Author: Lin Nah

Maker Faire Wellington – Wellington – 4 November 2018

What

Maker Faire is a gathering of fascinating, curious people who enjoy learning and who love sharing what they can do. From engineers to artists to scientists to crafters, Maker Faire is a venue for these “makers” to show hobbies, experiments, projects.

We call it the Greatest Show (& Tell) on Earth – a family-friendly showcase of invention, creativity, and resourcefulness.

Maker Faire Wellington is brought to you by Capital E, New Zealand’s leading centre of creativity for children and young people. For 21 years we have provided creative experiences to the youngest citizens of Wellington that include theatre, digital technology, and immersive, never-seen-before installations and events that spark and encourage creative thinking and expression. To bring these experiences to life, our creative team work with talented Makers from Wellington and beyond, constructing wild creations that invite children to explore their imaginations.

The inaugural Wellington Maker Faire is a celebration and showcase of the innovative, do-it-yourself work of the Maker community. This fun, family-friendly event is for Makers both young and young at heart, whether you’re a hobbyist, inventor, creator, tech-enthusiast, educator, performer, or crafter, you’ll enjoy experiencing the variety of maker-achievements on display at Wellington Maker Faire.

Who are Makers?

A Maker is anyone who creates, invents, tinkers, or constructs with anything, code, technology, or traditional craft materials, in labs, garages, or home kitchens. Makers are everywhere!

Maker Faire originated in 2006 in the San Francisco Bay Area as a project of the editors of Make: magazine.  It has since grown into a significant worldwide network of both flagship and independently-produced events.  Read more on Maker Faire history, the Maker Movement, as well as how to start a Maker Faire or a School Maker Faire where you live.

When and Where

4 November 2018
10am-4pm

Shed 6, TSB Bank Arena, Wellington

How Much

$9 per person.
Child (under 16 years) free.
Tickets/Register here.

More

Maker Faire Wellington – Website, Capital E page, Facebook and twitter @MakerFaireWgtn.

IoT Waikato Tech meetup – Hamilton – 23 October 2018

What

The IoT Waikato Tech meetup is a group for innovators, thought leaders and organisations interested in developing the Internet of Things (IoT) and digital technology in the Waikato.

An opportunity to get together, share, collaborate, contribute and co-create, or just come along and find out what is happening with the IoT and other digital technology and what it means or could mean for the Waikato.

The October Meetup will include the AgritechNZ Roadshow with the evening commencing with nibbles and networking from 5pm whilst attendees browse exhibitor stands before formalities kick off at 5.45pm.

If you are interested in exhibiting please get in touch.

Speakers for the evening include –

BlockBit Technology Solutions

BlockBit focuses on solving the problems that undermine trust in today’s business transactions through connected, secure, trusted, traceable emerging technology solutions.

They service a number of industries including Agritech.

For more information visit https://blockbitsolutions.com/

Pepper Creative

By combining business analysis, technology and creativity Pepper delivers innovative solutions that move you from the now and into the future.

In the Agritech space, and other sectors, Pepper is using Virtual and Augmented Reality solutions for advanced scenario-based industry training and real-time maintenance solutions

For more information visit https://www.peppercreative.co.nz/

Agritech NZ

Launched in 2018, Agritech New Zealand connects innovators, investors, regulators, researchers and interested public and promotes opportunities and challenges raised by agritech.

We will hear about –

  • New Zealand becoming the first ‘Country Partner’ of Farm2050, the global collective of major venture capital firms and international agribusinesses seeking investment into, and partnerships with, disruptive New Zealand agritech businesses.
  • New Zealand signing a major strategic partnership with Western Growers, the largest network of fresh produce farmers & growers in North America. Can you leverage this unique market opportunity for your tech?
  • Participating in evokeAG, the Trans-Tasman agritech conference, taking place in Melbourne, 19-20 February 2019. Are you ready to export to the Australian market?
  • Connecting with major NZ Tech Alliance members including the IoT Alliance, the AI Forum, BioTechNZ, and FintechNZ
  • The opportunity to join working groups and workshops designed to focus on some of the major issues affecting the country’s primary sector and technology’s role in addressing them.
  • Meeting and engaging with other key stakeholders in New Zealand’s emerging agritech space

For more information visit https://agritechnz.org.nz/

Callaghan Innovation

As New Zealand’s innovation agency, Callaghan Innovation activates innovation and helps businesses grow faster for a better New Zealand.

