Wellington Python Meetup – Wellington – 13 December 2018

What

Two presentations 🙂

Avo Patlong:

As part of my internship at Eagle, I was presented an opportunity to work with the NZTA Crash dataset. My objective was to incorporate machine learning to analyse influential factors and geospatial patterns to predict the risk of a crash occurring at road sections throughout New Zealand. I used Python throughout the project to implement the machine learning scripts, gather data, and implement a feature service that continuously publishes the predictions onto a web map. The web map visualises the heatspots of crash risks, which updates every hour. I would like to talk about the challenges throughout the process and discuss my findings.

Vincent Bonnet:

This presentation is about a personal project started earlier this year where I explored numerical computation in Python. It is only scratching the surface of this wide topic but will include a brief introduction to physics simulation and show an early 2D implementation.

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Python talks! Python people! Discussions from how to start learning Python through to debugging your robot pirate spaceship avionics controller library. Or whatever. There is also pizza, and sometimes spare beer.

When and Where

Level 3 meeting space,
Catalyst House, 150 Willis Street, Wellington

How to find us

The door locks after 6pm, so send a text to the number on the door and someone will fetch you.

How Much

Free. Please register here.

More

13 December 2018 Wellington Python Meetup by NZ Python User Group – Wellington.

NZ Python User Group (NZPUG) https://python.nz and twitter @nzpug.

Wellington City Library December Book Sale and Times Newspaper Sale – Wellington – 5-16 December 2018

What

Grab your holiday reading in the December Book Sale!

Every year thousands of avid readers and movie & music lovers gather at Central Library for the book sales. Judging by its past popularity, this sale should be no different. Past buyers have used the sale to find the best book deals, to complete their personal collections or just to rummage and find a gem. And the sale helps our libraries by making room for an ever increasing collection.

Highlights of this sale: plenty of children’s picture books, young adult reads along with a wide variety of adult fiction, DVDs, CDs and magazines on every topic imaginable. As at each previous sale, stock is replenished at regular intervals ensuring there are always fresh bargains to be found. With prices starting at 50c for childrens and young adult books, you really don’t want to miss out!

Get The London Times that was printed on your birthday! (or your Mums!)

The Central Library is offering to library members its hard-copy vintage collection of The Times, dating from 1946 through to the start of 1976.  Each issue is for sale at $5 per copy but there is only one copy of each date. Please note that this collection excludes the Sunday Times which was, and remains, a separate newspaper editorially.

This is an ideal quirky gift for anyone born between 1946 and 1976; please pre-order your copy by visiting or phoning the 2nd floor reference desk at the Central Library on 04 801 4114.

You can still access and read this entire date-range of The Times for free via the Times Digital Archive on My Gateway.

Just in time for Christmas, come in, grab a copy and delve into the past.

When and Where

December Book Sale
Wednesday 5th December — Sunday 16th December 2018

Central Library

The Times newspaper sale
Please pre-order your copy by visiting or phoning the 2nd floor reference desk at the Central Library on 04 801 4114.

How Much

Depends on how much you buy. Bring a bag with you to carry your books home.

More

December Book Sale and The Times Sale.
Wellington City Library.

MONIAC Demonstration – Wellington – 3 December 2018

What

On the first Wednesday of each month, except January, an economist will demonstrate how the MONIAC, a pioneering econometric computer, works.

Invented in the late 1940s by talented New Zealand – born economist Bill Phillips (1914-1975),
the MONIAC was a way of demonstrating the macro economy to his students at the London School of Economics.

He built the prototype for around £400, including parts scavenged from a Lancaster bomber. The computer uses water quantities and flows to simulate the flow of money through the economy.

The acronym MONIAC – ‘Monetary National Income Analogue Computer’ – was apparently invented to echo the ENIAC digital computer then being developed in the United States.

By contrast with those machines the MONIAC operated wholly on analogue principles, using water to simulate flows of money. Around 14 were built.

The MONIAC was capable of making complex calculations that could not be performed by any other computer at the time. The linkages were based on Keynesian and classical economic principles, with various tanks representing households, businesses, governments, and exporting and importing sectors of the economy.

Water pumped around the system could be measured as income, spending and GDP. The system was programmable, and experiments with fiscal policy, monetary policy and exchange rates could be carried out.

When and Where

3 December 2018
12:15pm – 12:45pm

Reserve Bank Museum,
2 The Terrace, Wellington

How Much

Free.

More

MONIAC – ‘Monetary National Income Analogue Computer’. Wikipedia.
The Reserve Bank Museum.

Demonstrations are on the first Wednesday of each month, except January. The next demonstration will be on 13 February 2019.

NZ’s first GitLab MeetUp – Wellington – 29 November 2018

What

Plenty of GitLab swag on hand for NZ’s first GitLab MeetUp which is happening – in Wellington!

This is a user-based event, not a sales / product demonstration.

You’ll be interested in this MeetUp if you’d like to hear and share GitLab experiences, and we’ll have a local customer share their GitLab story.

