In Govilon, we’ve tried to make this process easier. We’ve launched a “Village Information Pack” (VIP) – a small A5 folder which is delivered when someone new moves into the village. The pack contains a list of community groups and services offered in nearby villages (post offices, libraries, leisure centres etc). It lists bus times, school term dates and opening times of the shop & pubs. We also allow local businesses to put in a leaflet about their services.

The initial version of the pack was delivered to every house in the village, and updated ones are delivered by volunteers whenever we hear about someone moving in. So far it has been well received.

Recently, the Government began the process of opening up its datasets in a similar way to Data.Gov in America. The Newspaper Club has taken some of this data and produced a prototype of an information pack for people moving into a new area. It gathers information about local services, environmental information and crime statistics from the Government’s datasets and presents them in a small newspaper. They’ve also gone a step further and included maps, travel times to certain locations, NHS information and council details.

This is a fantastic idea and makes really good use of data which was not previously available. It shows what can be done when you make public data available for free. Something like this would really complement the village information pack we’ve created for Govilon.

You can find out more information and some pictures of the prototype on the Newspaper Club website.

In typical fashion, I’m over a week behind in this obligatory post marking the start of the new year. In fairness, I had the notes written on New Year’s eve, but for one reason or another, didn’t actually write it up until today.

So, here we are, a brand new year. What have I got planned for the next 12 months?

My first big aim is to complete a number of personal projects that have been pretty much on hold for the last 6 months. The most important of which is a completely revamped Govilon village website. By the end of February I intend to launch a redesigned site, complete with updated content, improved functionality for the history site, and a new community blog. We’ve hopefully got a few influential people in the village lined up to contribute to a news-style blog about things happening in the village.

My second aim is to blog more regularly. I’ve set myself a target of at least one entry a week this year. These entries are not going to be your typical ‘this is what I’ve been up to’ posts, but more focused towards web design and development. Coincidentially, it turns out that a few of my friends (Tobeon, Shepherdnick, Jonhurlock, saya) and my brother have also settled on the same resolution.

Another resolution is to be more active in the web design / development community. Part of this will be achieved through more regular blogging and better use of twitter. However I also intend to start attending industry events such as the Future of Web Apps in Dublin & Future of Web Design in London conferences this year. I’ll also be going along to a number of events run by Cardiff Web Scene.

My other resolutions revolve around my work life balance. I’m hoping to begin working from home at least one day a week, which should give me some more free time. I’m also going to force myself to make better use of my gym membership over the next year.

So, there we go. New resolutions for a new year, lets hope I can stick to them!

Normal service should resume this week with the first of my blog-a-week articles.

Over the last few months we’ve been busy working on several new websites, a fair number of which have now been handed to the client for final approval.  We’ve also been working on some of our own projects, and another new release of our content management system.

At home, I’ve been busy working on some of my own projects, including an updated Govilon History website (which I’m sure I’ll get finished eventually), and a new personal homepage (which I launched last weekend).

As soon as some of my work starts making it into the public domain, I’ll post some more.