Hear how you can engage with Callaghan Innovation to support your research & development capability.

For more information visit https://www.callaghaninnovation.govt.nz/

To stay in the loop regarding future Meetups and for more information on Meetups we have held to date join IoT Waikato at www.meetup.com/iotwaikato

IoT Waikato is a Wintec initiative and is supported by Design Factory NZ, Waikato Innovation Park, Pepper Creative and CultivateIT.

When and Where

23 October 2018
5:00 PM – 8:00 PM

The Atrium – Wintec (Wintec House),
Tristram Street, Hamilton,

How Much

Free. Register here.

More

Event on Eventbrite or Meetup.

 

Tech Month Workshops at Selwyn District Libraries – Canterbury – October 2018

What

TECH MONTH

Introduction to 3D Modelling for Games 2 hour / Free

This workshop will cover the basics of 3D modelling for absolute beginners, and is directed toward people who are interested in 3D art and don’t know where to start, or beginners that have a little experience, but want to learn more.

Recommended for adults and young people aged 16 years and over. All sessions are from 1-3pm.

Lincoln: Saturday 20 October https://li-3d-modelling.eventbrite.co.nz

Darfield: Saturday 27 October https://da-3d-modeling.eventbrite.co.nz

Presented by Taylor Mudgway, 3D Modeller and Game Artist

Introduction to Concept Art for Video Games 1 hour / Free

In this session, Daniel will outline his journey into Concept Art and will show you how to get started on your own path.

You will be able to have a go at creating a 2D character in this workshop. Equipment supplied.

Recommended for adults and young people aged 16 years and over. All sessions are from 11am-12pm.

Rolleston: Saturday 20 October https://ro-intro-concept-art.eventbrite.co.nz

Leeston: Saturday 27 October https://le-intro-concept-art.eventbrite.co.nz

Presented by Daniel Denova, Digital Concept and Character Artist

The Concept Art – Business & Career sessions will delve deeper into the industry of Digital art, and will be $15 per person.

The Online Safety Roadshow  1 hour / Free

This combination talk and workshop will cover the basics of everyday online safety, and is suitable for all ages and stages.

You are invited to bring your questions and your laptop for the hands on part of the workshop.

Recommended for adults and young people aged 16 years and over. All sessions are from 2-3pm.

Saturday 27 October – Lincoln Library – 2-3pm https://li-geecom.eventbrite.co.nz

Presented by Peter Gee from Geecom – Prebbleton I.T.

How Much

Free. Please book on the eventbrite event to ensure your seat.

More

Tech Month Workshops at Selwyn District Libraries.

Flipping the fleet: accelerating electric vehicle uptake using citizen science – Tauranga – 15 October 2018

What

Cafe Scientifique Tauranga is pleased to present Flip the Fleet which is a “citizen science” coalition of EV owners that submit data to a communal database each month to measure the constraints and benefits of electric vehicles in New Zealand conditions (www.flipthefleet.org). This talk first highlights opportunities for EVs to revolutionise our transport and economy. It then examines the strengths and weaknesses of citizen science as a research, education and advocacy tool to encourage sustainability transitions and innovation.

Prof. Henrik Moller is an ecologist who has transitioned to transdisciplinary research, often involving community-led sustainability themes. With Dima Ivanov, a business benchmarking and IT specialist, Henrik co-founded Flip the Fleet in July 2016. It now has over 800 participants (electric vehicle owners) from throughout New Zealand. Dr Monica Peters, a citizen science motivator joined the Flip the Fleet team this year to guide the public outreach and social networking component of the project.

There will be EVs available for test drives at the Yacht Club venue from 6 pm – 7pm and the presentation starts at 7pm.