A GitLab specialist will also be on hand for Q&A and to provide ideas on how/where your current work could be extended through GitLab.

When and Where

Thursday, November 29, 2018
5:30pm to 7pm

LeapDojo
Level 8,
93 The Terrace,
Wellington

How Much

Free

More

The first Gitlab NZ Meetup
Official Gitlab Meetups ANZ Meetup Group

 

Storytelling with Maps for beginners – Wellington – 3 December 2018

What

101 for Beginners: Who doesnt like a good story!

Ideal for those with no mapping experience, working in the public service.

Join us at LINZ to for a free, practical & hands on session – crafting stories using geospatial information.

Audience: People working in Policy, Media Services, Researchers, Advisors, Analysts and Technical Leads from throughout the Social Sector and Natural Resource Agencies.

In this session we’ll cover a range of themes including:

  • Tools and technologies available
  • Using stories to increase awareness of the benefits of geospatial information
  • Accessing and using Geospatial data sources like the LINZ data service
  • Engaging your audience
  • Sharing, embedding, social media, blogs and other sites.

You will need to bring a laptop, charger, mouse and your lunch. 9-12pm will be training, 1-2pm support for creating your own stories.

If you have a Google or Esri Account you will want to know your password. We will help get you setup prior to the workshop for those who dont have one.

No coding or mapping experience is required for this session. A summary webinar could be hosted at a later date if the demand is there.

You may wish to consider a project idea prior to this workshop, you will want to collect good quality photos, a little text, video clips (youtube) and maybe ideas for your story.

After this session: Participants have the knowledge and skills to develop and share their own stories using a variety of map based tools.

When and Where

3 December 2018
9:00 AM – 2:00 PM NZDT

Land Information NZ – Toitu Te Whenua
155 The Terrace,
Level 7 – Huia,
Te Aro, Wellington 6011.

How Much

Free. Please register.

More

Eventbrite event.
Advanced Storytelling with Maps: Intended for Geospatial Professionals on 10 December 2018.

Organised by Land Information New Zealand (LINZ).

KapCon 28, role playing convention – Wellington – 19-20 January 2019

What

What is KapCon?

KapCon is a not-for-profit role-playing game convention run annually in Wellington, New Zealand, every January. Over a hundred people get together for a weekend of role-playing, in a diverse range of styles and systems. Over the weekend, more than 30 individual games are run, with volunteer GMs (or storytellers, narrators or facilitators) running games between one and six times over the course of the convention.

There are seven rounds of gaming – each lasting 3 hours. Most games have pre-generated characters for the players to use, and some even have props, soundtracks, links to other games, or live action elements (where players act out the less dangerous parts of the story). Between rounds there’s time to chat, meet or catch up with people, and get some much needed snack food. There’s usually some snack food available on-site, and there’s always the dairy and fish-and-chip shop nearby.

If you have a favourite game that you want to play in, you can let us know in advance and we’ll try to find someone to run it – if you love Paranoia, Call of Cthulhu, D&D, PbtA, or any other system, send us an email and we’ll see what we can do. Also for the last few years some wonderful people have offered the Games On Demand stream, where players come in, vote for the games they want to play form a selection available, and one of the team runs the game for them. This is a great way to try out some of those games you may have heard of, but never been able to get your group to play.

After the third round on the Saturday, there’s a LARP. A LARP is a Live Action Role-Playing game – one where you wear a costume, and stay in character at all times. The style of LARPs we have at Kapcon tend not to use foam weapons or complicated mechanics – it’s all about being in character, finding out what’s going on, achieving your goals and having fun. In recent years the Saturday night LARP has grown from 50 to 85 players. There is a dedicated team of writers who volunteer each year to put together the LARP, and it is due to their tireless work that it’s so much fun!

When and Where

Saturday 19th and Sunday 20th of January 2019
Note: Monday 21st is a statutory holiday for Wellington workers and can be used for recovery

Wellington High School
249 Taranaki St
Mt Cook
Wellington

How Much

Full Player                      $30
First Time Attendee      $20
Facilitator (GM)            $20
Single Day Attendance  $20
Adventure Squad Only  $10
Live Game Only             $10

$5 discount for Full Player, First Time Attend, Facilitator or Single Day Attendance if paid prior to 14/01/2019

More

Information about Kapcon 28 and registration

 

Securing APIs for the Data Economy – Wellington – 27 November 2018

What

We look forward to seeing you at the next Wellington Identity Tech Talk, where we will discuss the impact and opportunities of Privacy & Consent that are affecting emerging ecosystems across various industries including Banks, Telco’s & Health.

With such ecosystems in mind it has never been more important to give consumers the ability to manage and control how their data is shared and used. Please join the discussion with like-minded peers and register here.

