post.

And remember, if you’re involved with DoES Liverpool at all, let us know what you get up to so we can include it here!

Things of Note

Coming Up in the Next Week

Monday 22 July, 6:30pm-9:00pm Maker Night – Free Sugru to anyone who wants to try some out!

Week 110 – PARTY! and a Visit From the Lord Mayor

15th July 2013
"Week 110 – PARTY! and a Visit From the Lord Mayor"

Each week we’ll endeavour to publish some details of the interesting things that members of DoES Liverpool have been up to over the past seven days. You can find out a bit more about them in our introductory post.

And remember, if you’re involved with DoES Liverpool at all, let us know what you get up to so we can include it here!

Things of Note

Coming Up in the Next Week

Monday 15 July, 6:00pm-9:00pm Sewing Club
Wednesday 17 July, 6:30pm-8:00pm Friends of the Earth

My Experience of DoES Liverpool

12th July 2013
"My Experience of DoES Liverpool"

Over the past two weeks I have been doing work experience at DoES Liverpool. I choose to do it at DoES for the simple reason that I wanted to experience an abnormal working area. I quickly learnt that the working area wasn’t the normal 9-5 office. Sitting on the wardrobe opposite my recently assigned desk was a blue toy called Bubblino (http://bubblino.com/). After sitting wondering what it did for a few minutes an outburst of bubbles erupted from its mouth. Adrian later explained that he had made this appliance so it blew bubbles every time DoES Liverpool was mentioned on Twitter, leaving me with a taste of what was to come.

The first couple of days I was used as a guinea pig to try out their latest instructions on how to build an “arduino weather dial”(https://doesliverpool.com/groups/internet-of-things-making-for-kids-from-does-liverpool/). This was enjoyable and gave me a different angle on the services DoES offered. Their main service being hot-desking, giving people a desk for just £8.00 a day, as well as selling packs to school with instructions on how to build simple but clever electronic based products.

Next I had a go in their workshop. Being about as in practical as they get I found myself feeling like a ticking bomb ready to blow up and break any equipment near me. To my astonishment I didn’t break the expensive 3D printer or the even more expensive laser cutter(probably because it was already out of order). I got the hang of the cutter quickly thanks to the help of Patrick and completed that day by writing a set of instructions on how to use it for the DoES wiki page.

The rest of my time in DoES I was left to my own devices with the help and support of the highly qualified people surrounding me. I decided to split my remaining time in half. Half I spent learning HTML, CSS and “a bit” of Ruby (however, after just learning loops in Ruby I felt like my head was about to explode if I learnt any more). The other half of my time I spent marketing DoES. Which went from putting products onto Ebay to standing in the middle of Starbucks handing out leaflets.

I have learnt a lot in my last two weeks and feel that I have learnt a lot about adult life. I’ve met some remarkably intelligent people and also learnt that I am never going to work for anyone. I cant thank DoES enough and wish them every success.

Internet of Things Making for Kids

8th July 2013
"Internet of Things Making for Kids"

One of the great things about working and playing together at DoES is that every now and then one person’s idea, becomes a shared idea.  One of these led to a joint MCQN ltd, Imagication and Open Labs application to Nesta to take Internet of Things into schools.

Lily-mai, 11: in school we have never done anything like what we did in the workshop. It was very fun and I learnt a lot from it.

With Adrian developing the programming, Kirsty developing workshops and kit, and with support from Kev and Cefn we developed a weather station built using shrimping, and tested and refined our resources and instructions with over 300 children aged 7-16.  We had great fun teaching children first to build Persistence of Vision kit (That’s Eleanor in the picture below demonstrating hers) and then adding to it to build the weather station.

Luke, 11: Me and my best friend Joel had lots of fun, even though we had some trouble we got through in the end.

The Weather station scrapes data from BBC weather [update: we had considered scraping the BBC weather site, but found that the Met Office had an API – Adrian] talks to the Met Office’s Datapoint service and then does two things with it.  A small servo moves to show the temperature, popping out like an old fashioned clock in one version, or twisting the top of a lighthouse in another, and they both display LED’s which show the prevalent weather condition.  This is the first of many resources and add-ons that we’ll be posting as up resources, and we hope just the start of developing Internet of Things, ‘Things’ with children.  Three things:

  1. You can find the instructions here – do download them and have a go.  You can get the kits or parts from Cefn, or follow the links on his site to order your own.
  2.  We’re holding a session in September for teachers and group leaders- if you or anyone you know wants to come, let us know @imagicationuk
  3.  We’ll be running a @_futuremakers_ session with shrimps in September – beg, borrow or steal children if you don’t own some already and join us!

Persistence of Vision in action

 Thanks to Nesta, Nominet Trust and Mozilla for supporting us to develop these first of many resources!

Week 109 – Party (Announcements and) Games!

8th July 2013
"Week 109 – Party (Announcements and) Games!"

Each week we’ll endeavour to publish some details of the interesting things that members of DoES Liverpool have been up to over the past seven days. You can find out a bit more about them in our introductory post.

And remember, if you’re involved with DoES Liverpool at all, let us know what you get up to so we can include it here!

Things of Note

Coming Up in the Next Week

Monday 08 July, 6:00pm-8:00pm PyPool
Wednesday 10 July, 6:00pm-9:00pm “Maker Night” at DoES
Thursday 11 July, 7:00pm-8:00pm Lean Liverpool
Friday 12 July, 6:00pm-9:00pm DoES Liverpool 2nd Anniversary Celebration! P-A-R-T-Y!
Saturday 13 July, 10:00am-5:00pm Maker Day
Saturday 13 July, 11:00am-2:00pm “Future Makers” NOT AT DoES THIS MONTH! Kite-flying at Otterspool Prom

You are cordially invited to an EPIC celebration.

4th July 2013
"You are cordially invited to an EPIC celebration."
Champagne from our 1st Birthday party

Champagne from our 1st Birthday party

We can hardly believe that DoES has been running for two years now, but we are 2 and feeling All Grown Up!

Whether you’re a regular hotdesker, maker, run an event here, or are just getting to know us we’d love you to come to our Birthday Bash after work on:

Come and join us!   Let us know you’re coming by emailing  hello@doesliverpool.com, tweeting @doesliverpool  or by replying here so we’ll have enough food for you!

We’ll have mouth watering Thai food from our friends’ new start-up Malong-Lae Thai.  Chris and Mild Iveson have been living in Thailand for many years and have recently moved back to the UK, so the food promises to be authentic, fantastic and not to be missed.

Do bring something to drink, though we’ll have some beer to start you off, and we’ll all likely repair down to the pub afterwards.

As well as being a great opportunity to get to know people from different parts of our wide community, there will be various fun things to dive into, including a session for kids run by Future Makers.

Hope to see you there!
Bubblino, and everyone at DoES.

Week 108 – (Lots of) The Printed Word

1st July 2013
"Week 108 – (Lots of) The Printed Word"

Each week we’ll endeavour to publish some details of the interesting things that members of DoES Liverpool have been up to over the past seven days. You can find out a bit more about them in our introductory post.

And remember, if you’re involved with DoES Liverpool at all, let us know what you get up to so we can include it here!

Things of Note

Coming Up in the Next Week

Monday 01 July, 6:00pm-9:00pm Liverpool Sewing Club
Tuesday 02 July, 6:30pm-8:30pm Clojure Dojo at DoES Liverpool
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