PyCon UK 2016 15 Oct 2016 12:57 AM (8 years ago)
Like the last few years (2013, 2014 and 2015) I’ve been to the PyCon UK 2016. This year, 2016, it was in Cardiff instead of Coventry. Next year, 2017, it will be in Cardiff again.
It was in the City Hall in Cardiff. An excellent location! much bigger (well, some room could have been bigger). The talks were a mixture and I tried to go to more workshops: even if I enjoy a talk quite often I learn more from a workshop. And I tried to be a good workshop student and I had all the required Python packages.
I’m writing it 3 weeks after the event but to mention two workshops:
- One was about Scikit. This is a way to make Python “”understand”” (double quotes are on purpose) English or languages. I really liked that I understood the limitations of the system: I want to use something similar and now I know what can be done and which “correctness” I can expect.
- Another workshop had lot of Pandas for data analysis. I do have a better idea of how Pandas can be used and it was in my list of things to study – thanks PyCon UK now I have a better idea about how to use it.
There were many interesting talks like (and not only these ones!):
- A data processing toolbox for agile scientific research: how a software engineer is trying to help researchers to have a better “pipeline”: with git repos, unit tests, acceptance tests, trying to validate the results… doing what science is doing but with their software
- How to Automate your Data Cleanup with Python: the speaker gave many links and resources for this task. By the way, no easy way for the PDFs (sometimes is nice to know that I haven’t missed anything)
- Test-Driven Data Analysis: instead of Test-Driven Development is Test-Driven Data Analysis: same principles, different constraints. Some of the explained tools could be useful for chronojump-importer that I’ve been working on.
- And many other good talks!
As usually, an important part is to meet people: some new people, people which I’m doing some project with, old friends… and many people from the London Python Code Dojo, etc.
See you there in 2017 again!
Web Atlas de Barcelona 7 Oct 2016 11:51 PM (8 years ago)
A la Universitat Catalana d’Estiu (veure l’entrada sobre la bona experiència allà) vàrem assistir a la presentació d’una Web.
Era la Web de l’Atles de Barcelona. Una Web MOLT interessant per qui, com jo, li agradi mapes i mapes històrics.
Tal com van explicar conté mapes de Barcelona del 1700 i més nous amb explicacions de com ha canviat, què ha canviat, història, etc.
En Ramon Soley i la Isabel Pitarch vàren presentar la Web. La Web és el resultat d’un llibre… que al ser de mapes és car i gros.
Els hi desitjo molta sort, em temo que és una d’aquestes Webs fetes amb molta il·lusió que poden tenir poques visites… però les visites agrairan l’existència de la Web. Feu-ne difusió si s’escau: Atles de Barcelona.
Universitat Catalana d’Estiu – voluntari a l’aula d’informàtica 30 Sep 2016 2:51 PM (8 years ago)
Aquest estiu, ara ja fa gairebé 6 setmanes, vàrem anar amb en Mecatxis a la Universitat Catalana d’Estiu (UCE a partir d’ara). Fa molts anys, uns 10, la UCE va convidar a Catux a muntar l’aula d’informàtica, WiFi i xarxes allà. Des de llavors, gairebé cada any en Mecatxis de Catux hi va i l’UCE és com una segona casa.
En Mecatxis i en Fran ens havien explicat què tal era i l’experiència d’estar a l’aula d’informàtica però, tot i que van fer molt bona feina explicant-ho, cal viure-ho per veure què tal és.
Estar a l’aula d’informàtica implica configurar els ordinadors (hi vàrem posar LUbuntus). La gent, d’edat avançada, ve i fa servir Internet. Alguns tenen preguntes, alguns necessiten ajuda per connectar a la xarxa WiFi, els periodistes necessiten ajuda per fer tasques i mentrestant cal aguantar com es pot la xarxa: teníem, igual que cada any, una connexió satèl·lit que alguns dies calia reiniciar. També teníem una ADSL, com a backup i per la gent (el satèl·lit és pels periodistes perquè puguin enviar vídeos i fotos més fàcilment… per coses com navegar l’ADSL amb un lag menor era normalment més ràpida).