Topics will include:

• Introduction to Privacy and Consent in emerging ecosystems
• Securing APIs for the data economy
• Lessons learnt from API enabling the enterprise

High Level Agenda

5:30pm – Welcome, Pizza & Drinks
6:30pm – Introduction to Privacy and Consent in emerging ecosystems
7:00pm – Securing APIs for the data economy
7:30pm – Q&A, Connect & Meet
7:45pm – End

See you there!

When and Where

27 November 2018
5:30 PM to 7:45 PM

The Loft, 2nd Floor,
Mac’s Brewbar
4 Taranaki St, Wellington

How Much

Free. Please RSVP here.

More

Meetup event.
Wellington Identity Tech Talks.
These talks are organised and sponsored by ForgeRock, but we aim for the talks to be wide ranging and not product-specific.

Domain Name Abuse Forum – Wellington – 27 November 2018

What

Finding solutions for a safer .nz space.

The Domain Name Abuse Forum invites you to participate and contribute to discussions and working sessions that aim to identify the issues surrounding domain name abuse. Forum attendees will work together to understand the issues and discuss and identify how to best tackle these challenges, including:

  • whether or how the .nz domain name space should deal with content abuse, e.g. online shopping and scam websites

  • how to minimise data quality issues from the .nz domain name space, e.g. fake or invalid registration details

  • how we can minimise and mitigate technical attacks on the .nz domain name space and protect this vital infrastructure.

The forum will be a space for collaboration between agencies inviting lawyers and law enforcement, Internet safety and security experts, government departments, academics, civil society and more.

All of this to make .nz a safer and more trusted domain name space.

Pre-reading: The Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network is working at the global level on issues that cross over with this forum. You may find interesting and relevant information on their website at https://www.internetjurisdiction.net/. We have prepared some specific pre-reading docs that you may be interested in reading before the event:

Agenda available on  this event page or programme (pdf).

When and Where

Tuesday, November 27, 2018
09:00 to 17:00

James Cook Hotel Grand Chancellor,
147 The Terrace,
Wellington.

How Much

Free. Please register here.

Is your organisation represented yet? Take a look at the organisations that have already registered (pdf).

More

InternetNZ event page and programme (pdf).

Smart locks, DIY IoT, Relays, Zoneminder, Node-RED and more! – Wellington – 20 November 2018

What

This month we have three speakers covering a range of topics.

Mike Stewart is going to present on various smart home devices he’s been using, including installing smart locks from scratch, automatic plant watering pump, various relays (Sonoff & Shelly) and more.

Thomas Howard is going to present on Zoneminder & Motion and how to use this open source software to setup and configure your own home brew security cameras.

And finally we’ll have Andrew Lockhart covering building your own IoT appliances using MQTT and Node-RED.

Schedule
17:30 – 18:00: Casual chat
18:00 – 19:30: Presentations
19:30 – 20:00: Casual chat

Wellington Home Automation Hackers

A group of like minded people who are interested in home automation, whether it’s plugging in off-the-shelf IoT lightbulbs, or soldering your own PCB designs doing BLE – and everything in between!

When and Where

Tuesday, 20 November 2018
5:30pm – 7:30pm

Sailthru
Level 1
14 Blair St
Wellington

How Much

Free

More

WebPage to the meeting
Wellington Home Automation Hackers meetup group

Lightning talks at WordPress meetup – Wellington – 6 November 2018

What

Dear all, in November we have a few lightning talks. We need two more speakers with 5-10 min presentations. Please, let us know if you are keen to do that!

Talk 1 is about speed optimisation and image compression from our WordCamp speaker Peter Warwick-Mahoney.

Website speed is so important, but with the plethora of tools available, what should you use? Peter takes us through the gamut of configurations he regularly uses to half a WordPress site’s loading time.

Peter is SEO expert, web developer & designer, all-round nice guy, and ravenous information devourer. Peter’s focus over the past decade has been on SEO (although it’s been a feature he’s offered since the late 90s), while making sure he keeps his typing fingers in the site creation pie too.

Talk 2 is about what is wrong with lists of must-have plugins from Maria Skatova.

Maria works with lots of bloggers and small business projects, doing lots of ‘fixing a problem’ work for websites, built by their owners. Her experience shows that plugins cause trouble quite often, and ‘must-have’ lists of plugins are the worst. Maria will also share her own ‘must-have’ list 🙂

Maria is married to WordPress for more than 10 years, and they have a gazillion of little websites together. She also is a co-organiser of WordPress Wellington meetup.

Talk 3 opens our Page Builders series with Thrive builder review from Peter Williamson.

Peter will share how he uses Thrive and why he prefers it to other page builders.

Pete Williamson has worked with WordPress for over 4 years now, having previously been involved in theatre and Audio-Visual industry.

Yours truly,

WordPress Wellington meetup organisers

When and Where

6 November 2018
5:30 PM to 7:00 PM

Biz Dojo (new location)
3 Market Lane, Wellington

How Much

Free. Please RSVP here.

More

November WordPress meetup – lightning talks.
WordPress Wellington Meetup, Facebook WellingtonWordPress and Twitter @WPWgtn.