A chance to drive a variety of EVs and talk to their owners then stay on for the talk.

When and Where

15 October 2018
6:00 PM – 9:00 PM NZDT

Tauranga Yacht & Power Boat Club Inc
90 Keith Allen Drive, Tauranga

How Much

$5 door fee to cover venue and AV costs.
Register on Eventbrite so that we know the number attending.
DO NOT PRINT YOUR TICKET – we only need to know numbers.

More

Café Scientifique Tauranga – Facebook.

Café Scientifique.

Industry 4.0 – The 4th Industrial Revolution. What is it all about? – Auckland – 11 October 2018

What

Industry 4.0 – The 4th Industrial Revolution. What is it all about?

The first industrial revolution stemmed from mechanisation through the use of water and steam power. The second revolution occurred when electricity was harnessed to power mass production and assembly lines. In recent decades, the third revolution occurred with computerisation and automation in production facilities. Now the fourth revolution is occurring with the advent of smart factories and the use of cyber-physical systems.

Come and hear about the combination of all the Industry 4.0 technologies: cyber-physical systems – physical assets connected to digital twins – the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), data analytics, additive manufacturing and artificial intelligence are employed to convert manufacturing to “the factory of the future”.

When and Where

11 October 2018
5.30PM – 8.30PM

Beca
21 Pitt St, Auckland

How Much

Free. Register here.

More

Industry 4.0 is an event organised by Engineering NZ.

DevFest Auckland 2018 – Auckland – 9 November 2018

What

GDG Auckland‘s GDG DevFest Auckland 2018 is a community run event where developers come together to exchange ideas and amazing things can happen!

DevFest events cover multiple Google product areas such as Android, Firebase, Google Cloud Platform, Google Assistant, Flutter, machine learning with TensorFlow, and Mobile Web.

At least 11 speakers who Googlers, Google Developer Experts and more. Schedule indicates there’s 15 sessopms acrpss 2 tracks.

Keynote by Andrew Kelly, Engineering Lead – Google Technologies, Bilue, an agency based in Sydney. Andrew is a Google Developer Expert for Android and has been working with Android for the past 6 years. He has worked on Android apps for ABC Triple j and Stan while at Bilue, and apps for Commonwealth Bank, eBay, BIG W and the Sydney Opera House during his time as a freelance Android developer.

Buying a ticket means you choose to respect our Code of Conduct. Please check it out at https://akldevfest.gdg.nz/cod.

Organised by Auckland’s Google Developer Group, GDG Auckland.

When and Where

9 November 2018
9:00am-5:00pm. Schedule.

Auckland Conference Centre,
12 Nicholls Lane, Parnell, Auckland,

How Much

$50.  Buy a ticket.
Buying a ticket means you choose to respect our Code of Conduct. Please check it out at https://akldevfest.gdg.nz/cod.

More

DevFest Auckland 2018, is organised by Auckland’s Google Developer Group, GDG Auckland. (Twitter @GDGAuckland)

Edit for Equity – Wellington – 9, 11, 13 and 14 October 2018

What

Wikipedia’s gender trouble is well-documented. In a 2011 survey, the Wikimedia Foundation found that less than 10% of contributors were women*. While the reasons for the gender gap are up for debate, the practical effect of this disparity is not: content is skewed by the lack of representation from women and non-binary people.

Let’s change that.

To coincide with this year’s Suffrage 125 celebrations, we invite you to Edit for Equity, a series of Wikipedia edit-a-thons to increase the online presence of women and non-binary New Zealanders. People of all gender identities and expressions are welcome to participate.

Each event is themed around a different topic, and you are welcome to attend as many as you like. Each edit-a-thon will start with an introduction from an experienced Wikipedia editor, followed by editing time where you’ll be supported in the editing equivalent of a pick-your-own adventure.

Four Edit for Equity edit-a-thons will take place during October, each with a different focus:

STEM (science, technology, engineering, maths): Tuesday 9 October
(this event will also be celebrating Ada Lovelace Day, an international celebration of the achievements of women in STEM).