La gent va venint i evidentment si en Mecatxis no hi era demanaven per ell (on és?!), se’ls ajudava, també als professors a imprimir material pels cursos, etc.
L’allotjament estava molt bé, el menjar també, les activitats al vespre (música) molt variat i molt bé. Els cursos hi havia de tot… molts sobre temes polítics (i també debats, etc.), llengua catalana, teatre, alguns més per la part de ciències (per exemple ciència del mar).
El més difícil d’explicar és l’ambient. Segurament a perquè estàvem a l’aula d’informàtica vàrem tenir contacte amb molta gent que després veiem als dinars o sopars fet que sempre és agradable.
Nosaltres volem repetir! L’any vinent serà difícil però potser d’aquí dos? Ens hi veiem!
Namibia: handy things 4 Jul 2016 11:27 PM (8 years ago)
I had many things with me in Namibia… I’ll only mention a few things that either surprised me how useful were or I think that some people might not have them.
OsmAnd
OsmAnd is an Android/iPhone app (I’ve only used the Android version). I’ve written about it here before, and is very useful when planning trips.
Basically one can download countries off-line (like Namibia) and it’s based on OpenStreetMap data. In Namibia the OpenStreetMap data was more than enough and in some areas it was amazing! (for example it had the small walking paths in Okonjiima, with the names and everything).
OsmAnd has some usability problems so if you want to use it learn it before the trip and add as favourites the places that you are going to sleep and other interesting points.
A real paper map is still useful for planning and navigation but I think that OsmAnd (or some other off-line app) really helps to calculate times and distances, I like seeing the Km. left and Estimated Time of Arrival and I find the fact that are the cities as well very useful. Also with paper maps one would need more maps and guides.
Other option could be MapsMe, I haven’t tried this one.
Binoculars
Probably this is obvious to many people but initially I didn’t consider bringing binoculars. A week before going to Namibia I tested some in Europe and thought that could be useful and actually they were absolutely essential! I had the typical 8×40 (Olympus 8×40).
Actually I considered using very old ones, from when I was a child… and compared with a “proper ones” my old ones were making the objects smaller! It’s also important that they are wide-range so you can see many things at once.
Animal field guides
I’m sure that for many people a field guide is an obvious thing to have. Initially I didn’t consider bringing thick books for mammals, birds and snakes/insects (yes, 3 books!). I thought that this was insane. But once there I borrowed the books often, I read the descriptions and I played my game of «guessing the bird here» (if the bird was keen enough to pose for me about 10 minutes while I was browsing the book).
Sitting there, seeing an animal and then being able to pint-point which type of zebra (or other) was very interesting. Then my favourite bit was reading their behaviour: what they do, when they do, are they nocturnal? Are they are in a pack? How do they hunt? What do they eat? Do they hibernate? Migrate?
Namibia: lodges, how many nights 28 Jun 2016 12:24 AM (8 years ago)
If you don’t want to read it all: our favourite lodge was Erongo Wilderness Lodge. Every minute there is special! (walking, the room or eating).
Erongo Wilderness lodge
As said before: it was our favourite one. The room was very good, the service, guided walks, food was very good, afternoon tea, etc. Only one thing: expect to see a lot of birds but not a lot of “big animals”. We saw some rock hyrax (very photogenic!), kudus, dick dicks but not many other mammals. Birds: many, and very pretty.
We stayed there 3 nights, and we could have stayed a few days longer: at least one more day in the lodge and then 2 or 3 extra days for one-day trips we could have taken.
They have a waterhole for birds. So it is important to take the binoculars with you when having breakfast or lunch… And the camera of course! One day it rained and then in the evening thousands of termites came to the restaurant lights! It was amazing! We could even see a lizard eating termites.
