Members of House32 presented this last weekend at BarCamp Angkor in Siem Reap!
It was a lot of fun to meet old acquaintances and new friends.

Head Coder Heng Huy Eng presented about our ongoing project with East-West Management Institute, Open Development Cambodia.

Project Manager John Weeks assisted ‘SK’ from ‘Mekong ICT Camp‘ to encourage attendees to sign up – registration closes for this event at the end of  the month! John also presented on E-Books and electronic publishing during the camp’s final ‘Lightning Round’ on Sunday.

We also sent a ‘shout out’ to BarCamp Hong Kong, happening the very same day!

Want to join? There are more Barcamps to come! Check http://www.barcampcambodia.org for a comprehensive list of this year’s meetings.

Dear Friends,

It’s been a productive year for House32 Web Design!

Continuing our efforts on Southeast Asia’s first ‘Open Data’ web site (Open Development Cambodia), we aimed to set high standards for our work. Something seems to have worked; we had team members join the Open Knowledge Festival in Helsinki, Finland, and were written up in ‘Le Monde’.

In Cambodia the team presented at Barcamp Phnom Penh and BlogFest Asia. House32 is also a proud supporter of the monthly Phnom Penh Mapping Meetup, attracting a diverse crew of guests from varied fields.

In addition to mapping new terrain, there was a decidedly gastronomical bent to our web work this year as we shared our expertise with The Blue Pumpkin, Deco, and Java Café.

Wishing you the very best wrapping up this year, as well as a productive 2013!

Best regards
The House 32 Team

We are doing a marathon update session for www.OpenStreetMap.org.

Date: this Saturday, 26th May
Time: 8am Saturday – 1am Sunday
Location: House32 Web Design
#67E1, Street 178, Chey Chumneas, Daun Penh, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

This is because, on this map, Cambodia is in need of the following:

1. district and province boundaries,
2. protected areas,
3. revision of roads classification in Phnom Penh (too many primary and secondary roads),
4. deletion of duplicate roads southwest of Wat Phnom,
5. addition of roads to Sihanoukville,
6. adding of railway line to Sihanoukville and Poipet,
7. addition of building footprints to Phnom Penh, and
8. the OSM Cambodia wiki needs updating!

During this marathon we will also have two extra cool things happening:

1. a 1 hour OpenLayers tutorial to show how to create a webmap on your website with OpenStreetMap data!
2. a programmer will be in attendance updating the font used on OpenStreetMap so that it contains Khmer characters. Thereby, OpenStreetMap will finally display Khmer script correctly and so will many other open source projects that use the font!

Agenda:

1. Bulk uploading of:
   • sangkats (maybe)
   • khans
   • kats
   • national parks
     1. from Forestry Administration
     2. from Ministry of Environment
   • roads in Sihanoukville (see agenda item 5)
   • Railway lines to Sihanoukville and Poipet
2. Revision of road classification in Phnom Penh
   • reduce the number of secondary (orange) and primary (pink) roads
     1. where necessary: convert secondary roads to tertiary (up a level)
     2. where necessary: convert secondary roads to residential (down a level)
     3. where necessary: convert primary roads down to the appropriate level (for example St 182 should be changed down to a tertiary road)
   • use the roads classification of Qebec city, Sydney and Siem Reap for inspiration/guidance
3. openstreetmap.org/wiki/wikiproject_cambodia requires updating
   • update list of volunteers
   • use wiki project Australia and USA for inspiration regarding:
     1. subheadings
     2. other content
   • provide a paragraph discussing road classification problem in Phnom Penh
     1. link to OSM roads classification webpage
     2. provide actual roads of Phnom Penh/Cambodia as examples of classes (e.g. residential class is St 95)
4. Remove duplicate roads in Phnom Penh
   • in the are southwest of Wat Phnom
5. Add roads to Sihanoukville
   • by digitizing off a geotiff from Google Earth, or
   • bulk upload from a roads dataset
6. 1 hour OpenLayers tutorial to show people how to embed a webmap using OpenStreetMaps data
7. Upload or digitise building footprints in Phnom Penh
   (we could have some architecture students participate to do this)

In order to prepare well for the event, please read the following notes.

COMPUTERS
Whilst House32 have some computers for the event, if you have one, please bring it with you. You will also need to install a program called JOSM on your computer, used to edit Open Street Map. The program is available here: http://josm.openstreetmap.de/. Don’t worry about internet, House32 has wireless for you.

TIME COMMITMENT
17 hours is a long time. A marathon even. You do not have to come for the whole event. Just come for as much time as you have available. You can even come and go throughout the day. We will introduce people to Open Street Map at the start, showing how to edit it and, if needed, install an editing program called JOSM. If you come later though, don’t worry because we can still show you how to use it.

WHAT IF I DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT MAPS OR OPEN STREET MAP?
Don’t worry if you don’t know much about maps or Open Street Map. We have many simple tasks to complete. Once these are done, the map will look much better and you will have something to be proud of.

ខ្ញុំអាចនិយាយភាសារខ្មែរបានទេ?
បាទបាន,​ មនុស្សពាក់កណ្តាលដែលចូលរួមជាខ្មែរ! យើងចង់អោយអ្នកសរសេរភាសារនៅក្នុង Open Street Map.

TABLES
If anyone has a folding table/card table they can bring along, please do so as there may not be enough at House 32. If you want to bring a table though, please reply about this in case everyone decides to bring one!

FOOD, DRINK
Friends have kindly offered to pay for some food and drink during the event, although you’re welcome to bring some along as well.

Ken Grobe AKA ‘The Idea Czar’ doesn’t do things halfway. So when he decided to re-design his personal site he called on his world-class network of professionals – including some final code touches from House32’s team in Cambodia.

Outsourcing is a hot topic in media these days, so we speculated: was our Czar using the playbook favorite of many, the ‘Four Hour Work Week‘? (The cover of which prominently features an entrepreneur on a hammock.)

As it turns out, Ken actually hasn’t gotten around to reading the book! But he does look quite relaxed, in this photo from his San Francisco home office (below).

Looking for creative energy and innovation?
For the final word on copy, content and comedy, take a little time to check out the brand spanking new IdeaCzar.Me!

Java Gallery is a landmark on the cultural scene in Phnom Penh, providing contemporary art accompanied by delicious food.
For visitors and locals alike, it’s hard to miss! You can see their many efforts at JavaArts.org.

Now, in addition to fine art, House32 is proud to have completed a web site devoted to the tasty treats of Java Café’s kitchen and bakery: JavaCafeandGallery.com!
Enjoy!

Twitter: http://twitter.com/javacafegallery
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/javacafeandgallery

Note: Java Cafe and Gallery is a ChildSafe Certified Family Friendly venue. For more information, visit the site!

Ripple Effect is a dynamic consultancy firm that works to strengthen and magnify the efforts of non profits, businesses, and non governmental organisations in Cambodia. (Hence the term!)

Keep tabs on ‘The Ripple’ via Twitter or Facebook, they’re all over the place!
A little change, in the right place, can go a long way.