Film, TV & Movies: Thursday 11 October

Art & Literature: Saturday 13 October

Politics & Social Change: Sunday 14 October

Beginners are welcome. People of all gender identities and expressions are welcome to participate.

Accessibility: all venues have sliding/open door front entrances with a flat entrance or ramp. There is elevator access where venues aren’t on the ground floor (InternetNZ and Ngā Taonga). There are accessible bathrooms at all venues.

The Edit-a-thons will be following “friendly space” guidelines; check them out. Harassment and disruption won’t be tolerated, online or offline.

Bring you laptop and power cord if you have access to one — we will also have some availiable to use. Note that iPads aren’t quite as easy to edit on. Snacks and drinks will be provided to keep you energised and caffeinated.

For preparation and more information please read eventbrite event as well as the the relevant wikipedia meetup for each edit-a-thon. Wikipedia meetup for STEM; Film, TV & Movies; Art & Literature; and, Politics & Social Change.

#EditForEquity hashtag

When and Where

Four Edit for Equity edit-a-thons will take place during October, each with a different focus:

STEM (science, technology, engineering, maths): Tuesday 9 October
Tuesday 9 October 2018, 5:00pm – 9:00pm
Sustainability Trust, 2 Forresters Lane, Wellington

Film, TV & Movies: Thursday 11 October
5:00pm – 9:00pm
Ngā Taonga Sound and Vision, 84 Taranaki Street, Wellington

Art & Literature: Saturday 13 October
12:00pm – 4:00pm
Adam Art Gallery, Gate 3 Victoria University, Kelburn Parade, Wellington

Politics & Social Change: Sunday 14 October
10:00am – 3:00pm
InternetNZ, Level 11, 80 Boulcott Street, Wellington

How Much

Free and open to all. Register here on Eventbrite for any or all of them..

More

Eventbrite event.

Wikipedia meetup for STEM; Film, TV & Movies; Art & Literature; and, Politics & Social Change.

Edit for Equity

Suffrage 125 celerations

AI: the future is here – adapt and embrace or move aside – Wellington – 11 October 2018

What

AI: the future is here – adapt and embrace or move aside

Panel discussion about the implications of artificial intelligence for New Zealand organisations.

Panel member bios

Will Browne has been developing artificial intelligence algorithms to learn through their experiences for 24 years in the UK and New Zealand. This includes disembodied tasks, such as data mining, and embodied systems, such as robot navigation. His passion is developing artificial cognitive systems that perceive, represent, reason, learn and act in their problem domain. How these agents can learn from small problems and apply their learnt knowledge to larger-scale and related problems is particularly fascinating. He has presented invited talks on advanced machine learning in MIT, Boston and Microsoft Research, Seattle as well as on machine consciousness in Nokia, Europe. Will is a co-leader of a national science challenge developing intelligent robots for the workplace.
***
Neil Dodgson was, for twenty years, head of the Graphics & Interaction Research Group at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory. In 2016, he returned to New Zealand to be Programme Director of Victoria’s Computer Graphics Programme and to bring skills that complemented the already strong computer graphics research group in Victoria’s School of Engineering & Computer Science. He chairs Victoria’s pan-university Digital Futures research theme, which considers how technology will affect society in all its aspects.
***
Akash Jattan has more than 10 years’ experience in leadership, technology and portfolio management in Cloud and Big Data. Taking multiple products from conception to delivery with five products currently in market. He built Australia’s first security focused ‘Big Data Platform as a Service’ product in Telstra. In Qrious as Head of Products/platforms, he successfully implemented the ingestion of 3BN events per day from Sparks mobile networks into a big data stack to service people movement insights and launched a Hadoop-as-a-service product to market. Currently works for Revera helping leverage Big Data technology and helping customers understand and adopt big data solutions in the cloud. He is passionate about technology and product management by delivery value through data.
***
Torrance Mayberry is an Information Technology, science and data engineering professional with more than 20 years of experience. He has developed enterprise software for Business Analytics, Data Warehousing, and Enterprise Resource Planning for PeopleSoft and Informatica Corporation in Silicon Valley. He has developed software with firms like Dynamic Research Corporation, Metis Associates and Annie E Casey Foundation. He has run business intelligence and data warehouse units at InterContinental Hotels Group, General Electric, Westpac Bank New Zealand Limited, and led the data engineering and data scientist pursuits at start-up Antuit, a Goldman Sachs portfolio company. More recently, he has been Data and AI Cloud Solution Architect at Microsoft innovating and driving solutions with partners to generate repeatable customer value and profitability.
***

