Meeting #9
Chris Dymond

Instigator

Posted on 19-12-2018

TTN Community meeting Monday 3rd December 2018

Venue: Ove Arup & Partners

Welcome and Introductions:

Chair Dr Geraint Jones (GJ) introduced himself as Operations Manager for the Pitch-In
project, led by the University of Sheffield.   GJ responded to the request for help from Chris
Dymond, and would be helping with the organisation of the Sheffield Things Network
ongoing.

Attendees:

  • Geraint Jones - Operations Manager for the Pitch-In project, University of Sheffield.  www.pitch-in.ac.uk - Promoting the Internet of Things via Collaborations between Higher Education Institutions and Industry to benefit the UK
  • Steve Jubb - Urban Flows Laboratory
  • Gareth Roberts - Regather - https://regather.net/ (300 customers interested in IoT with relation to regather, and other social enterprises. Referenced foodchain.ac.uk, involved with SCHARR at UoS; Fresh Start with Sheffield Council - vouchers for vegetables and fruit at Moor Market; Internet of Food Things
  • Matt Gillott - Works at Land Instruments - interested in Digital Strategy at a personal level.  Land Instruments’ premises would be a good location for a Gateway.
  • Rob Whiteside - works in Traffic Control at Rotherham Council / Sheffield Hackers & Makers
  • Simon Redding - TTN Chesterfield
  • Simon Nieder - TTN Chesterfield (Simon R and Simon N showcased some of the sensors they had procured/adapted)
  • Sarah Cullen - Sheffield City Council

Numbers:

  • 14 Gateways
  • 31 Contributors
  • 47 Members of the #InternetOfThings channel on Slack
  • 102 Followers on Twitter

(Yorkshire now has a significant concentration of gateways, marching up the east side of the Pennines, with Chesterfield, Sheffield, Barnsley, Wakefield, Huddersfield, Leeds, Calderdale and Harrogate).

Housekeeping:

  • Roy Woodhouse has stepped away as a Core Team member.
  • Dr Geraint Jones from the Pitch-In Project at TUoS has stepped in.
  • If anyone else wants to help organise, please volunteer & we'll make you a Core Team member. We should use the Slack (IoT channel and DMs) to coordinate.
  • We are going to decommission the mailing list, and direct interested people to sign onto the Things Network Community page and the Sheffield Digital Slack.

Things Network News:

  • Did anyone go to the Things Network On Tour event in Norwich? No one present attended.
  • LoRaWAN Conference 2019 in Amsterdam, Jan 31 - Feb 1st. (Remember Amsterdam is quicker and cheaper to get to from here than London is!)
  • Updates from Steve Jubb:
    • Urban Flows laboratories – are supporting the Sheffield Things Network – can help with equipment for and setup of network.
    • Have purchased 2 gateways – one to be installed at WanDisco, and at the Hicks building.
    • City centre node to be live 4th December.
    • How do we configure across the city?  Purchasing set of RF Survey equipment.
    • Don’t think enough about WiFi networks when doing urban planning.
    • From TTN POV can use TTN mapping nodes.  Can use any node with a phone.
    • SJ – would be useful to have a hack morning to get TTN mapping node going. Hackspace very limited in terms of space. Have common project – this would be a good one.  Mindsphere or I-forge – could be done at UoB
    • Important to get infrastructure fit for purpose.
    • Hamish - has money for NodeBox
    • Carrying out Air Quality measurements across the city -  40 sensors

New Gateways:

  • Whose are the new gateways? - Are there any new gateways are in progress? E.g. the one on the Hicks Building?
    • See note from Steve Jubb above.
    • Action:  Steve Jubb and Matt Gillott to liaise about locating a Gateway at Land Instruments.
  • Does anyone know how the Digital Catapult is converting its Things Connected network to The Things Network?
    • Some discussion but no direct information.

Coverage & Propagation:

  • Has anyone done any testing recently? Is TUoS' Mobius van doing any?
    • SJ - see plans in update above.
  • Can we start collecting data? Can we add data to the ODI Leeds map? (https://odileeds.org/projects/things/)
  • The meeting with Manchester to link over the Pennines didn't happen in the end, but we might want to look at this next year?
    • Action: GJ to ensure trans-Pennine link on agenda for January meeting

Applications:

  • Is anyone running anything on the network?
  • Can we run another series of Hacks next year, taking into account the lessons learned?
    • Action: SJ / GJ to set up morning hack on TTN Mapping Node at UoS - Mindsphere or iForge
    • Action: GJ to set up hack session at UoS on visualisation of Sheffield TTN data
  • Are there other initiatives the community could engage with?
    • There were initial informal discussions between members
  • Are there any projects that members are building or would like to build?
    • There were initial informal discussions between members

Community:

  • We should try to convene Community meetings on a monthly basis again from the New Year. Any volunteers to host in January?
    • Action: GJ to arrange next meeting for January 2019 at UoS
  • Are there any more partners / logos to add to the community page?
    • Sheffield Hackspace

AOB:

  • None
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