Scays Goes Forth

After a few months of adding, editing and pulling pages into place, the scays web (www.scays.co.uk ) site is finally looking useful and coming close to how I originally thought it might be. I still have more to do, move pages about, add contents and several new subjects I want to include before I consider it finished if it ever will be. A lot, if not most of my slide set has no lecturers notes, after all, they were meant to be for me only, and I used them as an aid memoir so that’s now the next big push, to add lecture notes and expand these into a small book. Books whilst I am on the subject, is an interesting way of sharing information, but it has a fault in that the information is so often out of date, consider the digital revolution, the construction industry is going through, hardly a day goes by with some new material, or CAD program being updated. So my intention is to keep the information live, Not just by my intervention, but other clever web sites feeding clips and research papers into Scays.co.uk to add to the knowledge base. I am also conscious of the wait some of you, who use the BCU Moodle system, might have to wait for a page with a lot of slides loading but hang in there, it’s done so that I might allow lecturers to download a complete lecture or even show directly from Scays.co.uk. No need for powerpoint, just a web browser. But after a liittle tuition it seems I might add a book to house my slides, and make loading a lot quicker.

I trawl the web for construction news, I love Pinterest, I post there as often as I can, Google news is as important, this link is to a page I use for simple construction news. Twitter is another important site, hashtags, or just a simple search often brings up news or linked friends who post quite regularly. I had thought about adding a link, but I think search is so personal, and a skill you need in this digital world, so follow my lead and make your own.

I am conscious of how much space the subject of Data will take and how much space, I am going to have to make on my website, just to do and of the subjects justice, Its a wide area of research, from just choosing materials, embedding the data into the cad model, extracting and sharing, not to mention Facilities management, and beyond into the fascinating area of Smart cities. I have added a separate site for the latter and will continue to add content over this summer, and will probably do the same for a general look at the Subject of Data.

I first want to understand the route the UK fibre network takes, and the players involved, BT and Virgin seem the most obvious, but what about Google and Mircosoft, the rail network seems the most obvious landlord, they connect most big cities, runs in straight lines, and is fairly easy to maintain.and importantly connect to the global network of the undersea cables that makes up so much of the internet, plus it allows direct access to city centres. Next comes the UK data centres, are there any, or is it kept overseas. I suspect most of the main cities like London, Birmingham, Manchester and the Glasgow and Edinborough all have some form of large data centres. Then there are still the independents, the institutes who are big enough to warrant having their own data centres, people like the financial centres, and city councils.

On that last point, I thought I might see what my own city council, is doing, and downloaded the Birmingham Digital Plan ( https://www.birmingham.gov.uk/downloads/file/5029/birmingham_city_council_ict_and_digital_strategy_2016-2021), only to read one of the most incomprehensible documents designed to confuse I have ever read. Written by Andy Fullard. It offers brief glimmers of hope, written it seems to promote Birmingham City Council, its shows a possible route. I would like to have seen a bigger digital plan, offering areas on connection, space and potential storage. The 4G map, and potential 5G integration and less jargon,

Birmingham is ringed by motorways, enough to put anyone off, but trains and we have many, plus HS2 offering easy access from almost anywhere, why is not this area with its links to the University area not being shown as a digital hub. Oh and our airport, with its expansion.

Written in 2016, it’s out of date, and needs a complete overhaul, Compare it to the recently issued Google Architect company, Sidewalk labs documents for Toronto Quayside and you see my point.( https://www.sidewalktoronto.ca/ ) the download link for the two documents are right at the bottom of the page.

Well, that’s my own thoughts, others might well think it great, but to me it said nothing. Put yourself into the shoes of a big corporation, wanting to move to Birmingham, you need an impressive digital backbone, space, a great place to live and work, would you be at least interested after reading this document !!, or will the Toronto Quayside look better,

yet I look about Birmingham and see digital presence, am I missing something, perhaps I need to re-read the document, or rewrite it!. or move to Canada.

After a few months of adding, editing and pulling pages into place, the scays web site is finally looking useful and coming close to how I originally thought it might be. I still have more to do, move pages about, add contents and several new subjects I want to include before I consider it finished if it ever will be. A lot, if not most of my slide set has no lecturers notes, after all, they were meant to be for me only, and I used them as an aid memoir so that’s now the next big push, to add lecture notes and expand these into a small book. Books whilst I am on the subject, is an interesting way of sharing information, but it has a fault in that the information is so often out of date, consider the digital revolution, the construction industry is going through, hardly a day goes by with some new material, or CAD program being updated. So my intention is to keep the information live, Not just by my intervention, but other clever web sites feeding clips and research papers into Scays.co.uk to add to the knowledge base. I am also conscious of the wait some of you might have for a page with a lot of slides loading but hang in there, it’s done so that I might allow lecturers to download a complete lecture or even show directly from Scays.co.uk. No need for powerpoint, just a web browser.

I trawl the web for construction news, I love Pinterest, I post there as often as I can, Google news is as important, this link is to a page I use for simple construction news. Twitter is another important site, hashtags, or just a simple search often brings up news or linked friends who post quite regularly. I had thought about adding a link, but I think search is so personal, and a skill you need in this digital world, so follow my lead and make your own.

I am conscious of how much space the subject of Data will take and how much space, I am going to have to make on my website, just to do the subject justice, Its a wide area of research, from just choosing materials, embedding the data into the cad model, extracting and sharing, not to mention Facilities management, and beyond into the fascinating area of Smart cities. I have added a separate site for the latter and will continue to add content over this summer, and will probably do the same for a general look at the Subject of Data.

I first want to understand the route the UK fibre network takes, and the players involved, BT and Virgin seem the most obvious, but what about Google and Mircosoft, the rail network seems the most obvious landlord, they connect most big cities, runs in straight lines, and is fairly easy to maintain.and importantly connect to the global network of the undersea cables that makes up so much of the internet, plus it allows direct access to city centres. Next comes the UK data centres, are there any, or is it kept overseas. I suspect most of the main cities like London, Birmingham, Manchester and the Glasgow and Edinborough all have some form of large data centres. Then there are still the independents, the institutes who are big enough to warrant having their own data centres, people like the financial centres, and city councils.

On that last point, I thought I might see what my own city council, is doing, and downloaded the Birmingham Digital Plan ( https://www.birmingham.gov.uk/downloads/file/5029/birmingham_city_council_ict_and_digital_strategy_2016-2021), only to read one of the most incomprehensible documents designed to confuse I have ever read. Written by Andy Fullard. It offers brief glimmers of hope, written it seems to promote Birmingham City Council, its shows a possible route. I would like to have seen a bigger digital plan, offering areas on connection, space and potential storage. The 4G map, and potential 5G integration and less jargon,

Birmingham is ringed by motorways, enough to put anyone off, but trains and we have many, plus HS2 offering easy access from almost anywhere, why is not this area with its links to the University area not being shown as a digital hub. Oh and our airport, with its expansion.

Written in 2016, it’s out of date, and needs a complete overhaul, Compare it to the recently issued Google Architect company, Sidewalk labs documents for Toronto Quayside and you see my point.( https://www.sidewalktoronto.ca/ ) the download link for the two documents are right at the bottom of the page.

Well, that’s my own thoughts, others might well think it great, but to me it said nothing. Put yourself into the shoes of a big corporation, wanting to move to Birmingham, you need an impressive digital backbone, space, a great place to live and work, would you be at least interested after reading this document !!, or will the Toronto Quayside look better,

yet I look about Birmingham and see digital presence, am I missing something, perhaps I need to re-read the document, or rewrite it!. or move to Canada.