Moderator bio:

Abinesh is currently the Client Strategy Director at leading technology talent recruitment firm Potentia Limited, following a successful stint as the Commercial Manager at Health Benefits Limited where he was the Lead Negotiator for the National Infrastructure Platform Programme. This strategic initiative drew upon Abinesh’s significant knowledge, experience and network across the technology domain and the health sector gained through over seven years of senior leadership tenure at healthAlliance (a shared services organisation serving the four northern region District Health Boards’s and one of the largest ICT operations in the country).

When and Where

Rutherford House
23 Lambton Quay, Wellington

Schedule:

5:30 – 6:00 networking, drinks and nibbles
6:00 – 7:00 panel
7:00 – 7:30 networking, drinks and nibbles

How Much

Free

More

Meetup event.

IT Conversations Meetup.

Sponsors: Potentia Limited (http://potentia.co.nz) and Victoria Business School (https://www.victoria.ac.nz/vbs)

Infrastructure at an Emerging Company – Auckland – 8 October 2018

What

Our presenter is Thomas Yang – Software Developer at AskNicely, and a bit of a server wrangler at work and for play.

He will share with us “Infrastructure at an Emerging Company”: A talk about how we have our Infrastructure set up at AskNicely, and the lessons and experiences from the perspective of someone new to DevOps.

** Please note the new venue and this meetup runs on the later schedule **

Doors will open at 17:30, and the presentation will run from 18:00 to 19:00, and we’ll leave at 19:30.

Catalyst IT have kindly offered us the use of their training space in the heart of downtown. Come to 2 Commerce Street, and someone will help you unlock the door and come up the lift.

Please observe our code of conduct (https://www.meetup.com/DevOps-Auckland/pages/Code_of_Conduct/) while participating in the group.

When and Where

8 October 2018
5:30pm – 7:30pm

Catalyst IT
Level 4, 2 Commerce Street,Auckland

How Much

Free.

More

Meetup event.

DevOps Auckland Meetup Group.

Backporting to the Future, Surfacing Composition, Lightning Talks – Auckland – 26 September 2018

What

This month we have two mini-talks previewing content to be presented at Pacific++ next month and a continuation of lightning talks left over from last month if time permits.

## “Backporting to the Future” – Andrew Paxie

Andrew will give a very draft version of the presentation he plans to give at Pacific++ next month. You will hear why he added C++11 support to Trompeloeil, a mocking framework that is top-to-bottom a C++14 library. After a brief introduction of its top-level features, Andrew will highlight the techniques he used to provide equivalent functionality in C++11. Compromises, limitations, and open issues will be discussed.

## “Surfacing Composition” – Toby Allsopp

Toby will also give an early version of part of his Pacific++ talk. He will talk about composition in software in general and C++ in particular

## “Lightning Talks”

If time permits:

* “Your C++ build system in 2020” – Nick Sarten
* “Naming Things” – Richard Maxwell
* “Finding stuff with the SQL…” – Paul Leslie

When and Where

26 September 2018
6pm – 8pm

WhereScape
12-16 Tapora Street, Quay Park, Auckland

## Rough Agenda

18:00 Arrive
18:15 Backporting to the Future
18:45 Lightning Talks
19:00 Pizza
19:15 Surfacing Composition
19:45 Lightning Talks

How Much

Free

More

Meetup event

Meetings are held approximately monthly and run under the Berlin Code of Conduct (http://berlincodeofconduct.org/).