The walks were very interesting. Our main guide, Emanuel, knew the birds and their behaviour very well.
URL: http://www.erongowilderness-namibia.com/
Stiltz in Swakomund
I thought that in Swakomund we would be in a Bed & Breakfast style accomodation or some kind of hotel. We found the Stiltz in Booking.com and it was different to other accommodation. The view of the pelicans was very nice, the room was very good, etc.
URL: http://thestiltz.com/ (we booked this one on Booking.com)
Toko Lodge
We had our favourite night safaris there! Actually they were so interesting that we repeated (obviously the animals were different). Even if they didn’t explain many things the night safaris in Toko Lodge were our favourite ones: slow type, not feeling “in a hurry” like the Etosha ones. In Toko Lodge they didn’t need to cover big distances so they could take their time to see things, stop and watch instead of just spotting.
The swimming pool was clean, and the room was big. One of the mosquito nets wasn’t big enough for the bed though.
The food was good and we had to share a table with other people. I had the opportunity of giving Marmite to some non-British people who said that they love London (I mean, Marmite was a topic of conversation else I wouldn’t give Marmite to random people for the sake of it). Giving Marmite is awlays a hard-to-forget experience! (specially for the ones trying it for first time). By the way, they had a jar of Marmite, I didn’t bring mine.
They have a Himba village nearby, just a 10 minute walk. It was really good that one of the people working at the hotel lived there and he was our guide there. I didn’t feel like I trespassed into someone elses property and was spying but I felt that I was invited by someone to explain what was happening there.
Somehow this place missed some of the enchantment of the Erongo Wilderness Lodge but the night drives were good. I’d say that 2 nights is enough there: we stayed 3 nights but one day we went to Etosha and came back: we could have stayed in Etosha that day.
URL: http://www.tokolodgesafaris.com/
Etosha
Note that on the Internet there is lots of information about Etosha and you could read it for ages. But I found that the information is a bit pessimistic. I agree that Etosha lodges are not the best but I found them much better than I was expecting. And the eating experience was good (perhaps not amazing but they always had good salads). It probably was not as bad as described on the Internet because it was low season.
We visited Etosha Dolomite camp just for a lunch. It seemed really nice and cosy, but sadly we didn’t stay there (we planned initially to stay in Etosha Halali and Okaukuejo). Etosha Halali was very good, we stayed 2 nights and we could have stayed longer. The waterhole was accessible from the camp site which was very handy and nice, I could have been sitting there for ages looking at the animals (usually they come and go very slowly). It’s relaxing to see them!
In Etosha Okaukejo was good but note that we were there in low season. I can imagine that it’s very crowded in high season (the restaurant and all the places). At the waterhole… there is WiFi! Sit down there, relax, copy some photos, answer some emails all while looking at the animals. Excellent!
Okonjima
Last but not least the Okonjima Nature reserve. The leopards and cheetahs have collars so they can be found more easily. Note that the collars are not sending GPS signals as I initially thought would be, but they just transmit some beacons and then, if the guys are lucky can be heard using a walkie-talkie and a directional antenna. I thought that, even if the technology helps, it still has some level of explorer (if they sent the precise GPS coordinates would be perhaps too easy and would not be as interesting as it was)
Leopards and cheetahs cover very big areas so it’s very unusual to just bump into them, specially the leopards who like sitting under a tree or on a tree and not be seen much.
Lots of people go there to make sure to see at least some leopards and cheetahs in Namibia (there are wild dogs as well). Our guide was really good and explained many interesting things about the nature reserve, what they want to do, how they build it, etc. very recommendable!
They also have tracks for visitors to walk, up to 5 Km. if I remember correctly. They have an inner area so it’s possible to walk without being eaten by leopards and cheetahs. Then outside they have all the dangerous animals. Inside there are water-hogs and other interesting animals.